Chapter 3 The Empty Vessel

(Natasha)

Every step through the towering glass doors of Warren Global feels like a dull blade sawing straight through bone.

At least that’s how it made me feel that day.

The swelling in my knee stretches the fabric of my trousers so tight it almost pulses. Heat radiates from the joint in slow, sickening waves, the kind that makes you hyperaware of every movement.

Behind the massive crescent reception desk sits the girl whose résumé I personally pulled from a stack of hundreds.

She barely glances up when I approach.

She definitely doesn’t stand.

A small nod—dismissive and quick—is the only greeting offered to the woman who used to sign her paychecks.

Funny how quickly the corporate ecosystem adapts when it smells weakness.

Crossing this bright, sprawling lobby used to be a victory lap. Employees part like the Red Sea. Once, it was respect. Now it feels more like contamination.

The polished marble floor feels like an executioner’s block. And apparently I volunteered to walk across it.

The executive elevator doors slide open. The moment I step inside, the air pressure seems to drop.

It’s ridiculous, really. Just a metal box moving up a building. But suddenly the space feels suffocating.

The executives standing inside were once my colleagues. We used to sit shoulder to shoulder in strategy meetings that decided the fate of entire markets.

Now they shift awkwardly in the cramped space. No one meets my eyes. Their gazes drift downward instead, landing inevitably on the curve of my stomach.

The smiles offered are paper-thin, edged with something that looks suspiciously like pity.

The message couldn’t be clearer: The Natasha they respected is gone.

In her place stands a cautionary tale. A walking reminder of what happens when ambition collides with biology.

My transformation is complete. Bloated. Exhausted. Carrying the next Warren heir.

Identity overwritten. Just like that.

I limp down the plush corridor toward Chase’s office, the door to his suite is slightly open.

I pause in the doorway.  The scene inside tells me everything I need to know.

Chase is sitting casually on the edge of his massive mahogany desk. Sonia stands between his knees, tucked perfectly into the space there like she belongs. 

They lean toward each other. Too close for anything remotely professional. The air between them almost hums with quiet intimacy.

When she speaks, her voice is soft—barely more than a breath. Chase tilts his head down to listen, focused and attentive. His hand rests casually near her hip.

They look… comfortable together. Like a couple who have spent years learning each other’s rhythms. The kind of quiet, effortless intimacy our marriage never managed to produce.

Then Chase looks up.

The moment his gaze lands on me, the warmth drains from his face as if someone flipped a switch. The temperature in the room drops ten degrees.

He pushes away from Sonia immediately and strides across the room. The manila folders disappear from my hands before I can even react.

He flips through them quickly, his expression tightening when his eyes flick over my pale face and the way I’m leaning slightly to keep weight off my injured knee.

“Wait here,” he says. No concern. Just irritation. His voice clipped, authoritative, “we need to talk.”

Then he steps out into the hallway. The heavy office door shuts behind him with a quiet click.

And just like that, he leaves me alone in his sanctuary with the one person I’d least like to share oxygen with.

The pain in my knee spreads slowly upward. It’s no longer just a throb—it’s a deep, malicious ache crawling up my thigh.

Standing suddenly feels impossible. My back finds the cool glass wall behind me. I brace myself against it.

Sonia watches the entire thing. Her gaze drags over me slowly, deliberately.

My swollen ankles. The severe, practical cut of my clothes. The curve of my stomach.

She looks like a scientist examining something mildly disgusting under a microscope.

Then she does something I honestly wasn’t expecting.

She starts chatting like we’re acquaintances.

“I’ve always been terrified of getting pregnant,” she says lightly. Her voice is airy, almost playful. “I worry it would completely ruin my figure.”

Her eyes flick down to my body again. “Did pregnancy do that to you?”

The insult is surgical. Precise. A strike aimed straight at the most vulnerable corner of a woman’s psyche.

And yet, something strange happens.

The tension drains from my shoulders. Because suddenly the situation becomes crystal clear.

This girl isn’t worried about motherhood. She’s worried about losing her waistline.

A cold calm settles over my mind like fresh snowfall.

Sonia looks at me and sees nothing threatening. She doesn’t see the strategist who negotiated billion-dollar deals. She doesn’t see the woman who once terrified entire boardrooms. She sees a defeated relic. A piece of Chase’s past.

And honestly? I’m perfectly happy letting her believe that.

I meet her gaze calmly. “I had a severe illness a few years ago,” I told her. “Heavy hormone medication changed my body.”

A beat. 

“Not pregnancy.”

Her glossy lips curl into a sweet, syrupy smile. “Well, that’s good to know.”

She studies her nails for a moment.

“My doctor called earlier. Her voice lifts with theatrical innocence. 

“I’m pregnant too.”

The silence that follows is thick enough to choke on.

The announcement doesn’t hit me like she expects. Mostly because I already suspected.

My lack of reaction clearly irritates her.

“Chase doesn’t know yet,” she continues casually. “I wanted to wait.”

She finally looks up. “I’ll tell him after the divorce is finalized. That way everyone will know I didn’t need to trap him with a pregnancy.”

There it is. The knife twist. Her eyes glitter with triumph.

She reaches for her designer handbag and stands. “I have a spa appointment,” she says breezily. Smoothing imaginary wrinkles from her dress. “We have a date tonight. I need to look perfect.”

Then she walks out. The office door closes behind her with a quiet click.

The silence she leaves behind is cavernous.

Moving toward the desk feels like wading through concrete. My knee protests violently with every step. But the clarity in my mind overrides the pain.

Sonia thought she had just delivered a fatal blow. In reality, she handed me a key. The final turn in the lock of my cell door.

I open my tote bag. The divorce agreement slides out easily.

A thick stack of paper demanding my complete surrender of any claim to the Warren empire.

In exchange for freedom.

I pull Chase’s heavy silver pen from its leather holder. The ink glides smoothly across the dotted lines.

The woman who cried for this man is gone. The one who fractured herself trying to build a family out of dust is gone too.

The shark Mason called for is awake. And starving.

I slide the signed documents into the top drawer of Chase’s desk, right where he keeps his most sensitive files. The metal glides shut with a clean, decisive click.

Let him find it. Let him choke on it.

I straighten slowly.

For the first time all day, the pain in my knee barely registers.