Chapter One

The heavy, suffocating silence of the villa was broken by a sound I had never heard in six years of marriage.

I paused in the hallway, the gift box in my hands suddenly feeling like lead. 

The sound came from behind the mahogany door of Kevin’s study: low, rhythmic, ragged panting. My stomach plummeted as a sickening wave of heat flooded my veins and the truth forced its way into my mind.

He was masturbating. 

Stroking himself in pure bliss. 

A quiet, bitter ache radiated through my chest, burning far worse than the smoke that had scorched my lungs years ago. 

Today was our sixth wedding anniversary. For six agonizing years, we had shared a house, a surname, and a bed, yet he had never touched me. Not once.

I had swallowed every drop of quiet rejection, suffocating my own yearning and desperately convincing myself that he was simply a man of extraordinary restraint, a cold corporate titan whose passions were locked behind steel doors.

Sinking into the shadows, I crept closer, my heart hammering against my ribs as I peered through the narrow crack of the door.

Kevin sat in his leather armchair with his back to me, his broad shoulders tensing as his breathing reached its ragged peak. But it wasn't his posture that shattered the remaining pieces of my heart. It was the blinding glow of his monitor screen.

Illuminated in the dark room was a high-resolution photograph of a woman. She had laughing, brilliant eyes, soft features, and flawless, glowing skin.

Iris.

His first love.

A quiet, hopeless smile dragged at the corners of my lips, tasting like copper in my mouth.

So that was it.

It wasn't that he lacked desire or was cursed with coldness. He simply couldn't bring himself to waste it on me.

Instinctively, I turned away and stumbled toward the hallway mirror. Framed by the dim light, the woman looking back at me was a stranger I had spent six years trying to forgive.

Crimson, jagged scar tissue stretched from my left cheek down toward my jaw, twisting the smooth flesh into a hideous map of ruin.

It didn't compare to Iris. It never could.

Before the fire, I had a face that belonged under stage lights. I had been a rising star in musical theater, vibrant, passionate, and full of promise. 

Now, I was just a ghost hiding behind a heavy curtain of black hair, terrified of my own reflection and ashamed to exist in the daylight.

The heavy study door clicked open.

I stiffened, my throat tightening as I instinctively pulled my hair forward to shield my ruined profile.

Kevin stepped into the corridor, looking immaculate as ever: crisp white shirt, tailored trousers, every dark strand of hair in place. 

The suave, composed heir to a billion-dollar empire. Kevin Vance.

"Kevin," I whispered, the word scraping against my sore throat. "I... I was just passing by."

His dark eyes softened immediately. 

There was no panic in his gaze, no shameful secret to hide, only that familiar, gentle warmth he always wrapped around me like a velvet shroud.

"Elodie," he murmured, bridging the distance between us with easy, fluid grace. His eyes dipped toward the side of my head. "Is your scar acting up again? Is it hurting?"

"No," I choked out, keeping my chin tucked low against my chest.

"Alright, that's good."

He offered a gentle smile, a breathy, handsome sound that would have made any other woman melt. He reached out, his long, warm fingers delicately lifting a strand of hair from my cheek. 

His thumb brushed just millimeters away from the damaged skin, close enough to perform the role of a devoted husband, far enough to avoid touching the scar itself.

"Happy anniversary, sweetheart. I had a gift delivered for you. Did you open it?"

My eyes shifted to the signature pastel box resting on the console table. A fresh wave of despair washed over me. 

I didn't need to open it to know what was inside. 

It was a pale, sleeveless chiffon dress from a luxury French boutique, elegant, delicate, and completely open at the shoulders and neck, a style I couldn't wear without exposing every inch of my ruined flesh to the world.

Every holiday, every birthday, every anniversary, he bought me the exact same brand and the exact same cuts.

Iris's style.

He didn't see me when he picked them out. 

He was dressing a memory.

"I haven't opened it yet," I lied softly, forced gratitude tasting like ash. "Thank you. I love it."

"You always look beautiful in it," he said smoothly, leaning down to press a soft, dry kiss to my forehead.

It was absolute perfection. His tone, his manners, his gentle care. He played the ideal husband flawlessly.

But as his lips left my skin, I felt only the freezing draft of a man executing a chore.

That night, we lay in the king-sized bed, separated by a vast, unbridgeable ocean of silk sheets. He slept peacefully on his side, his back turned to me, his breathing deep and even.

I stared up at the dark ceiling, tears hot and silent in the corners of my eyes as my mind dragged me back seven years.

Back then, Kevin had been an untouchable sun, and I had been just an ensemble singer who admired him from afar. 

He had been madly in love with Iris, his high school sweetheart. When she packed her bags to pursue her degree abroad, shattering his world, Kevin became miserable.

The proud heir spent his days drowning in whiskey, a tragic shell of himself.

I had never dreamed our paths would cross until the night of the alumni graduation gala.

I remembered the smell of burning smoke before the alarms even sounded. I remembered seeing him in the VIP lounge, slumped over a velvet couch with a glass of amber liquid dangling from his fingers, too intoxicated to comprehend the flames devouring the curtains behind him.

While the panicked crowd stampeded for the exits, my heart screamed at me.

I turned around and ran directly into the inferno.

I dragged his heavy, unconscious frame out into the cool night air, but a falling lighting rig caught my face, burning through flesh and nerve.

The next day, I was supposed to star as the lead in the nation's biggest musical revival. Instead, while I lay in a hospital bed wrapped in agonizing bandages, my understudy took the stage.

She became an overnight sensation, a star born in my place.

My career, my passion, my identity, all burned to ashes in a single night.

When Kevin sobered up and realized the terrible price I had paid for his life, he quit drinking overnight. Driven by suffocating guilt and a strict sense of moral obligation, he asked me to marry him.

For six years, he gave me everything money could buy. A mansion, black cards, endless luxury goods, and an unwavering, gentle patience.

But he never gave me his heart.

He never took me to company galas. He never introduced me to his elite circle of friends. I was his dirty little secret, a hidden obligation kept safe in a gilded cage.

My phone vibrated softly on the nightstand.

I turned away from Kevin's sleeping silhouette and picked it up. The glow illuminated an email from the prestigious Royal Opera House in Italy. 

They were offering me a full-time position as a vocal coach and resident arranger for their upcoming international season.

I stared at the acceptance button, my pulse thumping in my ears.

Six years of begging for scraps of affection. Six years of hiding my face in shame and letting my soul wither away while he pined for another woman.

With trembling fingers that quickly grew steady, I tapped the screen and drafted my acceptance reply. I set my departure date for exactly thirty days from now.

Thirty days.

I would give myself one month to settle my affairs, hand him the divorce papers, and walk away forever.

The next morning, I walked down the grand staircase just in time to overhear Kevin speaking to the housekeeper by the foyer.

"I won't be home for dinner tonight," he was saying in that calm, measured tone. "A sudden board meeting ran late into the evening schedule. Tell Elodie not to wait up for me."

"Yes, Mr. Curt," the housekeeper replied softly.

I stood frozen on the landing, my chest tight.

He didn't even have the courage to tell me to my face.

As soon as the front door clicked shut and his car pulled down the driveway, my phone alarm went off, a bright, cheerful chime echoing through the vast, empty house.

10:00 AM: Daily Vocal Warm-ups.

I stared down at the screen. I had set that alarm three years ago, desperately forcing myself to practice scale after scale just to fill the agonizing, hollow hours spent waiting for him to come home to me.

A sharp, resolute breath escaped my lips.

I was done waiting.

I swiped the notification away and deleted the recurring alarm entirely.

A new pop-up notification flashed on my screen: a friend request on my personal social media account from an anonymous, empty profile.

Curiosity piqued, I accepted it and tapped onto the feed. There was only one upload, a short video clip posted in the early hours of the morning.

I pressed play.

The background was loud, pulsing with jazz music and filled with familiar faces from the city's high society. It was an exclusive welcome-back party.

Right in the center of the frame stood Iris, laughing radiantly in a stunning red dress.

And right beside her, his arm loosely brushed against hers, was Kevin.

He was smiling, a brilliant, genuine, uninhibited smile I had never once seen in six years of marriage.

And held tightly in his hand, caught clearly under the shimmering chandelier lights, was a crystal tumbler half-full of amber whiskey.