All Chapters of Mr. Sterling, Your Wife Wants the Baby, Not You: Chapter 1 - Chapter 10

During the seven years of her marriage, Claire Bennett secretly had a child.Her daughter was five now.And her husband still had no idea.Claire had never given Adrian Sterling the chance to be a father.During a break on her night shift, Claire listened to the soft, sweet little voice message from the daughter she was quietly raising in a neighboring state."Mommy, why haven’t I ever met Daddy? Is he dead?"Claire actually gave that some serious thought.No.But close enough.Lately, little Ellie Hart had started having thoughts of her own. New questions had begun filling that small, clever head of hers.For one thing, she had never met her biological father.And day by day, her curiosity kept growing.So much so that Claire had started seriously wondering whether she should tell Adrian the truth, that they had a five year old daughter, and that he could skip the hardest years of parenting and become a father without lifting a finger.After exiting Ellie’s chat window, Claire checked

At the beginning of their marriage, nothing between them had ever come easily.Adrian was almost never home. Even sleeping together twice a month felt like more than Claire had any right to expect. Ordinary conversation was rarer still.By the end of their first year, he had already been marked for the oversea branch, where he was meant to build the foundation for one day taking over the family empire.The night before he left, he came home drunk from a business dinner and, for the first time, forgot to use protection.He was rough that night. Unrelenting.It was also the first time Claire understood that when he was too drunk to care who was in his bed, Adrian could be nothing like the controlled, distant man she knew.Two months after he left, she found out she was pregnant.She knew her body well enough to recognize the signs. The realization left her reeling.Back then, she had still been foolish enough to hope. If he truly hated the idea of children, maybe this one unexpected life

Another of Adrian’s friends, Ryan Locke, gave a short laugh from the side. “What happened to you? You look like hell.”After Damien sat down, his gaze drifted across the table to Sienna.She looked as composed as ever. Elegant. Controlled. The sort of woman who always seemed to know exactly how much expression to show and how much to hold back.And apparently, Claire had been slandering her downstairs.“Guess who I ran into just now,” Damien said. “Claire.”At the mention of her name, Adrian’s finely cut features did not shift in the slightest. One hand rested on the table, his fingers tapping the surface with idle precision.Clearly, anything involving his wife was beneath his interest.Sienna poured Damien a cup of tea herself. “Did the two of you have words?” she asked softly. “She’s just a woman. There’s no need to lower yourself by arguing with her.”The fact that Sienna was still defending Claire only seemed to disgust Damien more.He leaned back in his chair and let out a humorl

That soft, perfectly timed laugh drove into Claire like a nail.Sienna had seen it.She had watched Brenda slap Claire across the face, watched her stand there humiliated, and laughed.And worse than that, she had seen Adrian do nothing.Claire did not want Adrian anymore. Not really. Not in any way that mattered.But to be reduced to this in front of the woman who had helped wreck her marriage still felt—humiliating beyond words.Adrian shot Brenda a cold look, then told Sienna he would call her back and ended the video.His unreadable gaze skimmed past the flushed mark on Claire’s cheek without pausing, then settled on Brenda instead. His voice was cool, thin as glass.“Aunt Brenda, what exactly is this?”He did not ask Claire whether she was hurt.Claire was not naïve enough to expect concern from him.After seven years, she was used to being overlooked. She had made peace with that a long time ago.The moment Brenda met Adrian’s eyes, she visibly faltered.Claire was still his wif

Claire recognized Adrian’s hand almost immediately.Beside it was a woman’s hand, slim and elegant, close enough to graze his. The kind of closeness that needed no explanation.It looked as though they had spent the entire night together.Without thinking, Claire lifted a hand to her cheek.When Brenda had slapped her the day before, Adrian had not made nearly this much fuss.But let Sienna feel a little under the weather, and suddenly he was throwing money around in the middle of the night.Time, apparently, had nothing to do with the depth of feeling.Claire herself was proof enough of that.Avery rolled her eyes so hard she nearly lost them. “So Adrian does know how to care about someone. He and that woman are basically...”Claire glanced at the photo once, then lowered her eyes and took another spoonful of porridge.Then she finished the sentence for her.“Adulterers.”She said it almost calmly, like someone commenting on a scandal that had nothing to do with her.The word was so b