Chapter 1

My wife Moore's brother racked up fifty million in online gambling debts, but he left my contact information.

By the time the debt ballooned to a hundred million with interest, vicious debt collectors finally showed up at my door.

After I convinced them to leave, my wife and mother-in-law finally crept out of the bedroom, trembling.

My wife's face had gone pale.

"Let's get divorced. I'd rather leave with nothing. Your debts are your own—don't even think about dragging me down."

I tried to explain that her brother owed the money, but she refused to believe me.

My mother-in-law Ruth slapped me across the face.

"How dare you slander my son just to trick my daughter into paying your debts! Let's divorce now!"

"Might as well tell you the truth—Moore is pregnant. With your best friend's child."

Actually, I could pay off this debt. But since you want a divorce, you can deal with this massive debt yourselves.

My voice came out hoarse as I asked Moore:

"You... you're pregnant with Howard's child? When did this happen?"

Moore turned away, her voice dripping with contempt. "Alex, so what if I am? What business is it of yours?"

"Don't even think about trying to keep me! I don't want a useless husband who only knows how to rack up debts and won't own up to them."

I stood frozen, unable to speak.

Seeing me stunned, Ruth kicked me. "Did you hear that? Tomorrow, City Hall. Divorce!"

She turned with a sneaky smile to Moore. "Good thing you took birth control every time you were intimate with this loser."

"Otherwise he'd use a baby to blackmail you into paying his debts! We were planning to have him raise the child, but now that's clearly unnecessary."

I couldn't believe my ears. "So every time... you took pills beforehand?"

Three years of marriage, and Moore's stomach had never shown any signs.

Ruth had repeatedly called me a useless waste who couldn't produce children in front of relatives and friends, even forcing me to go to the hospital for tests.

The results showed nothing wrong with me, and the matter eventually faded away.

Turns out she'd been taking birth control all along. She'd even planned to make me raise another man's child.

Moore snorted coldly. "Did you forget how your family treated me? I never liked that whole wedding money situation!"

Ruth spat. "That pathetic wedding money back then—I didn't even want Moore to marry you."

My mind flashed back to the wedding three years ago.

We'd agreed on a hundred thousand in wedding money.

But on the wedding day, they demanded an additional hundred thousand.

I thought it was excessive, but Moore cried in the wedding car, saying her mother only had one daughter and it hadn't been easy.

I gritted my teeth and paid.

Then when we arrived at the house, Ruth said the door-opening gift couldn't be less—another hundred thousand.

I didn't want to pay anymore. This was obviously just a money grab.

In the end, my dad made the call, saying weddings were happy occasions and we shouldn't let this ruin things. He paid the money.

Thankfully, my dad saw through their true nature and hid the fact that we were worth hundreds of millions.

Dad even arranged the wedding at our old house from before we made it big. They finally stopped after getting three hundred thousand total.

Ruth didn't give Moore a single cent in dowry, saying our family "wasn't worthy of matching contributions."

I only found out later that Ruth had given all that three hundred thousand to her son Bob to squander.