Chapter 1

For seven years, I've been his wife hidden in the shadows. Our son is publicly denied as his "nephew."

To please his first love, he filled the house with deadly lily flowers.

My six-year-old son was locked in that pollen-filled room and suffocated to death.

When I rushed him to the hospital barely alive, my husband was accompanying that woman for an IV drip.

In that moment, I personally sentenced this marriage to death.

I disappeared with my child, and he knelt begging me to come back, trying to atone with everything he had.

But he didn't know.

The day he knelt down, I had already decided to make him spend the rest of his life paying for my son's final breath.

Jade's POV

"Mr. Carter, and this is...?"

"She's my assistant. That kid is my relative, staying at my place temporarily."

When Damien Carter introduced me to the client, his tone was casual.

I lowered my head, organizing documents without a word.

In reality, we'd been married for seven years.

That child was his biological son.

Damien and I had a child after an accident. We'd kept the marriage a secret ever since. To the outside world, our son was just my relative.

After the client left, the smile vanished from Damien's face instantly.

He slammed a contract onto the desk.

"Jade Wilson, why is the amount in this contract missing a zero? Are you trying to cost the company tens of millions?"

I picked up the contract and glanced at it.

"This was the first draft prepared by Clara. I hadn't gotten to review it yet before you rushed to show it to the client."

Damien frowned and looked over at Clara Hayes.

Clara's eyes were already red, standing there helplessly.

"I'm so sorry, Mr. Carter... I'm so useless. I saw Jade was too busy and wanted to help share some of the workload. I didn't expect to make such a mistake..."

Her voice carried a sob, and her body trembled slightly.

Damien's stern expression immediately softened.

He sighed, his tone helpless yet indulgent.

"Alright, if you're not sure about something, leave it alone. Next time, let Jade handle this kind of work. You just focus on making my coffee."

Clara smiled, responding sweetly.

"Thank you, Mr. Carter. You're so good to me."

I stood to the side and noticed the tie clip on Damien's tie.

It was shaped like a cartoon bear, crudely made, with paint even chipping off at the edges.

This was something Clara had bought from a street vendor last week and given him-supposedly only five dollars.

Meanwhile, the cufflinks I'd given him last month, worth six figures, were currently gathering dust in a pen holder in the corner of his desk.

That was the difference.

Anything from Clara was treasure, even if it was trash.

Anything from me was trash, even if it was treasure.

My phone vibrated in my pocket.

I glanced at it-the nanny from home was calling.

I walked to a corner to answer. The nanny's anxious voice came through.

"Mrs. Carter, Mason has a fever and keeps gasping for air. His chest is heaving badly. The doctor said before that he's at risk for asthma-what should we do?"

My heart seized.

Mason was premature and frail. High fever triggering asthma could be life-threatening.

After hanging up, I took a deep breath and turned toward Damien.

"Mr. Carter, I need to take leave."

Damien was teaching Clara how to identify coffee beans, his head still lowered.

"The company's busy. Request denied."

"Mason has a high fever of 103 degrees and may be showing signs of asthma. I have to take him to the hospital immediately."

I tried to keep my voice calm.

Hearing Mason's name, Damien finally looked up.

But there was no concern in his eyes. Only impatience.

"Sick again? Last week it was coughing, this week it's a fever. Jade, are you using that kid as an excuse to skip work?"

I clenched my fists.

"This time it's serious. The nanny says he can't breathe properly..."

"Ah!"

A scream cut off my words.

Damien whipped around to see Clara covering the back of her hand, the freshly brewed coffee spilled all over the desk.

"What happened?"

Damien rushed over and grabbed her hand.

Clara's eyes filled with tears.

"The water was too hot, I couldn't hold it... Mr. Carter, am I useless?"

A small red spot appeared on the back of her hand-not even a blister.

Yet Damien looked as panicked as if the sky were falling. He immediately shouted outside.

"Get the burn ointment! Hurry!"

After shouting, he seemed to think it wasn't enough and grabbed his car keys directly.

"No, we need to go to the hospital. Can't let it scar."

With that, he pulled Clara toward the exit, completely forgetting I was still standing there waiting for him to approve my leave.

I blocked his path.

"Damien, Mason is at home waiting to be saved! Are you going to abandon your own son over this tiny injury of hers?"

Damien stopped and looked at me coldly.

"Jade, Clara got injured making coffee for me. That's a work-related injury. As for your nephew..."

He paused, his tone mocking.

"If he has a fever, call a doctor. I'm not fever medication. Go home yourself and stop making a scene here."

He shoved me aside and strode away with Clara protectively.

"Damien, you care about me the most..."

Clara's coquettish voice drifted from the hallway.

I stumbled back two steps from the push, my lower back hitting the desk corner painfully.

But I couldn't feel the pain.

Because my phone rang again. The nanny sent a video.

In the video, my six-year-old son's face was flushed red with fever, his mouth open as he struggled to breathe, his hand clutching a drawing tightly.

The drawing showed a faceless man holding his hand.

The nanny sent a text message.

"Mason keeps calling for daddy, asking when daddy will come home."

Watching the video, tears finally streamed down my face.

I wiped my tears and replied to the nanny.

"Call an ambulance. Tell Mason that daddy is dead. From now on, only mommy will be with him."

I threw the unfinished documents on the desk into the trash and turned to leave the company.

Watching Damien's Maybach speed away into the distance, the last trace of hesitation in my heart disappeared.