Chapter 3

Chloe left in tears.

Logan didn't bother walking her out.

He stood frozen in the living room, glaring at the card suspension notice on his phone, his face twisted in sheer hostility.

"Jane, who did you call?"

"By what authority did you freeze my card?"

I didn't answer.

At that exact moment, my chronic migraine flared up violently.

My vision blurred into darkness. I gripped the corner of the dining table to keep myself from collapsing.

Seeing how pale I was, Logan took half a step forward.

He still remembered that my prescription painkillers were kept in the second drawer of the media console.

Then his phone rang.

It was Chloe.

Logan answered immediately, and Chloe’s tear-choked voice leaked through the speaker.

"Logan, I feel so dizzy."

"My blood sugar crashed, and I'm all alone in my apartment."

Logan glanced at me, then looked back down at the glowing screen.

Without another thought, he snatched his car keys off the counter.

"I'm taking her to the ER."

Leaning heavily against the table, I asked under my breath, "Logan, I can barely stand from this headache, and you're leaving to take her to the hospital?"

He scowled, looking at me as if I were being entirely unreasonable.

"She lives alone! What if something happens to her?"

"You get migraines all the time. Your pills are in the drawer. Take them yourself."

The front door slammed shut behind him.

Silence fell over the living room.

I pushed myself off the table, walked to the media console, took two pills, and swallowed them with warm water.

Logan had left his personal phone behind on the coffee table.

When the screen lit up with a notification, I saw a text from his mother on Snapchat.

"Logan, how far out are you?"

"The beef roast is almost done."

"Chloe mentioned she loves spicy food, so I prepared that special pepper dip for her."

"Make sure she feels right at home when you bring her. No need for her to feel shy."

Staring at those lines, my fingers tightened around the phone.

So this affair wasn't Logan’s private secret at all.

His parents had known about Chloe for a long time.

They had already reserved my place at the family table for her.

An hour later, Logan walked back in.

He brought the sharp stench of hospital antiseptic with him, and the collar of his shirt reeked of Chloe’s sweet, heavy perfume.

He flipped the lights on. Seeing me sitting quietly on the couch, his brows knitted together.

"Why are you sitting in the dark?"

"Did the headache pass?"

I slid his phone across the coffee table toward him.

The screen displayed the messages from his mother.

Logan’s expression locked up.

"You went through my phone?"

I looked at him. "Your mother wanted you to bring Chloe out to the family house?"

"Mom was just talking nonsense."

"She's getting older, she doesn't understand modern social boundaries."

"Don't take it personally."

I held his gaze.

"She even knows Chloe's exact taste in food."

"And you're still going to stand there and call it casual nonsense?"

Logan stayed silent.

His phone buzzed with an incoming FaceTime request from his mother.

He hesitated for a second before answering.

His mother’s stern face filled the screen.

"Logan, why aren't you here yet?"

"Is that woman holding you back again?"

Logan blurted out, "Mom, stop it."

His mother didn't hold back.

"Am I wrong?"

"A barren woman who hasn't given you a single child in five years of marriage—what good is keeping her around?"

"Chloe is young, ambitious, and actually knows how to take care of a man."

"Hurry up and bring her over. Your father and I adore her."

Logan hurriedly terminated the call.

The living room fell into a heavy, suffocating silence.

I asked, "In your mother's eyes, I'm just a barren woman?"

"Jane, you've always known she has a sharp tongue."

"She said that to your face, and you still wouldn't say a single word to defend me?"

Logan rubbed his temples in frustration.

"Do we really have to pick a fight over this right now?"

"Let's just go visit them first. When we get back, I swear I'll cut all ties with Chloe."

He stepped toward me, reaching out to take my hand.

"We've been married for five years. Don't you trust me at all?"

I looked down at his outstretched hand and didn't move.

Five years ago, this very hand slipped a diamond ring onto my finger.

He had knelt before me, swearing that no matter what happened, he would always stand by my side.

Throughout our five years of marriage, he called me "Jane" with endless warmth.

When I had high fevers, he stayed by my bed, replacing damp cloths on my forehead.

When my migraines flared up, he would draw the blackout curtains and prepare my medication.

I truly believed that was love.

It turned out to be nothing more than a disguise he hadn't yet found the opportunity to strip away.

I stood up and walked toward the study.

Logan let out a heavy sigh of relief, assuming I had finally conceded to accompany him on the trip.

He immediately looked down at his phone to text Chloe:

"She caved."

Inside the study, I opened the wall safe and pulled out a thick leather portfolio.

It contained three key documents.

The first was a draft of a divorce petition drawn up by Ethan Vance.

The second was a formal asset preservation injunction and a legal demand notice.

The third was the preliminary forensic audit report that Marcus had just forwarded to me.

The report detailed that over the past two years, Logan had charged massive personal expenses to the corporate account.

Chloe’s designer bags, luxury hotel suites, the down payment on her sports car, and the rent for her luxury downtown apartment were all listed.

More critically, three major external vendors showed suspicious fund transfers funneling directly into shell companies controlled by Chloe’s cousin.

I carried the portfolio back into the living room.

At the exact same moment, Logan’s phone buzzed violently again.

System alerts from the bank and corporate servers poured in simultaneously.

His executive card, the company car authorization, and all administrative sign-off privileges were completely revoked.

He stared at his screen, the color draining from his face second by second.

"What the hell is going on?"

I dropped the portfolio on the table in front of him.

"You're about to find out."

The loose papers spilled across the floor, the divorce petition resting right on top.

Logan scooped it up, scanned the header, and snapped his head toward me.

"You're divorcing me?"