From Betrayal to Baby

I stared at the divorce papers Cassian had slammed onto the mahogany desk between us, the crisp white sheets seeming to glow against the dark wood. The study had once been our shared sanctuary, filled with quiet evenings and whispered dreams. Now it felt like a courtroom, with my husband as both judge and executioner.

"Sign them," Cassian said, his voice as cold as I'd ever heard it. His blue eyes, once warm with love, now regarded me with detached impatience. "Our marriage was a mistake, Sage. I think we both know that."

My fingers trembled as I picked up the fountain pen—a fifth anniversary gift I'd given him just two years ago. "Is this because of the Lane sisters?" I asked, though I already knew the answer.

He didn't even have the decency to look ashamed. "Rosalie and Aurelia understand me in ways you never could." He ran his hand through his perfectly styled dark hair, a gesture that once made my heart flutter. "I never truly loved you the way I love them."

Each word was a precise cut, designed to slice through whatever remaining hope I might have harbored. Seven years of marriage, reduced to an inconvenience he needed to clear away.

"Both of them?" I whispered, the pen hovering above the signature line. "You're leaving me for both sisters?"

Cassian's lips curled into a smile that never reached his eyes. "They complement each other. Rosalie has the passion, Aurelia the intellect. Together, they're everything I've been missing."

I felt something inside me crack—not my heart, which had been breaking slowly for years with each of his affairs and dismissals—but my patience, my willingness to endure. As I signed my name on each flagged page, I made a silent vow: I would never forgive Cassian Crawford again.

"There," I said, sliding the papers back across the desk. "You're free."

He gathered them without checking my signatures—such was his hurry to be rid of me. "The lawyers will handle everything else. You can stay here until the paperwork is finalized."

His generosity was as hollow as his vows had been. I nodded, not trusting myself to speak as he strode from the room without a backward glance.

* * *

Two weeks later, I was gasping for breath on a busy Seattle street corner, my lungs constricting as if being crushed in a vise. My asthma attacks had been rare in recent years, but stress had always been a trigger. And what greater stress than watching your life disintegrate?

Panicked pedestrians swarmed around me as I fumbled for my inhaler, finding my purse empty. With trembling fingers, I called Cassian—technically still my husband for another week.

"What is it, Sage?" His irritation crackled through the phone.

"Can't... breathe," I wheezed. "Asthma attack... forgot inhaler... near Pike Place..."

To my surprise, his tone changed instantly. "Stay there. I'm ten minutes away."

I slumped against a storefront, each breath a desperate struggle. Black spots danced at the edges of my