Drowned by My Husband, Reborn as an Heiress

After I got pregnant, I stumbled across a post online.

"What's the wildest thing you've done after breaking up with your ex?"

I spotted a familiar profile picture and tapped into the comments without thinking.

"Hehe, I've got a good one for this."

"My ex is my brother-in-law now. The night before his wedding to my sister, he came to me for one last goodbye round. We went so hard he missed the ceremony."

The memory dragged me back three years, kicking and screaming.

On our wedding day, Reginald Gilbert had told me, apologetic and rushed, that a client needed him on a flight to Paris that very morning.

He'd spent six months grinding on that deal. Revised the proposal a thousand times over.

I couldn't bear to watch all that work go up in smoke, so I held it together and played the part of a bride at a wedding for one.

That little episode was still a punchline at certain dinner tables to this day.

But now I knew the truth. That day, he'd been with that illegitimate brat, giving her a farewell roll in the sheets.

I laughed until tears ran down my face, then turned around and went straight back to the hospital for an abortion.

My love would not be stained. I refused to allow it.

——

Ten minutes ago, I'd been overjoyed about this little life inside me.

He would have had a father and mother who loved him more than anything. He would have had a happy, complete family.

But now, after reading that top-voted comment a hundred times over, my heart felt like it was being shredded alive by a serrated knife.

Tears streaked down my cheeks. The nurse stared at me in disbelief.

"Mrs. Gilbert, are you sure you want to terminate this pregnancy?"

"You spent two full years at our clinic trying to conceive. The medications, the injections, more than anyone could count. This baby was a miracle."

I ran my hand over my still-flat belly, and despite everything, part of me scrambled to make excuses for Reginald.

So many people used the same profile picture. So many people had similar stories. Could I have been wrong? Could it have been someone else?

Instead of torturing myself with suspicion, why not just call Reginald and ask him directly?

The next second, a familiar ringtone went off behind me.

I turned, stiff as a board, and saw Reginald Gilbert carefully guiding Pat Winfield by the arm.

Pat's belly was swollen high and round. Five months along, at least.

My mind went blank. I watched Reginald glance at his screen and decline my call.

Then my phone chimed with a message.

His tone was warm, tender.

"Hey babe, miss me?"

"I'm wrapping up the last bit of work and then I'll be home. I'm dying to know what surprise you have for me."

Acid churned up from my stomach. Through a blur of tears, I followed Reginald down the corridor.

He pulled out Pat's previous prenatal records like he'd done it a dozen times, then gently helped her lie down on the exam table.

I could not reconcile the man in front of me, so tender and attentive to this illegitimate woman, with the Reginald in my memory, the one who'd stood shoulder to shoulder with me and curled his lip in disgust at the mere mention of her name.

He knew what Pat Winfield had done. He knew she'd shoved my mother down a staircase when my mother was seven months pregnant.

She'd deliberately refused to call an ambulance, watching with cold eyes as my mother lay in a pool of blood until she stopped moving.

And she got exactly what she wanted. Her mistress mother was finally promoted to wife, stepping right into the place my mother had left behind.

They threw me out of the house. They forbade my father from spending a single dollar on my mother's burial.

It was Reginald who emptied two years of his tuition savings so my mother could finally rest in peace.

Every moment of his past kindness was seared into my memory.

But now I truly couldn't tell whether any of it had been real, or if Reginald had been acting the whole time.

I couldn't look anymore. I drifted back to the operating room like a ghost.

The young nurse had seen it too. She'd seen Reginald walk in with another woman for a prenatal checkup.

She looked at me with pity.

I forced the corners of my mouth up into something resembling a smile, and signed the consent form.

"I don't want to wait. I'll pay extra. I want this baby gone today."

And Reginald? I didn't want him anymore either.