Novalie POV

“Do you know where your husband is? Of course, you wouldn't. He is laying in bed, eating me out.” Amelia, my stepsister said over the phone with a little giggle before ending the call.

I was shaking so hard on the sick bay with my teeth knocked together, even though the blanket my best friend, Kira, tucked around me was thick and warm.

My fingers curled weakly against the bedsheet, my knuckles turning white with my nails digging in as if holding myself to something would stop the cramping tearing through my body.

I had just lost the tiny soul in me. My five month old baby was gone.

Staring up at the fluorescent lights above the hospital room, I couldn't help but wish the world to pause with me. To sympathize with me and at least, favour me with a child!

But did something ever come my way?.

Kira sat at my side, her eyes redshot from crying and her hand never leaving mine. “Just breathe, Nova. I'm right here. Don't even dare to think about Amelia. She has lost her mind.”

Kira Tucker, the famous model in New York, has been my best friend since the night I collapsed at a gala party, while my husband, Noah Ashford, was having a heart to heart conversation with another woman over the phone.

Amelia, my stepsister.

And since then, we became best of friends. A friend I never thought I would have.

And even though she didn't put me in this position, she still came through for me and discarded her modelling work today.

I closed my eyes, trying to hide the pain of what Amelia had said and a long ping sounded from my phone.

I raised my hand to get through to my phone but she quickly hijacked it, scrolling through the message and I felt her grip tighten.

Definitely meant she saw something about Amelia and my husband, Noah.

“Just show me,” I whispered, stretching forth my hand even though I knew I would be a wreck of emotions very soon, but she shook her head.

“It's disgusting, okay. It's not worth it.” She tried to convince me and I shook my head.

“No, Kira. Just let me have it.”

She hesitated first, before turning the screen toward me.

And there was my husband and my stepsister.

The man I had married with love. The man I called almost fifty times because I was dying and bleeding, but didn't pick. Noah's arm was wrapped around Amelia's waist in the street of ‘Paris’ the same one I planned for us to go to on our anniversary and he had declined with the ‘I don't fancy Paris. They don't regard people.’ but he was there now. With my own stepsister, his ex lover.

And he was smiling. Smiling at her in a way that spoke volumes of love and affection. Something he had never genuinely done for me.

I stared at the picture while another wave of pain ripped through me and this one was somehow deeper than the last.

Paris.

He was in Paris and I was here…losing our baby.

Gnashing in pain

My free hand drifted to my stomach out of instinct, but the nurse words course through. “We are sorry. We couldn't save the baby.”

They couldn't save the baby I had done everything to save. They couldn't save the baby I had planned my life out with.

And Noah? The man I had loved when he needed it the most. The one who swore to never make my cry or feel unloved, didn't answer any of my messages.

But he texted Amelia back within two minutes. I knew because the screenshot she sent included a tiny preview of the next picture: Amelia's pouty selfie, Noah commenting with a heart.

He flew to Paris just when he heard of her return.

What was I even expecting?

Ever since Amelia showed her face again in the tabloids, things changed. Even my step mother, who had specifically told me to take in Noah, help him recover from Amelia's pain in his heart, was now threatening me to give everything up for Amelia because she was his to begin with.

My body felt suddenly too heavy and Kira stood abruptly, fury flashing over her face as if noticing my mood. “I swear, I'm going to fly to Paris myself and break his…”

I forced out a small smile. “Don't, Kira.” The words came out as a whisper. “You have done enough already.”

Of course, she has done enough. She had abandoned her show just to be here with me. What more can I ask for?

“I can't believe Amelia's mother stood there, watching her daughter find her way into Noah's hands when she was obviously the one who ditched him.” Kira spat out angrily.

The doctor returned with a clipboard tucked under his arm. “Mrs. Winter's, we’ll run more tests, but you should rest. Stress and overexertion could be factors, though miscarriages can happen for many reasons.”

When he left, I tried to breathe with the pain spreading through my chest, but it felt like the worst idea.

“You need to sleep,” Kira urged as she brushed gentle fingers over my hair. “I’ll be right here. You’re not alone.”

Noah had already been slipping away for months. No… years.

Two years when Amelia suddenly showed up.

And he didn’t slip away randomly. There was always one gravitational pull strong enough to drag him from anyone and anything:

Amelia Winters.

My step sister and his so-called first love who ditched him!

The golden child of Hollywood, America’s sweetheart, and Noah’s not-so-secret obsession.

The moment she stepped foot in the media, everything reset. He turned his world upside down. He started to keep a drawer full of her magazine covers, as if they were private treasures. And then he looked out for the letters she wrote him from childhood summers they spent together. Old scrolls she gave him to read. Every fucking thing he had kept away when he wanted to propose to me.

I remember the sick feeling I had the first time I saw the drawer.

He never hid it and it was almost worse that he didn't.

Anytime I complain about this, he would discard my words and say he was only trying to get things.

And I…the naive one, hopeful, maybe stupid, believed him when he said it didn’t mean anything. She was his past. I was his future.

But Noah had a way of choosing her every time it mattered.

When she cried about a failed audition, he would leave the house at midnight just to drive to her apartment.

When she wanted company, he canceled our plans without guilt even on our fucking anniversary!

When my endometriosis acted up and I begged him to stay, he kissed my forehead, said “You’re strong, baby,” and left anyway because Amelia “really needed a friend tonight.”

I used to imagine that his obsession would fade, that one day he’d realize I was enough.

But tonight proved something more painful:

I had never been his first choice. I had just been the one who loved him more than she did.

“Let me get you water.” Kira said, planting a kiss on my forehead before turning the television on and walking off.

At first, I didn't pay attention. My gaze drifted to the ceiling, tracing nonexistent patterns, trying to feel something other than the empty soul in my chest.

But then I heard her name.

“…child star Amelia Winters has officially returned to the country after spending the last eight months filming her latest project in France…”

My head jerked toward the screen.

The news anchor smiled too brightly as footage played, Amelia stepping out of a black car at the airport, sunglasses perched on her perfect nose, platinum blonde hair catching the flash of cameras. She waved, all effortless charm, all effortless beauty.

“…sources say Amelia plans to take a break from acting to reconnect with loved ones and focus on emotional healing after a challenging year and she would be announcing her new found lover.”

Emotional healing? Announcing her new found lover?

I let out a bitter laugh as my gaze dropped to the envelope on the tray beside my bed.

It was the pregnancy report.

Spontaneous miscarriage. Nonviable pregnancy.

Novalie POV

Kira had dropped me off at home yesterday night because I was adamant. I hated everything about hospitals.

The hospital scent. The antiseptic. The noises of pain. I hated everything.

And now, I was in the dining room, with damp hair, forcing myself to eat breakfast and hoping, stupidly, that Noah and I could talk when he got home.

The front door opened and I turned my eyes on the door. Noah stepped in without looking at me, the way someone enters a room with a void. His expression was stone cold.

As though he wasn't smiling with Amelia yesterday.

Oh God.

He didn't even drop his keys into the bowl or shrug off his jacket like he usually did. He just walked straight to the dining table and placed a folder on it.

“Sign these.” He said flatly.

No greetings.

No apologies whatsoever.

My stomach tightened painfully, staring into the envelope in front of me. “What….what is that?” I stuttered.

He raised his brow at me and my hand was already trembling.

“Divorce papers, Novalie,” he said expressionless.

The word DIVORCE echoed louder than the emptiness in my heart.

“I think we both know this marriage shouldn't have happened.”

The room tilted slightly.

“Can we talk first?” My voice came out small. Very Fragile. “Please?”

He exhaled sharply, as if I were exhausted.

“Amelia needs me,” he simply said, as if that was an explanation enough.

“She's going through a lot. She wants stability, and I want to give it to her.”

My legs buckled weakly, causing a little push.

Does Amelia need him? Amelia needs him more than I do. He had never, for once, used that word with me.

Even when I went to his office, urgently in need of him, he'd held me back. Asking his secretary to tell me to wait because he was in an urgent meeting.

“And what about…” my voice broke before I could finish. “Noah, I just lost our baby. Don't you think..”

His reaction was instant. As though he had been waiting for those words to slip out of my lips.

He spun toward me like I had struck him, his face twisting into a disgusting look. “I am tired, Novalie!” He shouted, the sound slamming into me so hard I flinched.

“Tired of you acting like the world ended every time something happens! Something like this!”

I stared at him, taken aback. “Something..? Noah, I lost…”

He cut me off with a harsh scoff as he hit his hand furiously.

“Exactly! Exactly, Novalie. Here we come again with that stupid emotional blackmail of yours. You've had three miscarriages, Novalie. Three fucking! How many more times do you expect me to go through this?.” His eyes flashed with irritation.

Through this? Like he was the one carrying them or whose body broke every time.

But then he said something I wasn't expecting.

“I'm tired of pretending”

The word lingered more than it should before he added.

“I can't do this anymore. I won't. Amelia would never put me through this emotional circus. It's very clear you are not even fit to be a mother.”

The words coursed through me like an arrow, piercing my damn heart.

Three miscarriages.

Not fit to be a mother.

Amelia would never put me through this emotional circus.

Every word was ringing in my damn brain.

He said it was like my grief was an inconvenience. Like I wanted to lose my own baby.

I can't even recognize the man I said yes to.

His voice grew colder. “I'm done okay? This was a mistake from the start. I shouldn't have married you. I was confused, and you were…there.”

I felt my soul break inside of me and I blinked.

“I loved you,” I whispered.

I knew the divorce was coming. However, I never thought of it like this.

He didn’t even blink. “And I tried. Maybe I was confused, but I can’t force myself to feel for you what I feel for Amelia.”

Of course! All he had been saying was ‘Amelia this Amelia that.”

He always chose her!

My lips trembled, but I forced my voice to be steady. “If I sign this… you won't ever regret it?”

His eyes flickered. Just briefly.

Something unreadable passed across his face.

Then it vanished.

“No.” His answer came sharper than I expected. “This is what I want. Who do you even think you are to ask me if I won't regret.”

And just like that, any protest died in my throat.

I exhaled, ruffling my hair.

“Fine.”

I took the pen with trembling hands and signed the agreement. He simply picked up the papers, slid them back in the folder, and headed for the door.

Before he left, he halted to a stop and a small silence call came through.

I saw the caller before he could even cover it.

Amelia Darling.

He answered it as he stepped outside.

And that was the final thing I heard from my husband of five years:

“Hey. It’s done.”

The silence that came after this heavy storm was more deafening.

My body felt too empty for tears. I sat on the sofa, staring at nothing, until the house blurred. The world kept happening even as mine had stopped.

Then I turned my head and saw it. The picture.

The one Amelia sent me on the night I miscarried, their photo on a Paris street. Her lipstick smudged from kissing. His hand on her waist. Their smiles are too intimate to be anything but true.

The tears came slowly at first, then all at once as I realised what had just happened.

Amelia took back the love of my life.

I pressed the phone to my chest, curling around it like a wound, sobbing until breathing felt like punishment. My body shook as if grief was trying to tear itself out of me.

I stood up and began packing the essentials in two bags, nothing more. Clothes. My documents. The small locket my mother gave me. The last pregnancy test I couldn't bring myself to throw away.

And the report from the hospital.

I didn’t look around the house. I didn’t take one last memory. What was there to hold onto? Every room was filled with ghosts of the things I lost.

I walked out and locked the door behind me, even though it wasn’t my home anymore.

When I got into the car, my hands were still shaking, but I started the engine anyway. I pulled out of the driveway and onto the street without thinking, without a destination, without anything but the need to get away from the place where my heart died.

Traffic was heavier than usual and I could hear horns blaring. People shouted from open windows. My vision blurred as my tears returned, more stubborn than I’d hoped. I blinked them away, but they kept spilling.

My chest tightened again, trembling fingers, the steering wheel slipping slightly under my clammy hands.

“Stop crying,” I whispered to myself. “Stop. Please.”

But do tears ever listen?

Another horn blared and a flash of white lights.

A screech.

Something slammed into the side of my car. My body jolted violently, seatbelt locking hard against my ribs. My head hit something and pain exploded.

Then I heard it, a voice calling my name.

“Novalie! NOVALIE!”

My breath seized. It had to be Noah.

He finally came by..

Noah’s POV

Paris was never about Amelia. That was what I told myself. Because the truth was that I just wanted to stay away from Novalie, I needed space to rethink the big step I was about to take.

I stood on the balcony of the hotel suite, staring down at the lights of the city I once claimed I hated.

“I don’t like Paris,” I had told Novalie once.

Now I was here, with the woman I supposedly never stopped loving. My first love.

Behind me, Amelia laughed at something on her phone.

She always laughed like nothing in the world matters and nothing could scare her, like she was untouchable and very bold.

I used to love that about her.

But now! I don't know what this feeling is anymore… Her laughter creates this kind of uneasiness and it doesn't bring me peace anymore.

Instead my mind drifted to how charming Novalie's smiles were. My phone vibrated in my palm.

Novalie.

Fifty two missed calls,One message, “I’m at the hospital.”

I read it three times.

My chest tightened.

She is at the hospital.

Again.

My fingers lingered over the call button.

Then Amelia stepped beside me, her hand sliding around my arm. “Don’t tell me you’re going back,” she said softly. “You promised you wouldn’t run back to her every time she cries.”

Cries.

That word triggered something dark inside me.

The first time she had a miscarriage, I stayed in the hospital for days with her.

The second miscarriage, I canceled meetings just to be with her to care for her because I know how broken she was when we lost our first child, so I was there by her side caring for her… when I got the message that changed our lives.

“Isn't this your wife? I saw her at the Whitrad hotel a few hours ago. "A photo was attached to the message from the unknown number showing Novalie in the arms of another man.

The photo looked so real.

Making me question everything we have ever shared, doubting if the child we just lost, that I'm mourning, was even mine to begin with.

Did she intentionally abort the child to cover up her infidelity?

I had so many questions but I just couldn't bring myself to accept that my lovely wife would cheat on me.

Until Amelia messaged me for the first time in a long time, asking to see me and everything that happened afterwards made me start rethinking my decision of marrying Novalie.

The third one…

I didn’t know if I had it in me to pretend to be the supportive husband she solely desired and stand by her despite the hurt.

“She keeps losing the babies,” Amelia continued softly.

“Do you really think that’s normal, Noah?” I didn’t answer. I couldn't.

Because I had started asking myself that question months ago.

I even hired a private doctor to go through her medical report and records to see if there is any issue with Novalie that's making her have miscarriages but the doctor said the same thing as others.

“Nothing out of normal and stress can cause hormonal instability.” But he didn’t sound fully convinced.

And the doubt I saw in his eyes, triggered my actions.

And doubt, once planted, grows.

I hated myself for thinking that maybe she was cheating or didn't love me enough to have my kids.

But I couldn’t stop.

I went back inside.

Amelia looked up at me, her eyes soft.

“She drains you,” Amelia whispered. “You’ve changed since marrying her.”

I clenched my jaw.

Had I?

I remembered the day I proposed to Novalie. I never thought I would have anything to do with Amelia ever again.

Amelia had left me for Hollywood.

Novalie was stability,safety, I thought safety could become love, that Novalie would love me wholeheartedly despite knowing I was once in love with her step sister.

I was wrong.

Because love without passion becomes resentment, and passion without trust becomes obsession.

My phone rang again,Novalie calling.

I silenced it.

Because if I heard her voice while trying to make this decision of mine

I would either forgive her completely or say something I could never take back…

So I chose distance disguised as control.

Then Amelia’s phone buzzed. She smiled sheepishly then turned the screen toward me.

A picture of the both of us, I didn't even know when it was taken. Sent from Amelia’s number to Novalie.

My stomach dropped. “You sent that?” I asked sharply.

“She needs to know where her husband is,” Amelia said calmly.

Anger burned through my chest. But it wasn't directly at Amelia. I couldn't directly express the anger in me towards anyone else but Novalie.

Because in my mind, twisted and defensive as it was…If Novalie hadn’t cheated on me, If she hadn’t kept losing pregnancies… If she had even told me about the guy she met before experiencing the second miscarriage

I wouldn’t be here doubting everything.

That was how I survived the guilt of what I wanted to do, by turning it into blame.

When I returned back to the city, I didn’t go to the hospital, instead I went straight to my lawyer.

“Prepare divorce papers,” I told him with every atom of courage I had left in me.

I didn't choose the divorce route because I didn’t care. But because I was afraid of loving someone I didn’t trust.

If the miscarriages were caused by her actions, If I was being lied to, I needed to protect myself before I destroyed both of us.

Back at the house, when Novalie mentioned the baby, something ugly surfaced inside me.

Fear.

Guilt.

And rage at my own helplessness, So I attacked first.

Because distance felt safer than honesty. I couldn't bring myself to ask her for the truth because hearing it from her would shatter me more than anything.

Cruelty is protection when you are terrified of losing control, That was my weakness, And my greatest sin.

But when Novalie signed the divorce papers without putting up any form of fight, Something inside me cracked.

Because I had expected her to beg, to cry or even fight a little for me! For us.

But she didn’t.

She just accepted it.

And that hurt more than anything she had ever done.