Ivy’s POV

I had imagined freedom would feel lighter. Instead it felt unbearably lonely. The apartment was barely half the size of Raphael’s walk-in closet… one bedroom, one bathroom, a tiny kitchen, a worn-out sofa by the window. It was all I could afford after six months’ rent up front. The landlord had smiled kindly when I signed the lease.

“You’ll like it here, I assure you,” he’d said.

I’d smiled back, but the truth was nothing would ever feel like home again. Silence pressed in as I set my suitcase beside the couch… no servants, no laughter from Margaret, no Emily calling me down for breakfast, no small footsteps crawling across polished floors, no Raphael. Just silence.

The one thing that comforted me was this: my mother was alive, and my sister Lily was still at one of the best universities abroad, thanks to everything that came with being Mrs. Langford.

My phone buzzed as I switched it on for the first time since leaving the mansion. Over two hundred missed calls filled the screen… most from unknown numbers, several from Emily, Margaret, Daniel, my mother, Lily. One from Raphael.

My thumb hovered over his name until my chest tightened, and then I switched the phone off again. Some goodbyes hurt less when they stayed unfinished.

A soft knock sounded at the door.

Maybe it’s the landlord, I thought… he’d mentioned bringing an extra key. I wiped my face before opening it.

A woman stood there in an elegant cream dress, diamond earrings, flawless makeup, smiling with a confidence that made my stomach drop before I even placed her face.

Sophia. How had she found me this fast?

“So this is where you’ve decided to start over?” She looked me up and down, her smile widening.

“What do you want?” I asked, sharper than I meant to.

She stepped inside without waiting to be asked, heels clicking softly against the tile as she took in the apartment. She stopped at the window.

“I expected somewhere nicer.”

I didn’t answer. She turned toward me, her expression softening into something almost sympathetic.

“You’ve done the right thing, Ivy.”

“What do you mean?”

She tilted her head. “Don’t worry… Richard told me everything.” My blood went cold. “About your marriage. The contract. The baby.”

Every word landed harder than the last.

“I know this can’t have been easy,” Sophia said gently, “but it was always going to end this way. Raphael doesn’t even like you.” She studied my face for a moment. “What man signs a contract with a woman he actually likes?”

The question hit like a slap… and worse, it felt true. No man treats a woman he loves the way Raphael had treated me from the very first day, back when Grandma first asked him to marry me: the silence, the barely concealed irritation.

My nails dug into my palms. I couldn’t find a single argument against her. He’d been good to me while I was pregnant… the last six months at the mansion had been the best of my life, the first time I’d ever felt truly seen. But maybe that had only ever been for the baby’s sake. Maybe it had always been going to end.

“How did you even find me?”

“I saw you leaving the mansion with your things. I followed.”

“Why are you here?”

“To thank you.” My head snapped up.

She pulled a small velvet box from her handbag and opened it… a diamond engagement ring caught the light.

“I wanted you to hear it from me before the papers announce it.” My heart stopped. “Raphael is finally free.” She snapped the box shut. “Our engagement will be announced soon.”

She looked straight at me. “When it happens, I hope you won’t make things difficult.”

The room went silent. I couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think. She stepped closer, until only inches separated us, and dropped her voice to a whisper.

“You were never meant to stay. You were only ever meant to give the Langfords an heir. I’ll take it from here.” She smiled once more and turned for the door… then paused.

“Oh, before I forget.” She pulled a signed check from her bag and tossed it toward me. “You should move somewhere farther than this. If I found you this easily, anyone can. And I’d hate for you to show up someday causing trouble for my son.”

She smiled and let the door click shut behind her.

I stood frozen. The apartment suddenly felt too small, too quiet, too empty.

Her son? Had she really just called my son hers?

A tear slid down my cheek, then another, until I was sobbing hard enough to sink to the floor. My wedding ring had left a pale mark on my finger. I rubbed at it absently, as if the skin still remembered the weight of it.

Maybe Richard was right. Maybe Sophia was right.

Maybe I had simply mistaken Raphael’s kindness for love.

I closed my eyes, hoping that when I opened them, some of this would hurt less.

Two years earlier, I had been nothing more than an ordinary office assistant at Langford Group. I never imagined that helping one elderly woman would change my life forever… that I’d end up living with the consequences of a choice I’d made to lift my family out of poverty, and that it would cost me this much.

Raphael’s POV

I sat on the edge of the bed, staring at the ring in its velvet box. I’d imagined this moment so many times… her shocked expression, maybe tears, that quiet smile she always tried to hide when she was genuinely happy. I’d imagined telling her the contract was over. That if she stayed now, it would be because she wanted me, not because she needed to, not because she was carrying my heir, but because she loved me.

Now the room was empty. I’d been too late.

I walked to the nursery. The crib stood exactly where we’d set it up, our son sleeping safely inside. Ivy had left him with me… she hadn’t taken our child. She’d trusted me with the one person she loved most in the world.

That realization hurt in a way I hadn’t been prepared for.

“I’ll bring mummy home,” I told him, my voice breaking. “I’ll make everything right. I promise.” He slept on, peaceful, unaware of any of it.

Three days passed. I barely slept. The ring stayed in my pocket… I refused to leave it behind, because it had become a reminder of what I’d lost and what I still meant to fight for.

My mother and grandmother came to the office on the third day. One look at my face and they knew… she hadn’t been found. They’d been calling her for days themselves, and had even traced her mother and sister. Daniel had told me about the transplant… he’d seen Ivy at the hospital the same day I brought Sophia in, and after some digging he’d learned her mother had been there for months. I’d since met her younger sister, Lily, too.

“What’s going on, Raph? Where is Ivy?” Emily’s voice was sharp with anger.

I didn’t answer. Margaret sat down slowly. “Raphael. Please talk to us. Did you two fight? Why would Ivy leave her own child behind? Say something.”

“It’s my fault,” I said. “She left because of me.” I placed the original contract on the desk between us.

Emily stared at it. “What is that?”

“The marriage agreement.”

Margaret’s face changed. “You gave her a contract?”

“Before we married.”

The silence turned heavy. “It was supposed to last two years.”

Emily looked at me like she barely recognized me. “You made that girl marry you, knowing you meant to let her go?”

“I thought I was protecting myself.”

“From what?”

I looked down. “I don’t know. I misjudged her.”

Margaret’s expression softened into sadness. “And now?”

“I love her.” Simple words, but saying them out loud felt like setting something down I’d been carrying too long. “I came home three days ago to end the contract. I swear it.”

Emily’s eyes moved to me. “To end it?”

I nodded and pulled the velvet box from my pocket, opening it. “I even bought a ring. I was going to ask her to marry me properly.”

Margaret covered her mouth. “But she was already gone.”

I closed the box. “I was too late.”

My father arrived that afternoon, and not alone… Sophia walked in beside him, and my expression hardened before either of them said a word.

He looked around the office. “So Ivy really left.” I said nothing. “The contract’s served its purpose.”

Something in me snapped. “No.”

He frowned. “No?”

“The contract is over,” I said.

He smiled, faintly. “Exactly. So you can move forward.” His eyes flicked toward Sophia, and I understood exactly what he meant. She looked down.

“You and Sophia have history.”

“That history is over.”

“But you were engaged once.”

“A long time ago. We were never married.”

“You could still marry her.”

“I’m already married, Father. Did you forget?”

He looked irritated. “You’re throwing away a perfectly suitable woman for someone who’s already abandoned you.”

I stood. “She didn’t abandon me. She left because I made her believe she was temporary.” Sophia was watching me now. “And I’m not replacing my wife just because she’s gone.”

“You’re letting emotion control you,” my father said.

“If that’s what this is, then for once, let it.”

I looked straight at Sophia. “I have nothing against you.” Her eyes glistened. “But I will never marry you, Sophia.”

My father started to speak; I cut him off. “Like I said… I’m already married.” The room went still. I didn’t care what the media said, what the board thought, what my father wanted. “I have a wife. And until Ivy tells me otherwise herself, that’s exactly what she remains.”

The next morning my legal team put together a statement I hadn’t planned on making public… but the rumors had already started, people linking Sophia to me, calling her my fiancée, saying we’d reunited. Ivy might hear that wherever she was, and I couldn’t let another misunderstanding stand between us.

I stood in front of the cameras and kept it brief. I didn’t name Ivy, didn’t expose anything private. I just made one thing clear.

“I am already married.” The reporters stirred. “My relationship with Sophia belongs to the past. We are not together, and there is no romantic relationship between us.” I looked directly into the camera. “I have no intention of marrying Sophia.” A pause. “My wife is the only woman I intend to spend my future with.”

That was it. No careful phrasing to protect my image… just the truth. It spread within hours.

I watched it once, then sent it to Daniel. “Make sure Ivy sees this, if you find any way to reach her.”

“Yes, sir.”

I looked down at the ring. “I want her to know.”

My mother came by the office afterward. “You really love her.”

“I do.”

She touched my shoulder. “Then find her.”

Grandma stood beside her. “And when you do, don’t hand her another contract telling her when she has to leave.”

I smiled, faintly. “I won’t.”

“What will you do, then?”

I looked at the ring. “I’ll ask her to choose me.”

“Then go,” Grandma said.

Three days, and I still didn’t understand how I’d lost her without ever seeing it happen. If I wanted to find my way back to her, I needed to understand where she’d started… long before any of us knew her name.