The reality of what happened yesterday slammed into Rachel like a freight train.

Her husband had chosen his ex's opinion over hers.

She felt it humiliating like she meant nothing to him.

Rachel headed straight to the kitchen, she took the pills and trashed it.

She wanted to take it to the hospital for confirmation but it was of no use.

She checked the time on her phone ‘8:20am.’ She had woken up late for three consecutive days now.

Her schedule for the day was a little bit tight. She has scheduled the first two hours she would leave her house for her painting skill practice. The second two hours would be to her lawyers chamber for the divorce decree and after that she will head to the Thompsons company to resign from the secretary role Lucas gave her in the company.

She hurried back upstairs and got dressed. She wore something different today. A high waisted jean and a white crop top, she wore over it a long beige trench coat.

She came back downstairs and met Fiona standing in the doorway that connected the kitchen to the dining room.

“Hi Racheal” Fiona called, placing the spatula she held on the dining table. Her other hand held a plate filled with scrambled eggs.

Rachel was puzzled to see Fiona was home. After the incident yesterday, Lucas left with Fiona and they didn’t return till she slept off.

“You can come have a bite" Fiona giggled and picked a piece of egg and muched on it.

Rachel stared at her face and then her bandaged feet. Fiona was more than evil. Causing herself pain just to ruin someone else.

Rachel's phone bepped and she knew she had little or no time to spare so she picked her keys and left hearing Fiona's distant laugh.

********

Rachel headed straight to the Thompsons' company after leaving her lawyer's place. She decided to head to her office to get her things there and also drop off the resignation and divorce letters with Lucas.

She pushed the door open and her face dropped at what she saw.

Fiona was seated in her office sorting out files on her desk.

“Rachel.” Fiona squealed from her seat.

“Shocked to find me in your office huh. Well I am now the new secretary. Lucas gave me the position days ago.”

Rachel stood in shock. She was visibly shaken Lucas stripped the position off her without even informing her first. And worst still gave the position to Fiona.

She hadn’t gone to work for a whole week. The doctor said she needs a lot of rest and shouldn’t stress herself for the meantime. So she took a week off without knowing the position had been filled by Fiona for that whole week.

“Rachel, isn’t it obvious that Lucas doesn’t love you anymore? If I were you, I would probably end my life or run out of the marriage. You are just an interfering homewrecker”

‘Homewrecker?’

Rachel suddenly felt enraged at this. For goodness sake she is Lucas Thompson's legal wife. She decided to drop pursuing her masters because of Lucas. And here Fiona stood referring to her as a homewrecker when that word should be used for her instead.

She stared down at the envelope she held and assured herself one more time that the divorce was necessary.

“What do you have there?" Fiona asked and pulled her chair backwards. She stood and approached Rachel, staring at the divorce decree she held.

“Can I have them?” Fiona smiled and tried to snatch it from her.

“Dont you dare." Rachel yelled and clenched the envelope tightly.

She had been quiet all this while but wouldn’t tolerate her melding into her personal affairs.

Fiona withdrew her hand. And in her frustration she said “Didn’t know you were feisty Rachel. More reason Lucas doesn't like you. He loves his woman soft and calm” she rolled her eyes dreamingly.

Rachel's lips curled into a faint smirk. She knew Fiona said all of that to get back at her. If for any reason Lucas isn’t in love with her anymore, it was simply because Fiona is back. Fiona is the woman after his heart not her. Lucas married her just because she saved him. Nothing more.

“You can……”

Fiona was interrupted by the presence of Lucas.

“Y…. You shouldn’t be here Rachel” Lucas stammered in confusion.

He was surprised to see Rachel at the company.

Rachel turned to face him.

“Lucas I’m…..”

" I know you aren’t happy to see Fiona in your office.” Lucas cut in.

“ I was meaning to tell you before now though. Fiona will be taking the role of my new secretary from now on.” He blurted.

Rachel wasn’t in shock. Everything isn’t known to her. The very day he caught the both of them making out, all the accumulated feelings for Lucas throughout the years of their marriage crumbled.

“Fiona needs the money more than you do Rachel. I mean you practically get whatever you want cause I have it. But Fiona can’t. She needs the money so I offered her the job.”

Rachel exhaled deeply. A lot of things were happening too fast.

She stood speechless looking at Lucas.

‘How did he suddenly change.’

Lucas was a loving and daring husband before now. But changed after Fiona's return. The change was just too quick for her. He spared no time in showing Fiona he still loved her and always will.

“Here Lucas, check what's inside." Rachel handed the envelope to Lucas.

Lucas collected it and squeezed them roughly,he threw it into the trash can behind him.

“I know Rachel, it's still negative" he said and moved to hold her hands.

He thought Rachel had come to show him her pregnancy test again. Always negative, he believed. For any reason, he wouldn’t think that Rachel would want a divorce.

A nobody he married out of the blues. Where had she run to if she leaves.

“Lucas it's a d…….”

" Doctors report! It's the same news Rachel isn't?" Lucas said impatiently. He was pissed already.

Rachel stood bewildered. She looked at the folded divorce decree in the trash and shook her head

She had another copy at home though.

‘ So Lucas was behind her infertility for firmly believing it was a pregnancy test and the result positive.’

Rachel's phone suddenly rang, it was a call from Lucas' mother.

She picked it up. Rebecca, Lucas' mother yelled over the phone.

“Where are you Rachel? Didn’t Lucas tell you I was coming home today? Hurry over and come home, I’m starving.

Rachel hissed and hung up the phone.

The Thompsons witch was finally back. Rachel has been at peace for one year now following her departure.

She was the only problem Rachel faced years ago and was glad when she left Canada. Her coming back was just to torment her. But at least she was about to leave the marriage.

“Why can’t you be useful at least" Rebcca lashed out immediately Rachel stepped into the house.

" For goodness sake Rachel you are of no use to the Thompsons.” She barked and glared at her.

Rachel was stunned at her outburst. Mrs. Rebecca had reacted like someone had told her something.

Rachel knew she didn’t like her. But the outburst was too fast.

Rachel ignored her and turned to head upstairs when the woman suddenly bursted into tears, slumping on the couch behind her.

“Mum!" Lucas' voice rang out.

Rachel turned to see Lucas coming out of the kitchen.

He held a plate of Mayoonse sauce. The plate fell off his hands at the sight of his mum in tears.

“What happened, Rachel?" Lucas asked.

Rachel's hand suspended awkwardly in the air as she shook her head vigorously.

" I have no idea, " she suddenly started crying. I don't know why.” Rachel explained.

“Don’t you get it Lucas? Rachel pushed her onto the chair while trying to brush past her to her room.” Fiona voiced out.

They all turned towards the direction of the voice and Fiona stood at the staircase.

“I saw her, Lucas. I was standing right here when she did all of that.” Fiona sighed, climbing down the stairs.

Rachel stood stunned at the spot.

She glanced her head and Mrs. Rebecca was nodding her head.

“She is right son, you have to end whatever it is you have with Rachel. She isn’t worthy to be a wife. She is just a barren witch. Unlike Fiona here. Lucas mother sneered

She hated Rachel from the start. ‘Girls from a low-class family aren't worthy of her son.’ she always said.

She loved Fiona to the core. Fiona's father owned a billion dollar company at Zetel city here in Canada. Being an only child, she was treated with so much care in the world.

She claimed she had left Canada at the eve of her engagement with Neo because her best friend fell sick and needed an urgent kidney transplant that needed her presence.

When asked why she didn’t inform Lucas, she said she believed he wouldn’t agree to it therefore she left on her own will.

“Don’t call Rachel barren, mum. Its totally out if it."

Lucas hurried over to where Rachel stood and glared at her.

“Why did you do that Rachel? She is my mum for God’s sake and the matriarch of the Thompson's family.” He cursed.

“I didn’t do anything Lucas! I didn’t!.” Rachel screamed.

She was pissed and suffocated by the whole Thompsons family drama. She knew her stay here was almost coming to an end.

“Dont you dare yell at me!" Lucas clenched his fist in anger.

Rachel looked at Fiona and her lips were twisted in a mickey grin. She was clearly enjoying the brokenness in Rachel's eyes.

“Come here Fiona" Mrs. Rebecca signalled and she came to stand next to her.

“This is the only woman I know Lucas has." She explained and stroked Fiona's arms smiling warmly.

Lucas bit his lower lips in frustration. He knew his heart wasn't with Rachel anymore. But how could he possibly let go of the woman that once saved his life.

“Why did you even leave the house Rachel? Fiona and I had to leave the office to rush back home to cook for her. For what? Lucas' voice shook the room. He was burning in rage.

“And what about the help?" Rachel quipped.

“Oh wow, help?" Lucas laughed, nodding.

" Like you didn’t know she has been on sick leave."

Rachel's mouth fell open in an ‘oo’ shaped manner. She figured out she forgot things too easily these days and it wasn’t helping. She will have to visit the hospital once she gets to Solana city.

“I forgot that though." Rachel mouthed.

But even at that. Mrs Rebecca isn’t fully aged. She has a home where she resides with her husband in Villa Island.

Their sophisticated mansion was filled with help and servants of different kinds.

She was here because of Rachel and Rachel knew it.

“Besides, I advise you to get a new help" Rachel finalised and dashed up stairs. She was tired of the drama.

Her phone bepped as she pushed her room door open.

[Rachel Everton, Flight rescheduled for tomorrow. The vacant position needs to be filled urgently. The company is welcoming its owner to the grand charity gala.

Maple brushes Artworks.]

Rachel's heart skipped for a second. Her flight to Solana has been rescheduled to tomorrow. Which means her marriage with Lucas ends today.

She smiled triumphantly. She clearly registered her name with “Everton" , her fathers last name.

She laughed and held her phone. Suddenly, an unfamiliar number sent her a message that crushed her ounce of happiness.

[ NAME: RACHEL EVERTON

RESULT: PREGNANCY TESTED POSITIVE]

Her words stumbled before her. She was feeling nauseous the other day and Aria suggested she did the test.

Ever since she found out Lucas cheated on her she has always erased the name Thompson in every of her names.

Aria took her to a special hospital where she got tested and the result forwarded to her just now.

She stood still. Shock shot her entire body as though she was struck by lightning.

She made up her mind immediately. She will leave tomorrow after dropping the divorce papers with Lucas and the baby is kept a secret from everyone including Aria.

But she wondered to herself. The pills were meant to ruin her womb as Fiona said or were they lies?.

Rachel pulled the last shirt from the drawer and folded it without looking at it.

She had been moving this way for the past two hours hands working, mind somewhere else, the way you operated when feeling everything fully would stop you from doing what needed to be done. She couldn't afford to stop. Not tonight. Not in this house where every corner held something she had once believed in.

The room was dark except for the small lamp on her side of the bed.

Lucas' side was empty. He had not come upstairs after the argument. After Fiona's smile from the staircase. After Rebecca's words landed in the room like something thrown rather than spoken. Rachel had come up here alone and started packing with the quiet discipline of someone who had already made every decision and was simply executing them now.

She was almost finished.

The suitcase held her clothes not all of them, just the ones that had been hers before this marriage. The second bag held her art supplies. Her brushes. Her worn sketchbook. Three small canvases she had been working on before life in this house had made painting feel impossible. She would not leave those behind for anything.

Everything else could stay.

The furniture. The silk. The closet full of expensive things Lucas had chosen without asking her what she liked. None of it was hers in any way that mattered. She had arrived in Shantel City with two bags and a direction. She was leaving the same way.

She sat at the small writing desk and opened her laptop.

The divorce papers her lawyer had drafted three days ago were saved in a folder she had titled simply done. She opened it and sent it to the printer. Four pages came out slowly, one after another, the machine hum filling the quiet room. She picked them up and read each page once. Her lawyer had been careful and fair no claims on his assets, no demands, nothing that would extend this any longer than necessary. Just the legal fact of an ending.

She signed her name four times.

Rachel Everton.

She pressed down hard each time. She didn't know why. Maybe because she needed the pen to feel real. Maybe because she needed something about tonight to leave a mark.

She folded the papers and carried them out of the bedroom.

The hallway was dark and still. She passed the family portraits without looking at them. She had stopped looking at them eighteen months into the marriage when she realized her face would never appear in any of them. At the time that had hurt. Now it just seemed like the house had known something she hadn't been ready to admit yet.

The stairs were silent under her feet.

Lucas' office door was open a few inches. She almost walked past it. Then she stopped.

She pushed it gently and looked inside.

He was at his desk, head resting in his arms, asleep. A glass sat beside him, half full. The office lamp was still on, casting everything in a low amber light that made him look younger than thirty. Less defended. More like the man she had believed she was marrying before she understood the full picture of who came with him.

Rachel stood in the doorway and looked at him for a long moment.

She thought about the morning he had driven forty minutes across the city to find the specific brand of tea she had mentioned liking once. She thought about the afternoon he had sat beside her on the studio floor for two hours just watching her paint, not speaking, just being present in that particular way of his that used to make her feel less alone in the world than she had ever felt before.

She thought about Fiona's voice on that call.

About the pills.

About months of taking something she believed would help her while it was quietly doing the opposite.

She placed the divorce papers on the desk beside his hand.

He didn't stir.

She looked at him one last time.

Then she walked out.

The front door opened silently. The night air came at her all at once cold and sharp and clean in a way the air inside that house hadn't been in a very long time. She breathed it in slowly. Held it. Let it out.

Aria was at the gate.

She was standing with her arms crossed against the cold, her blonde hair pulled back, her face carrying the careful expression of someone working very hard not to ask questions. She had received Rachel's message two hours ago car, gate, no calls, no knocking. She had arrived without a single word of protest, which was the truest thing about her.

"That everything?" Aria asked, looking at the two bags.

"That's everything," Rachel said.

Aria lifted the heavier bag without being told and put it in the boot. Rachel set the second one beside it. They got into the car and Aria started the engine and they drove away from the Thompson mansion in complete silence.

Rachel kept her eyes on the road ahead. Not the rearview mirror. Forward.

The streets were empty at this hour. The city between midnight and dawn was a different place stripped of its noise, its performance, everything it put on for the daylight hours. She had always thought this was the most honest version of any city. When nobody was watching, when it was just the roads and the dark and the people who had somewhere urgent to be.

She pressed her palm flat against her stomach once, under her coat, where Aria wouldn't see.

The baby was a secret.

It was going to stay that way.

"Flight is confirmed," Aria said gently after a while. "I checked an hour ago. You're on the seven-fifteen."

"Good," Rachel said.

Aria glanced at her sideways. "Rachel. Whatever happened in there you're doing the right thing. I can feel it even without knowing the details."

Rachel nodded.

She didn't trust her voice enough to say more than that.

Aria pulled up to the hotel. Rachel took her bags and went up alone. She sat on the edge of the bed in the dark without turning on the light. She pressed both hands over her stomach this time and just breathed.

I'll take care of you, she thought toward the tiny quiet thing growing inside her. You won't need anything from anyone else. I promise.

Her phone lit up.

She reached for it expecting the airline confirmation.

Unknown number. A message.

Rachel. Do not get on that flight. There are things you don't know things that will completely change what you believe happened in that marriage. I'm sending you something. Please look at it before you leave.

She almost put the phone down.

Then the photograph arrived.

She opened it.

And her breath left her body entirely.

Because the photograph showed Lucas not with Fiona, not at any location she recognized from their marriage but sitting across a table from her father. Both of them leaning forward. Papers spread between them. Both of them signing.

The date stamp in the corner read four months before her wedding day.

Her father.

Who had never once mentioned knowing Lucas Thompson.