Julia's POV

After saying that, Adrian scooped Camille up in his arms and walked right out of the event hall.

The room turned so quiet that it felt like even the air stopped moving.

I forced a polite smile. "Everyone, please enjoy your meal."

When I got home, the left side of my face was still faintly burning. Once I got Lila to sleep, I sank onto the couch.

My cheeks were wet, and my skin felt taut from dried tears. It was as if someone had crammed a dozen lemons into my chest and was beating on them with both fists.

Everything inside me ached, swollen, and stretched too far. Even breathing hurt.

It was late into the night when I finally heard the door creak open. Adrian stepped inside. He remained silent at first, slowly reaching for my face as if he had any right to do so.

I turned away.

“I was wrong, Julia,” Adrian whispered, kneeling at my feet and pressing his cheek lightly to my knee, like that would soften anything.

“But come on, you hit her first. Camille was drunk. She said some stupid crap. How could you take it seriously?”

He tried to smile, like we were in the middle of some harmless misunderstanding. Then he stood, leaned in, and brushed his nose against mine.

“Can you forgive me?”

The moonlight cast a glow across the floor.

That’s when I saw it.

A faint lipstick mark, just below the collar of his shirt.

The color was soft, but the message was loud and clear.

I picked up the divorce agreement from the coffee table and held it out.

Then I said calmly, “Adrian, let’s get divorced.”

“Divorce?” He blinked, stunned, like he hadn’t seen this coming from a mile away.

Adrian snatched the papers and started flipping through them like they were written in another language. When he realized I wasn’t bluffing, he threw them right at my face. The divorce papers struck my chest and fluttered to the floor.

Adrian’s voice exploded across the room. “Are you insane, Julia? Lila just turned one, and you’re already trying to divorce me? You think divorce is something you just say and boom, it’s done?”

He started pacing, hands running through his hair, as if trying to pull the right words out of his scalp.

“I know I screwed up today. I hit you. But you think that just came outta nowhere?”

He turned to me then, eyes flashing, not with regret, but with justification.

“I already apologized! What more do you want?”

He threw his arms up in frustration, like my silence was the real betrayal. “Stop acting like some spoiled damn princess!”

He pointed a finger at me now, sharp, jabbing. “Seriously, grow up. You’re a mom now. Keeping the family together should come first!"

Adrian kept going, voice rising with every word. He didn’t even notice the tears running down my face, not once. My cheek was still sore from the earlier incident. A staple on a folder had scraped it, and now the salt in my tears made it sting all over again.

Adrian reached for his wallet out of reflex and then froze halfway, like someone had hit pause on him.

I looked him dead in the eye as I asked, “You gave your last band-aid to Camille, didn’t you? And you ordered her chicken soup too.”

He straightened up a little, trying to keep cool.

“So what? That doesn’t mean anything. You’re really divorcing me over a Band-Aid and a bowl of chicken soup? You’re blowing this way out of proportion, Julia!"

His voice was too loud.

Lila’s wail came sharp from the bedroom, echoing through the walls and cutting straight into my nerves.

Adrian winced, already annoyed, his brow folding with frustration.

I turned to him and asked quietly, “Do you even know where her bottle and formula are?”

That stopped him cold.

Adrian blinked in silence, unsure of what to say.

Of course, he didn’t know. Ever since the baby was born, Adrian believed taking care of Lila was my job. It had nothing to do with him as a father.

Right then, I grabbed the bottle, walked toward the bedroom, and paused at the door.

Then I turned back. I picked up a pen and signed the divorce papers.

As I handed him the papers, I said flatly, “You should sign it, too. If not, I’ll file for divorce on the grounds of infidelity. And if it gets to that point, you won’t get a single benefit out of this marriage.”

He opened his mouth to argue, but I reached out and touched the face I had once loved so deeply.

“Your mouth still tastes like the red wine Camille drank tonight. What happened between you two? Hard to say, isn’t it?”

After settling Lila and getting her back to sleep, I came out to find the living room empty.

Adrian was gone.

The divorce papers were shredded and scattered all over the trash like confetti after a war. Even the pen I’d used to sign them had been snapped clean in two, as if breaking it would somehow erase the decision.

On the coffee table sat a designer shopping bag, almost camouflaged by the chaos around it. The same one Adrian had been hiding behind his back when he walked in.

Inside was a neatly folded, limited-edition cashmere baby throw.

I stared at it for a long time, unable to look away.

My chest tightened, and slowly, my gaze dimmed.

Julia's POV

Ever since I became a mom, every gift Adrian gave me was for the baby, every single one. Bit by bit, he was boxing me into one identity: Lila’s mom, and nothing more.

My phone buzzed with two simultaneous alerts. One was from the law firm I’d reached out to earlier:

[We heard you took maternity leave—didn’t expect to hear from you.]

[We believe your return will make us stronger.]

[Looking forward to working together.]

I replied with a professional thank-you, closed the chat, and barely had time to set my phone down before another notification popped up.

It was a friend request, with just five words:

[It’s me, Camille Quinn.]

I accepted, and instantly her message appeared, not text, just a photo. A towel dotted with blood, sheets soaked through with moisture. No explanation needed.

A fresh college graduate, with nothing to her name, and she’d already given Adrian everything she could.

Young women like her, so fearless and headstrong, always think they can survive the flame, moths drawn to fire.

In a daze, I seemed to catch a glimpse of my younger self.

When I was sixteen, Adrian and I were the only two from our small town accepted into a prestigious high school. His parents, both middle school teachers, were so excited that they hosted a celebratory party for three consecutive days.

Me?

I didn’t even have the nerve to tell my father.

He was already half-drunk, parked on the front steps with a few empty bottles, sipping beer and toasting with the town matchmaker.

“Damn it,” I remember him saying, “that dead woman Rachel only left me this useless money-drainer. Good thing she takes after her mother. Maybe I’ll still get something decent for her.”

That’s what love looked like in my house.

So when Adrian showed up at the gate, beaming and asking when I’d be heading off to school, I couldn’t even speak. I just stood there, frozen, as the door creaked open behind me.

My father’s voice, suddenly sweet and servile, floated out like honey on rotted bread. “My girl here’s got no issues at all. Once you’re ready, I’ll send her over myself.”

They all looked at me as if I were up for auction.

I dropped my head, too ashamed to meet anyone’s gaze. I could feel the tears coming fast and hot, and they wouldn’t stop.

“I’m not going to school,” I mumbled. “I have to get married.”

Adrian’s voice came from somewhere low, like he was choking on it. “You… want to get married?”

I didn’t answer. I just cried even harder.

That night, Adrian climbed seven flights of stairs with his bare hands just to reach me.

It was dark. Nearly midnight. But his eyes were burning like stars.

“I brought money,” Adrian said, panting. “Come on, let’s go to school.”

Since I was a kid, I’d always been told to obey adults without question. But that night, all I wanted was to hold Adrian’s hand and never let go.

High school wasn’t easy. I got teased for my country accent and my hand-me-down clothes. I felt out of place, like I didn’t belong. Meanwhile, Adrian fit in effortlessly. He was relaxed, charming, and always quick with a laugh.

The city kids took to him like he’d always been one of them.

I started keeping to myself, slipping into silence, trying not to be noticed.

But Adrian noticed anyway.

One afternoon, he pulled me aside, his expression unusually serious. “Julia, if you don’t like me hanging out with them, I won’t. I’ll just hang out with you. Just don’t hate me, okay?”

That’s when something in me cracked wide open.

For the first time, I didn’t feel like I was fading into the background. Everything I’d kept buried—the fear, the shame, the crushing loneliness—came rushing to the surface.

I cried uncontrollably while he quietly stood by, patiently waiting for me to release my emotions.

From that moment on, it became a routine. Adrian consistently sought me out at the back of the cafeteria, where I sat alone with my tray.

Every day, Adrian sat next to me, eating five bowls of plain chicken soup like it was fine dining.

He never cared about the whispers or the looks.

“I’m from a small town, too. If you’ve got a problem with Julia, you’ve got a problem with me,” he’d say, casually.

When our college entrance exam results came out, they were exactly the same.

Tied. Dead even.

Maybe it was fate. Or maybe the universe was just being a little too poetic, trying to tell us we were meant to end up together.

One afternoon, my nerves all jumbled, I finally worked up the courage to ask him where he planned to apply.

He didn’t even blink. “Wherever you go, I’ll go.”

That was Adrian back then—his love didn’t hesitate. It was bold, steady, and all-in, like he honestly believed I hung the stars. When he loved me, it felt like armor, like nothing in the world could touch me.

“Do you… like me—”

I barely got the words out when a dark shape moved over the sidewalk next to us.

I looked up, and there he was.

My father.

His eyes were bloodshot, his clothes stained and reeking of beer and sweat.

His expression twisted, seething. “Found you, you little brat!”

Julia's POV

“So the worthless prize I paid for finally grows up and runs off with a man, huh?!”

A steel pipe as thick as a man’s arm swung toward me.

In one instinctive move, Adrian leapt forward, shielding me with his body. He pinned me beneath him. I couldn’t see anything, only smell the metallic tang of blood, thick and sharp in the air.

Later, when they lifted him into the ambulance, his eyes were squinting through the pain.

Adrian's voice was quiet and strained as he said, “I really like you. Will you be with me?”

My father was convicted of aggravated assault and sentenced to three years.

When Adrian and I finally left for the capital to attend school, he still had metal pins in his hand from defending me.

After we graduated, we decided to start a business together. In a tiny, damp basement, we shared a single bowl of plain chicken soup every day.

All my courage had been spent that night we ran away together, in that confession whispered from an ambulance, and during the years we chose to chase a dream despite knowing the odds.

So when Camille sent that photo, I had nothing left to face it with.

The boy who once shared that bowl of chicken soup with me had disappeared somewhere into the world of money and lust.

...

It took me a full week, every waking moment, to pack up my life and Lila’s.

Adrian never came home once during that time. Yet his name haunted every headline.

He arrived at a business gala as Camille’s companion, effortlessly intertwined with her. He treated her to the entire new-season luxury collection to make her day special.

Additionally, one article mentioned that he rented the top floor of the Harborview Hotel. After dinner with her, they enjoyed a private fireworks display on the terrace—just the two of them.

My heart throbbed with a dull, aching numbness.

Throughout this time, Adrian’s notable presentations successfully kept the focus on the headline:

[CEO of Callahan Group Suspected of Marital Crisis]

It consistently ranked at the top of the trending searches.

Beneath it, the comments were merciless:

[If I were Adrian Callahan, I’d pick the assistant, too. Youth always wins.]

[They’re showing up everywhere together. You know it’s already over.]

[I told you since she gave birth, his wife’s aged like crazy.]

[He looks so much better with the assistant, honestly!]

I remember when a tabloid tried to print an article about our supposed separation. Adrian stopped it before it could be published. He forced the reporter to issue a public apology, and the reporter later vanished from the media landscape.

He knew how much I cared because he had once paid special attention to every online comment.

But now, it seemed as though he was silent, finally pulling the curtain down on our marriage.

...

That morning, I stepped into the office and was met with a mountain of files piled high on my desk.

A full week away, and Adrian hadn’t asked once where I’d gone.

I brushed the folders aside with a sigh and called over Jenna Whitman.

She came in looking a little nervous, and I didn’t waste time. I pulled open a drawer, took out the 'Director of Legal Affairs' badge, and placed it around her neck.

Her eyes widened in shock. “Ma’am, what—”

“I’ll transfer all system permissions to you today,” I said, already moving on to the next file. “And let IT know that if Mr. Callahan doesn’t sign a document, it doesn’t come through Legal anymore.”

Jenna glanced down at the badge, then back at me. “Attorney Henderson, are you really… done? With Sir Adrian?”

I met her gaze and nodded, my voice firm. “That’s right. It’s over.”

After clearing out all the pending files, I took the divorce agreement and headed to the top floor.

When the elevator doors slid open, laughter spilled out from down the hall.

“Still acting low-key, Camille? I heard the news from Jenna today!"

"Exactly! No one fits the role of Adrian Callahan's wife better than you."

“We’re waiting for the official announcement. Once it drops, you’ll be our queen then.”

Meanwhile, Camille sat at the assistant’s desk, radiating joy like a flower in full bloom. When she saw me, her expression showed no surprise at all.

“Julia, here for Mr. Callahan?” she asked casually, like we were best friends competing for attention.

It had been only a week, and Adrian’s office was already overflowing with mannequins and high-end women’s gowns.

Camille turned and smiled at me over her shoulder.

“Adrian is taking me to a gala tonight.”