The Billionaire's Daughter Married to a Monster

On my husband's birthday, every seat at the dinner table was taken. Every seat but mine.

"You've been on your feet all day. You must be exhausted."

"Why don't you go check on the baby first? You can eat when there's room."

Being tired wasn't the point. Checking on the baby wasn't the point.

The point was that there was no seat for me at that table.

My apron was still damp, balled up in my fists, the fabric almost burning against my palms. I swallowed my anger and spoke.

"Nigel Delgado, you just said yourself that I've been working alone all day. And now I don't even get to sit down and eat?"

The laughter in the living room died. Every guest set down their chopsticks and turned to look at me.

Nigel's brow furrowed. He didn't lower his voice. "Don't start something over nothing!"

"Get out!"

The word hit me like a slap. Hurt and humiliation flooded my chest. I bit my lip, turned, and walked out.

I barely made it to the door before I heard someone inside urging him to go after me, to smooth things over.

"A woman who married far from home doesn't need smoothing over. She's got nowhere to go."

"Relax. Give it an hour and she'll come crawling back."

Every word out of Nigel's mouth suffocated me.

A few careless sentences, and eight years together were buried in the past.

——

I walked the streets alone, staring at the neon lights of this city.

His words kept circling in my ears.

The alleyways we'd walked hand in hand, the shops we'd lingered in, the parks we'd strolled through on lazy afternoons. In that moment, all of it became foreign.

Whatever sense of belonging I'd built here vanished the instant those words left his mouth.

So this was what it really meant to marry far from home.

I walked in a wide, aimless loop and ended up right back at the foot of our apartment building.

I looked up at the light in our window, and the tears came before I could stop them.

What hurt the most was that Nigel was right.

I had nowhere to go.

In this city that was never mine, I didn't even have somewhere to run after a fight.

I'd left without my phone. I didn't even know how long I'd been gone.

I stood outside the front door, listening to the noise still going on inside, and drew one long breath before pushing it open.

The room went quiet. Every pair of eyes found me, loaded with meaning.

"You're back?"

Nigel set down his glass and glanced at me without a trace of emotion.

"Baby Zach was crying a minute ago. Go see if he needs to be fed."

"Honestly, you're so unreasonable. All I said was to wait a little before eating. Was that really worth making a scene in front of everyone?"

I looked at the wrecked table, the bottles tipped over on the floor, and clenched my fists at my sides.

The cake in the center had been smeared beyond recognition.

I caught the traces of frosting still on Nigel's face and could picture exactly how much fun they'd all had without me.

That cake. I'd made it from scratch with my own hands. I hadn't gotten a single bite.

They'd used it to smear on each other's faces. A toy.

"Come on, Nigel, is that any way to win your wife back?"

"Lorraine Henson, here, take my seat!"

The one speaking was Leona Matthews, Nigel's assistant.

Also the girl he'd grown up with. His childhood sweetheart.

I pressed my lips together, shook my head, and walked straight to the bedroom without a word.

Zachery Henson was wailing in his crib. I blinked back tears and changed his diaper.

But the resentment inside me churned like a riptide, wave after wave threatening to pull me under.

"Nigel called it. She actually came back."

"Yeah, and it's only been half an hour..."

"That's how it is with women after they've had a kid. Easiest people in the world to control."

"Not all of them. It's the ones like Nigel's wife, stay-at-home moms from out of town with no family around. Those are the easiest."

"Gotta hand it to Nigel, though. Isn't his wife originally from Seaview City? How'd he get her to follow him back to a nowhere town like ours?"