Nina’s POV

At Easter luncheon, my husband was having sex with another woman.

The door was not fully closed.

I stood outside the study on the second floor of the Fontaine estate, holding my son’s medicine kit. From inside, I heard a woman’s breathless moan, followed by the dull thud of a desk hitting the wall again and again.

“Jasper, don’t stop.”

My blood went cold.

It was Luna Fairchild. Jasper Fontaine’s unforgettable first love. The living, breathing third person in my six-year marriage.

“Greedy,” Jasper said with a low laugh. His voice was rough, but gentle. “But I like you that way.”

That kind of tenderness—I had been his wife for six years, and I had never once received it.

I looked through the crack in the door.

Luna was lying back on the desk, one leg hooked over Jasper’s shoulder, the other hanging over the edge. Her body moved with every thrust. Jasper stood in front of her, his shirt open at the collar. One hand was braced on the desk, and the other held her waist.

A photo frame had been knocked face down. A pen had rolled onto the floor. The things on the desk shook with their movements, like some cruel, shameful rhythm.

Suddenly, I felt sick.

Downstairs, guests were laughing, and children were screaming as they searched for Easter eggs. Their voices drifted up through the floor.

And my son, Ulysses, was still waiting for me downstairs. He had scraped his knee while chasing after an egg, and I had come up to get his medicine.

Luna’s voice rose again, soft and broken, one sound after another.

My stomach rolled. I wanted to step back, but my feet felt nailed to the carpet.

Clatter.

The medicine kit slipped from my hand and fell to the floor.

The room went silent.

So I pushed the door open.

“Jasper.”

Luna gasped and shoved Jasper away. In a panic, she grabbed her coat and pulled it over herself.

Jasper turned around. His shirt was messy, and his breathing was still uneven, but there was not a trace of panic on his face.

For a moment, even the noise downstairs seemed to be wrapped in thick cotton.

“Why didn’t you knock?” he asked with a frown.

“This is my home,” I said, staring at him.

“Wow! I found the golden egg!” a child shouted from downstairs.

“It’s not what you think…” Luna said, her voice shaking.

“Then what is it? Did you trip and fall on him?”

She closed her mouth.

Jasper buttoned his shirt. “Don’t make a scene. The guests are still downstairs.”

Don’t make a scene.

Hearing those words, I almost laughed.

Six years of marriage.

I gave him a child. I used my money to fill the hole in the Fontaine family’s finances. I held this home together for him.

And in the end, he had the nerve to cheat on me in our own home.

I walked up to him and slapped him across the face.

The sound was sharp and clear.

His face turned to the side.

Luna covered her own face and took a step back.

“Nina,” Jasper said, his voice full of warning.

“Don’t touch me.”

His hand stopped in midair.

I bent down and picked up the medicine kit. The smell in the study rushed toward me, and my stomach turned again. I pressed my tongue to the roof of my mouth and forced the nausea down.

Ulysses was still waiting for his medicine.

I turned and left.

Downstairs, the Easter luncheon was still bright and lively. Children were counting their eggs. Guests held glasses of champagne and laughed as if nothing had happened.

Ulysses sat on the bench by the window. Blood had already soaked through the tissue on his knee.

“Mommy!” His little face twisted in pain. “Why did you take so long? It hurts.”

“Don’t move.”

I knelt in front of him. My hands were still shaking, but the moment I touched his wound, they became strangely steady.

Clean. Disinfect. Press to stop the bleeding. Bandage.

“Can I keep looking for eggs?” he asked.

“No.”

“Then can I have ice cream? Auntie Luna said we can have ice cream on Easter.”

“No. You just bled. You can’t run around, and you can’t eat anything cold.”

Ulysses was not like other children.

He had been born early and spent a month in the NICU. He had a clotting disorder and a weak immune system. Other children could fall, cry for a bit, and get back up. Ulysses might keep bleeding.

Once, a careless nanny had made one mistake, and he ended up in the ICU.

After that day, I paused my graduate studies and took over all his medicine, food rules, and daily care myself.

His face fell at once.

Just then, Jasper came downstairs.

He had changed into a clean white shirt. Nothing on his face looked different. If not for the faint red mark on his left cheek, even I might have wondered if that slap had only been in my imagination.

“Papa.”

Jasper touched Ulysses’s head.

Ulysses lowered his voice and said in French, “Papa, je veux une autre maman.”

Dad, I want a different mom.

My hand froze over the medicine kit.

Ulysses stiffened for a second, then relaxed.

In his eyes, I was just a woman who stayed in the kitchen all day and smelled like butter. Of course I would not understand French.

I looked up. “Ulysses, what did you just say?”

He turned his face away, impatient. “I’m practicing French with Dad. You don’t understand, so don’t interrupt.”

Then he lifted his face and continued.

“Mom is always wearing an apron, and she never lets me do the things I like. My classmates will probably think she’s our maid. Auntie Luna is different. She rides horses and wears pretty dresses. She looks like a mom in the movies. Dad, you like her too, right? Can she be my mom instead?”

My own son wanted another woman to be his mother.

For one moment, I still tried to make excuses for him.

He was only a child.

He did not know how much those words hurt.

He did not know how much I had given up just to keep him alive.

Jasper did not correct him.

Instead, he said, “I like her too. But what about your mom?”

They were still speaking in French.

Ulysses answered without thinking, “Mom can still live here and make breakfast. Auntie Luna doesn’t know what kind of pancakes I like.”

Jasper glanced at me, then looked back at him.

“We’ll talk about it later.”

Not “No.”

Not “She is your mother.”

Just—we’ll talk about it later.

My chest felt like it had been torn open.

They thought French was a wall.

But I understood every word.

They did not know I had an almost perfect memory. If I read something once, I rarely forgot it.

When I was thirteen, I learned French only because Jasper spoke it at a charity dinner, and I wanted to understand every word he said.

After that, languages became easy for me. Ten major languages and dozens of smaller ones were not a problem.

I never showed it off.

Because in this family, no one ever asked what I could do.

They only asked what was for dinner.

Ulysses continued, “Auntie Luna said she’ll take me to the amusement park next weekend. But Mom will definitely want to go too. Papa, can we do what we did last time? We can say I want beef Wellington. It takes her all day to make it, so she won’t have time to come with us.”

My mind flashed back to last Saturday.

Ulysses had wrapped his arms around my neck and begged me to make beef Wellington.

I got up at six in the morning to prepare the beef, cook the mushroom filling, roll out the pastry, and replace every spice he was not allowed to have.

When they came home that night, he only took two bites and said he was not hungry.

So it was not because he was not hungry.

It was because he had already eaten outside with Luna.

“The medicine is done,” I said, closing the kit.

Then I turned and went upstairs.

At the corner of the second floor, the nausea I had been holding back finally broke free. I held the wall and gagged twice. Only bitter acid burned my throat.

When I returned to the bedroom, I locked the door behind me.

The woman in the mirror was pale. An apron was still tied around her waist, and flour stained her sleeves.

I took off my wedding ring.

Everyone said Jasper Fontaine built himself from nothing.

But the first stone he stepped on was the one I handed him.

Six years ago, my marriage to Jasper began with an unexpected pregnancy. At the time, the Fontaine family was close to bankruptcy. Jasper’s mother cried and begged me to keep the baby. She also begged me to help them get through it.

I kept Ulysses.

And I used the family trust my mother left me to save the Fontaine family.

Later, Jasper became the richest man in the city.

And I became the unknown lady of the Fontaine estate.

We were legally married.

But there was no wedding.

No photos.

Not once had he held my hand in public and told anyone, “This is my wife.”

For six years, I was an invisible wife.

For six years, I was a mother.

And in the end, one of them treated me like air, and the other treated me like a maid.

Downstairs, the laughter slowly faded. One car after another drove away from the estate.

I lay alone in bed all night.

I did not cry out loud.

Sometimes, I simply could not breathe.

Near dawn, a thin line of cold light slipped through the curtains.

I was going to divorce him.

At six o’clock sharp, the alarm rang.

My body reacted out of habit, and I sat up at once.

Ulysses’s oatmeal could not have nuts.

Jasper’s coffee had to be cold brewed at a low temperature.

The medicine kit had to be checked...

Then I stopped.

How ridiculous.

I had been treated like a servant for so long that even I had almost forgotten.

I was not one.

I washed up, changed clothes, and picked up my laptop bag and student ID before going downstairs.

The kitchen was cold.

The stove was off.

The coffee machine was silent.

For the first time in six years, the Fontaine kitchen stayed quiet in the morning.

At eight o’clock, I had class at A University.

I packed my schedule full.

Medicine. Bioengineering. Artificial intelligence.

Three classes in a row.

The divorce could wait until after class.

But my studies would never be pushed aside for anyone again.

Before leaving, I sent Chelsea York a message.

—I want a divorce. No settlement. Get ready to sue.

Chelsea replied almost instantly.

—Finally?