Chapter 3

3

I had clearly overestimated my own strength.

As soon as I grabbed my ID and stepped out the door, the pain hit me like a physical blow.

I collapsed right there on the driveway of the villa.

By the time I regained consciousness, an hour had already passed.

During that hour, Silas had called me thirty times.

Since the day we married, he had never been this eager to reach me.

I answered the phone with a trembling hand.

“Vivian Vance! Are you playing games with me?” he roared.

I didn’t have the energy to argue or explain.

“I’m coming,” I croaked.

My body was failing me, and fainting was becoming a regular occurrence.

He could blame me all he wanted for being late.

If he had given me the money for the medicine sooner, I wouldn't have been on the ground.

When I finally reached the lawyer’s office, Silas snatched the documents from my hand.

He didn't even trust me to fill out the paperwork.

He was terrified I would try to claw at his massive fortune during the settlement.

Lacey was there too, looking me up and down with a smug grin.

“Vivian, you’re only a few months older than me,” she chirped.

“Why do you look so haggard? Your skin looks like gray parchment.”

“You look like you’re already halfway in the grave.”

I instinctively touched my face, my heart sinking.

I had tried to put on makeup before leaving, but the accident changed everything.

I had been lying in the dirt under the scorching sun for an hour.

My makeup had melted and smeared, leaving me looking like a wreck.

She was right, but hearing it out loud felt like a knife to the chest.

I wanted to crawl into a hole and disappear.

She pulled out a small, exquisite box and waved it in front of me.

“Want some cake? Silas just bought this for me. It’s the best I’ve ever had.”

“He told me he’ll give me every beautiful thing in the world.”

“I don’t have to beg or hunt for a rich man. I just have to ask him.”

She was throwing my own past words back in my face, clearly coached by Silas.

He hated my perceived greed so much that he told his mistress every detail.

I didn’t tell her that the best cake I ever ate was a fifty-dollar DIY mess.

After Silas had left in tears six years ago, I had dug that cake out of the trash.

I ate every single bite, sobbing until I couldn't breathe.

I didn't care that it was dirty.

My brother Ben had found me like that, a total mess.

He wiped my face and tried to give me strength.

“Vivian, we did the right thing. Be happy for him.”

“Silas has a bright future. We can’t be the anchors that sink his ship.”

Ben, Silas, and I grew up together―three kids with nothing but each other.

Our parents died young, and Ben had raised us both.

When Silas and I started dating, Ben was so proud.

But bad luck always finds the people who are already down.

The year we graduated, Ben started showing the first signs of the illness.

That was when he told me our parents had died from the same thing.

It was genetic, fast-moving, and there was no cure.

He was the first to fall, and I knew I was next.

Silas was a man of honor; he would never have left us if he knew.

We would have become a burden that would have crushed his dreams.

He had been offered a prestigious fellowship abroad, but he had no money to go.

I found out and told Ben. We made a choice.