I knelt in front of his friends. Every single one of them looked down at me with cold eyes. Not one would lend me a cent.

Only Maurice Fox—the quietest one in the group—

had wavered as I was being shoved out the door, then finally opened his mouth.

"Stop trying to borrow money. Look after yourself."

"Even if you can't raise the funds, Mick… he'll be fine."

At the time, I thought he meant inside the prison.

That those people would never just stand by and let Mick die in there.

Only now did I understand what he'd really been telling me.

By now, Tilda had already spotted me. She'd steered Mick into saying all of that on purpose, for my ears.

I could only listen, swallowing the humiliation, my face showing nothing.

What expression was I supposed to wear?

In two years, I had swallowed more suffering than most people see in a lifetime.

The day Mick's company was declared bankrupt and the police took him away, the house was seized along with everything else.

I was forced into a damp, freezing basement.

To pay off tens of millions in debt, I bussed tables, took overnight shifts sleeping in houses no one else would set foot in.

Two years of grinding myself down wrecked my body, and when I was diagnosed with cancer, when the doctor urged me again and again to have surgery immediately,

all I could do was shake my head with a bitter smile. "Doctor, I'm done treating it."

If I hadn't stumbled onto what I just saw,

I would have already mixed pesticide into a bottle of cola and drunk it.

But no. I wasn't going to let this cheap life end for nothing.

I tossed the bottle of pesticide into the trash.

Mick opened the car door with careful attentiveness, letting Tilda climb into the passenger seat with the baby in her arms.

I almost couldn't stop myself. I wanted to walk straight up to him, rip apart every lie about his bankruptcy and his prison sentence, and slap him hard across the face.

I wanted to demand why he'd lied to me for two years. Was it really just because I'd suspected Tilda was carrying his child and pushed for her to have an abortion?

I had gathered solid evidence proving the baby was his.

He was the one who cheated first, yet he'd looked down at me from on high and said I deserved to be punished.

But in the end, I did nothing.

I turned around, expressionless, and walked back to my basement rental.

Dark and damp, and I had lived in it for three years.

The bathroom was right by the front door, its walls crusted with mold that had built up layer by layer, a smell of rot seeping out at all hours.

When I first moved in, I threw up every single day.

For the first twenty-five years of my life, I had been pampered. The sheltered eldest daughter of the Gilbert family, never exposed to a single day of hardship.

An internationally recognized painter, award after award until I'd lost count.

And at the height of all that, Mick Weiss—the kind of heir every socialite in the city wanted—had proposed.

After the wedding, he spoiled me rotten.

Just like that, without seeming to lift a finger, I'd become the kind of woman every girl envied.

The media called me a woman who had it all.

Then the old nanny retired, and Mick hired a replacement: a timid, soft-spoken young woman. That was when everything began to change.

From the day Tilda Pruitt walked through our door, my things kept being moved.

I told Mick about it, dead serious. He brushed it off.

"Come on—Tilly's a nanny, not a thief. She was raised well. She's not going to touch your things. It's all in your head."

So I told myself I was overthinking it.

Until I came home early from a trip and found Tilda sprawled across my bed in my nightgown, rolling around in it like she owned the place.

Clothes and bedding everywhere. Tilda froze, the color draining from her face. "Mrs. Weiss, I just thought the fabric of your nightgown felt so nice, I wanted to try it on. I'm sorry…"

I frowned hard.

I've always despised people who don't know their place—no sense of boundaries, no respect for the line. I was ready to fire her on the spot.

But she dropped to her knees in front of me, sobbing.

"I know I was wrong, Mrs. Weiss, please don't fire me. My mother's still in the hospital waiting for me to send money back."

And right at that moment, the door was shoved open and a figure barged in.

Mick pulled her to her feet with a frown, then turned a cold look on me.

"Desiree, you've always been generous about everything. So why is it that the moment Tilly's involved, you turn cruel?"

"It's nothing. Don't be so petty over every little thing."

With Mick shielding her, Tilda only got bolder.

Until the day she flung a pregnancy test showing two lines and a paternity report right in my face.

"Desiree Gilbert, I'm pregnant."

"It's your husband's baby."

"I'd advise you not to try throwing me out again. Otherwise, the one who ends up suffering will be you."

I exploded that same day and demanded a divorce.

He stared at me with a crease between his brows. "Fine. And why exactly do you want a divorce? Can you stop being unreasonable?"

"You got the nanny pregnant and you're calling me unreasonable?"

Then Tilda rushed out and fell to her knees in front of me, crying.

"Don't blame him—it was all me. I took one of his used condoms from the trash and did it behind his back. I just… I only wanted a baby of my own."

I laughed, cold with fury. "Do you two actually think I'm stupid?"

But that same day, Mick produced surveillance footage to prove his innocence.

He knelt in front of me, begging me to forgive him, even swearing he'd fire Tilda—and against every instinct, I softened.

I had one condition. "Get rid of the baby."

He agreed to my face and told me he'd already taken her to the hospital for the procedure—but behind my back, he'd hidden her in a villa.

A few days later, Mick claimed he'd gone bankrupt and been sent to prison. Overnight, the sky fell.

I sold the property and moved into a damp basement. There was nothing else left to do.

Hiding from the debt collectors, I couldn't sleep through the night.

They eventually found my basement. A group of them stormed in with clubs and beat me.

Two of my ribs were broken. My wrist was shattered. I could never pick up a brush again.

It took me longer than I can say to force myself to accept it.

I gave up everything, just to stay alive.

And now I'm told all of it was fake.

For two whole years, Mick had been out there wrapped around another woman, warm and tender, enjoying every comfort of family—while I ran in circles like a fool believing every lie.

Right then, my phone buzzed.

A message from Mick.

"Desiree, I'm getting released in three days. Don't forget to come pick me up."

I gripped the phone and stared at the screen for a long time, blank.

In the two years since Mick went to prison, he was allowed to check his phone once a week. That was our only window to talk.

Last time, he'd told me he was being sentenced to ten years. Told me to sit tight and wait for him.

That was before the brain cancer diagnosis.

I'd thought, in despair: Mick, I won't live long enough to see the day you get out.

Maybe his conscience finally stirred. Or maybe he'd had enough of the act.

Either way, he'd decided to end the lie.

"Okay. I'll come pick you up."

What I never could have imagined was that the moment Mick saw me that day, he shoved me into a car and headed straight for the hospital.

I stared at this Mick I didn't recognize, at the panic written all over his face, and asked quietly.

"Why are we going to the hospital?"

"Til—a friend of mine was in a car accident. She needs an emergency transfusion and your blood type is a match. Desiree, you'll help—won't you."

I lowered my gaze. I'd seen it on my phone just two days ago—the car accident near Rivergate Bridge. The victim was Tilda Pruitt. And the very first thing he did after his "release" was drag me here to donate blood for his mistress.

"Mick Weiss, how much longer were you planning to lie to me?"

I shoved the photos I'd taken that day right in front of his face.

"You lied about prison. You lied about the company going bankrupt. So why couldn't you even bother lying properly to the end?"

"A man who supposedly went bankrupt two years ago, and the day he gets out of prison he's driving a Porsche?"

"And that suit—worth more than most people make in a month. You couldn't even find something cheap to play the part?"

The more I said, the bleaker my expression became, until I was laughing at the absurdity of it all.

"Mick Weiss, you changed your release date."

"Just so I'd come donate blood for Tilda Pruitt. That's all this was, wasn't it?"

Mick went rigid. Panic flashed across his face before he forced himself back to calm.

He let out a long, slow breath.

"Didn't expect you to figure it out."

"Fine. Since you know, I won't hide it anymore."

"These past two years, I wasn't in prison. I was with Tilly—her and our son."

"Tilly said she wanted to know what it felt like to be my wife. So for two full years, I was completely hers."

"But I promised that once the agreed time was up, I'd come back to the family. You'd still be my wife."

"As for Benny, he'll be my heir. You can raise him as your own."

I stood frozen, my whole body nearly shaking. "Why? Why would you do this to me?"

"I could have given you a child. So why did you go have one with her?"

Mick's smile turned cruel.

"You wanting another child is never going to happen."

"What do you mean?"

"After the nanny gave birth, I got a vasectomy."

"I swore to her that Benny would be my only child. Ever."

Before I could process it, I was brought to a hospital room. I watched Mick rush to Tilda's bedside, his face tight with worry.

Then he turned and ordered me without a shred of hesitation. "Desiree. Give her your blood."

"If Tilly wakes up, I'll end the punishment. You can go back to being Mrs. Weiss—all the status, all the luxury, starting today."

That tone. As if he were granting me a favor.

"And if I refuse?"

Mick's expression went cold. "Then don't blame me for what happens next."

One look from him was all it took. A wall of bodyguards surged forward and pinned me in place, their faces blank.

They forced me to give blood.

I watched bag after bag filled and carried out, and with each one my body hollowed a little more, the color bleeding from my face along with everything else.

Mick sighed. The way he looked at me softened, just slightly.

"Desiree, come on now. Be good for me."

"I promise, once Tilda wakes up, whatever terms you want, I'll agree to all of them."

I stared at him, ice in my eyes. "Even... dying with me?"

His whole body locked. His brow furrowed hard. "Don't joke about that."

He glanced down at his phone. "Get some rest. I'm going to check on Tilly."

He was gone in a stride. Tilda didn't wake until that evening.

By then I had the fruit knife in my hand, and I was already moving toward her room.

"Desiree Gilbert?"

Tilda's eyes opened and found me standing there. She went still.

"I heard you're the one who saved me. I really should thank you. Though I have to say, these past two years I've been taking very good care of your husband, too."

"Shut up."

I narrowed my eyes and stepped closer. "Tilda Pruitt, I've never been able to figure it out. I never wronged you. We had no grudge between us. So why? Why would you do this to me?"