A searing pain ripped through my stomach as Guy's foot slammed into me, sending me flying.

Water erupted around me. My consciousness began to sink. I thrashed, slapping the surface with everything I had, screaming with the last of my strength: "Guy!"

But he only held the woman in his arms tighter. He didn't look back.

My body drifted downward into the pool. I thought of three months ago, when I'd gone skiing and been caught in an avalanche, trapped in the mountains. Guy had charged in without hesitation, pulling my hypothermic body from the snow.

"Amber, I'll always protect you. Whenever you call my name, I'll be right there."

All lies.

Every last word.

Soon, they would pay for everything they'd done.

When I opened my eyes again, a hospital ceiling stared back at me. I'd barely twitched my fingers when that grating voice slithered into my ears.

"You're finally awake. So you're pregnant." Mabel looked me up and down, a loaded smile curling at the corner of her lips. "You should take good care of that baby, sis."

I wrapped my arms around my stomach on instinct and turned my head. Mabel's contemptuous gaze met mine. She stood there like a victor claiming her spoils, then reached out and seized my chin, fingers digging in hard. "Looks like your husband cares about me more after all, doesn't he, sis?"

I stared into her eyes. I'd expected bitterness to flood through me. Instead, my heart was a stagnant pool. Nothing stirred. Not a single ripple.

When I said nothing, the smile on Mabel's face nearly cracked. "I stole Guy from you. You don't have anything to say about that?"

I reached up and pried her fingers off my chin, one by one, my gaze dripping with mockery. "Say what? You want me to throw a fit? Wail and beg? Not going to happen."

"You stole a piece of trash. Why would I be upset? Congratulations on recycling someone else's garbage."

Mabel hadn't expected that. The smile vanished entirely, replaced by raw fury burning behind her eyes. "Amber, a sharp tongue won't help you. You still couldn't protect your own child or your mother."

She stepped closer, her expression vicious. "And this baby? Don't think for a second you're keeping it."

The mention of my daughter sent a spike of pain through my chest. My nails dug into my palms until the skin nearly broke. My body trembled, and no words would come.

But that wasn't the reaction she wanted. Her lips curled again. "I've prepared a big surprise for you, sis. When you see it, you'll lose your mind."

Her heels clicked against the floor as she walked out.

I stared at the doorway long after she disappeared, her words circling through my head on a loop.

What was she going to do to my mother? What was she going to do to the baby inside me?

I couldn't let myself think about it, but the images clawed their way in anyway.

I didn't know how long I sat there before I realized my face was soaked with tears.

I wiped them away with a shaking hand, picked up my phone, and dialed the number.

My voice was hoarse, but every word came out razor-clear. "Wallace, get the divorce certificate processed and send it straight to James Group headquarters. And look into Mabel's financial records."

"I'll come for you the day after tomorrow."

After I hung up, I stared at the IV drip. Pain radiated from my stomach. The space where my heart should have been felt hollow, cavernous, wrong.

But the longer the pain lasted, the more numb I became. I closed my eyes. When I opened them again, nothing remained but cold resolve.

Discharge day came. I gathered my things and had barely stepped through the door when I saw Guy waiting outside, leaning against his car as if he'd been there a while.

His tone carried a thread of impatience. "It's your birthday. Mabel went out of her way to put together a party for you. Don't waste her kindness. I'm here to take you."

I sidestepped him without a word, a bitter smile ghosting across my face.

Every birthday before this, he'd been called away by one of Mabel's convenient little emergencies. Now he wanted to play the devoted husband?

My voice was flat. I frowned and refused.

"I'm not going."

Guy's expression darkened instantly. He didn't speak, but the silent pressure radiating off him was more suffocating than any threat.

He lifted a hand. Bodyguards moved in immediately, forcing me into the car and dragging me to the party.

The moment I was shoved through the doors of the banquet hall, Mabel swept toward me in a gown, all smiles, and placed a party hat on my head.

She played the part of the doting little sister to perfection, pressing a beautifully wrapped box into my hands, her voice honeyed and sweet. "Happy birthday, sis. I've been working on this gift for a long time. You're going to love it."

Every pair of eyes in the room settled on my hands, silently urging me to open it.

I lifted my gaze, cold and indifferent, and tore the wrapping apart.

Inside lay a single sheet of paper.

My mother's death certificate.

My vision went black. The report crumpled in my grip and slipped to the floor.

Tears spilled down my face, but no sound came out. I was a fish with a hand around its throat, gasping for air that wouldn't come.

My daughter was gone.

Now my mother was gone too.

The last person on this earth who loved me, and Mabel had killed her.

With my daughter and my mother both dead, what was left to be afraid of?

Mabel's coy laughter drifted to my ears. "Big sister, are you satisfied with your gift?"

I looked at the woman smiling prettily in front of me. Something savage filled my eyes, and the last thread of reason inside me snapped clean through.

I lunged and locked both hands around her throat, squeezing harder with every breath. "How did you kill my mother, Mabel? Like this?"

"You psycho!" Mabel shrieked beneath my grip, her face flushing a deep, mottled red.

That's right. I had lost my mind.

You murdered my mother. If I wasn't going to lose it, who would?

"Amber! Mabel gave you a gift out of the goodness of her heart, and this is how you repay her? Why do you always have to hurt her?"

The next instant, Guy shoved me to the ground. Pain tore through my lower spine like a blade.

He cradled Mabel in his arms as though she were the most precious thing in the world. The look he turned on me was the one you'd give a piece of trash.

I lay sprawled on the floor. And then, slowly, I laughed.

Ten years.

I had loved this man for ten years.

The first time he looked at me like that was the day Mabel and her mother walked through our door.

The first time he raised a hand to me was the day Mabel ran to him crying that I'd bullied her.

The first time he abandoned me without a second thought was the day Mabel screamed for help.

Again and again and again. He had never once chosen me.

It was his indulgence that let Mabel destroy everything I ever loved.

I pulled myself upright. My gaze locked onto Mabel, cold as a blade, and I raised my voice so every guest in the room could hear.

"Mabel, all that money Guy gave you, you funneled it straight into Max Fox's accounts. What's going on between you two? Some kind of affair?"

Guilt flickered across Mabel's face. She blurted out in a panic, "Don't make things up! The only man I care about is Guy!"

I let out a sharp, scornful laugh and turned to face the crowd. "You all heard that. My adopted sister just confessed she's in love with her brother-in-law."

Whispers ignited through the room like wildfire. Fingers pointed at Mabel.

"The Fox family's second daughter looks so sweet and innocent. Who knew she'd go after her own sister's husband?"

"Wait, hasn't the older sister even divorced Guy yet? Doesn't that make Mabel the other woman?"

I watched Mabel throw herself into Guy's arms, tears streaming prettily down her cheeks, and my stomach turned.

Guy soothed the woman clinging to him, then walked to the center of the banquet hall. He picked up a microphone, gazed at Mabel with eyes full of adoration, and spoke for every person in the room to hear.

"The only woman who will ever be my wife is Mabel. Amber Fox was always the interloper."

Just like that, the crowd's judgment swiveled onto me.

I watched the two of them with frozen eyes. Nothing stirred inside me anymore.

But when I heard the word interloper, I still smiled.

Interloper?

I met you when I was eighteen. I married you when I was twenty-two. Was I intruding on your little underground affair?

I couldn't be bothered to argue. I walked straight up to Mabel and demanded through clenched teeth, "Where is my mother's body?"

Mabel's lips curled in triumph. She grabbed a fistful of my hair and wrenched my head down, her voice dripping with venom. "Your mother? She's already been burned to ash. You want her? Go pick her up from the funeral home yourself."

A violent tremor ripped through my body. I said nothing. I tore myself free of her grip and ran for the exit.

I had barely climbed into a taxi when Mabel caught up, her fingers clamping onto the door like claws. "Sister, why are you leaving so soon? Didn't you like your present? I really do want you to be happy. Don't go. I'll give you my place. Just stay—"

"Get off." I had no interest in performing in her little show. I looked at the driver, my voice flat and dead. "Drive."

The car had barely pulled away when Mabel darted in front of it, arms flung wide.

A split second later, the screech of brakes cut through the air. Not from the taxi.

From the Maybach behind us.

Guy's car.

CRASH.

The impact sent the taxi skidding sideways. My head slammed into the window glass, and the world turned red.

Through the blur, I saw Guy climb out of the Maybach and sprint toward Mabel.

He didn't so much as glance in my direction.

I closed my eyes. A bitter smirk tugged at the corner of my mouth.

The divorce papers should have been delivered by now.

Guy James, from this moment on, we are nothing to each other.