"I'm pregnant." The words left Ria's lips like a confession she never wanted to make. Not because she didn't want the child but because she already knew what carrying his baby in this marriage meant. Hell with a heartbeat. She watched him laugh. Not the warm kind. The slow, deliberate kind that made her skin crawl. "So that's it." His eyes dragged over her with something closer to annoyance than concern. "All that distance. All that silence. I was worried about you, Ria." The word worried landed like a slap. "Evelyn was right," he muttered, shaking his head. "You were doing this for attention." Evelyn. The name hit her like cold water. His first love. His always love. The woman he swore meant nothing , yet somehow always needed him at midnight. The woman he chose over their anniversary dinner. The woman Ria had spent years pretending not to see. But then his expression shifted. Softened. And somehow, that was worse. "Actually.." A slow smile stretched across his face. "This is perfect." He said it like she'd handed him a gift. "Here's what you'll do. Pretend you had an affair. Tell the world the baby isn't mine." He said it casually, like he was reading a grocery list. "I'll tip off the paparazzi. Don't worry, I'll clear your name eventually." Ria couldn't breathe. "Evelyn is three months pregnant," he continued, his voice dropping to something almost gentle the most horrifying part. "She's terrified of giving birth alone. It's not mine, but she needs cover. And Ria" he looked at her, dead-eyed, " you owe her this." "If you hadn't called me that night, I'd still be with her. She wouldn't have tried to end her life. She wouldn't have lost her memory. She wouldn't have run into the arms of someone who hurt her." He exhaled, like the weight of all of it was Ria's fault. Like Ria had ruined everything just by existing. And then crack. Her palm met his face with everything she had. Everything she'd swallowed for years. Every midnight she waited up. Every lie she smiled through. Every version of herself she'd buried trying to be enough for a man already in love with someone else. "You never once asked for my side." Her voice broke open. "Not once. Not anyone." She ran and he never chase her. Tears burning, vision blurred, chest heaving, she ran out into the night with nowhere to go and nothing left to lose. She never saw the truck. And as the world went dark and quiet, her wandering soul drifted back, just long enough to hear her husband's voice. On the phone. Laughing. Calling the hospital a scammer. No tears. No panic. Not even her name. In the stillness between life and whatever came next, Ria made one final vow, not in anger, not in grief, but in the kind of cold, absolute certainty that only the dying understand: If there is another life, he will never have mine.