Bought by Marriage

Chapter 7:

Natalia’s POV:

One morning, while I was grocery shopping at the supermarket, I received a call from Butler Matthew telling me Edward had returned. Overjoyed, I hurried home at once.

As I slid the key into the lock, a strange sound drifted from inside intimate, wet, heavy freezing my entire body in place. My heart pounded wildly, the harder I tried to steady it, the more it spiraled. My hands shook so badly the key clinked lightly against the metal such a soft sound, yet to me it cracked like thunder. And when the door finally opened, my world collapsed in a single instant.

In front of me was a sight beyond anything I could have imagined: ragged breaths, unrestrained moans, Edward’s body pressing down on a woman who clung to him like a snake coiling around its prey. His back was taut with muscle, moving with raw force; she arched beneath him, her nails clawing into his shirt as though terrified he might slip away. Everything blurred and spun. It felt as if someone had shoved me off a cliff falling, falling endlessly until my lungs seized.

The door swung fully open, and it was like being splashed in the face with ice water. My throat tightened; my mouth opened, but no sound came out. I stood frozen, my chest aching as though someone had stomped on it.

Edward and the woman both turned, not startled, not embarrassed, but irritated, as if I had ruined their entertainment. The woman frowned; Edward’s brows knit together as though I were something distasteful.

He shot me a cold glance. “Don’t you have any manners? Ever heard of knocking? Get out.” His voice was frigid.

I opened my mouth without knowing what I meant to say. The woman tilted her head up, her voice dripping with seduction: “Edward, who is she?”

Almost at the same time, I asked, “Who… who are you?”

Edward’s frown deepened, clearly annoyed. “I said get. Out.”

Then like he wanted to grind my heart beneath his heel, he lowered his head and slowly ran a hand down her bare skin, a gesture intimate and taunting. The woman moaned softly, wrapping her arms around his neck, staking her claim right in front of me.

My heart twisted so violently I had to grab the doorframe for support. My voice slipped out, frail and pathetic, cracking beyond my control: “You… you already have someone else? …Do you… have anything to say to me…?”

I didn’t know why those meaningless words tumbled out. Maybe because I was hurt. Panicking. Drowning in despair.

Edward looked at me as though I was a bothersome obstruction. “Explain? You think you deserve an explanation? You barge in and ruin my business here, and you stand there whining?”

My knees nearly gave out. The world spun, and I swallowed a stifled sob.

I couldn’t take it anymore. I had to say it. Had to cling to any last shred of hope, even if there was none left.

“Edward…” My voice shook so much I barely recognized it. “I… I’m pregnant.”

Edward looked at me. In the brief flicker of an eyelid so fast I almost wondered if I imagined it, I still saw a shard of cold mockery flash through his eyes. He knew I was standing here. And he wanted me to witness this.

I went numb. My strength drained away, my legs turning so weak I wasn’t sure whether I was standing or simply leaning on the door to keep from collapsing. The flowers I had just bought, the flowers I had been excited to bring home to share the happy news slipped from my hands. They hit the floor softly, like silk falling, but inside me the sound cracked like shattering glass.

It felt like someone grabbed my heart and squeezed hard. Pain radiated so sharply I couldn’t breathe. My hand trembled as I pressed it over my chest, trying desperately to contain the violent tightening threatening to tear me apart.

I tried to speak, but my lips were so dry they stuck together. Finally, my voice escaped weak, fragile, like wind brushing past a withered petal: “Edward… I’m pregnant.”

The room froze. His body stiffened. Even the air seemed to stop.

I looked at him the way someone stares into an abyss waiting to swallow them whole.

The woman beneath him lifted her head slightly, cheeks flushed, lips still stained with breathless moans and yet she forced an air of elegance.

“Edward, who is she? How rude of her to interrupt us.” She pressed her face into his chest, staking her territory again. I didn’t know which hurt more: the sight itself or Edward’s cold, unmoving silence.

Then he frowned irritated, displeased pulled out his wallet, scribbled a number on a check without even glancing at the amount, and threw it at her face.

“Get out.”

One word.

Cruel as a slap.

“Edward?! She should be the one leaving, not me...”

“If you don’t disappear right now…” His voice dropped, heavy and icy like the voice of something inhuman. “…don’t blame me for being ruthless.”

She turned pale, yanking her clothes into place. Before leaving, she shot me a hateful glare, as if I had ruined her life. But I had no strength left to care. I stood numb, as though the blood in my body had stopped flowing.

Edward walked toward me. He buttoned his shirt slowly, each sharp, precise motion cold enough to cut skin. His voice was low: “What you said, was it true?”

I nodded, though my mind was spinning. The earlier scene replayed again and again, each image stabbing into me like shards of glass.

Edward let out a cold huff. He pulled out his phone, as if I had told him something trivial and insignificant. “Matthew, call Dr. Buckley. Tell him to prepare for a termination. Immediately.”

Something exploded inside my skull. For a moment, my vision blurred to white.

“Edward… what did you just say?”

My voice trembled so violently it barely sounded human. My hands were ice-cold. My heart fell from my chest and shattered at my feet.

He shoved me aside as if touching something filthy. “You didn’t hear me? I said get rid of the child.”

I stumbled back, as though he had pushed me straight off a cliff. “No! Edward, how can you... this is your child, our child!”

“My child?”

He laughed. A hollow, knife-edged sound that scraped through my soul. Something inside me cracked completely, irrevocably.

“You dare cheat on me?” he snarled. “You dare claim that bastard is mine?”

I felt my blood drain away. The world spun; my legs barely held me. “Edward… what are you saying? This is our baby. You... you can’t say that…”

His face was a slab of ice, as though I were a stranger a contemptible one.

“I have to protect the Hargrove name. Getting rid of an illegitimate child benefits everyone.”

My heart seemed to collapse inward. “EDWARD! You’re insane! I have never betrayed you. Never betrayed this family!”

He gripped my arm so hard veins stood out along his hand, as if he intended to crush my bones. “You’re loyal to the Hargrove family, yes. But to my father, not to me. You think I don’t see that?”

I went still. A roaring emptiness filled my ears. “You… really believe that? You actually think that of me?”

Edward seized my shoulders, his words hammered into my ear like metal struck under force: “You are not my wife. The person you serve is that old man.”

Crack.