The Arranged Wife He Never Wanted - Until She left

Chapter Seven: What Lucas Knew

Maya POV

The first thing I noticed when I woke up was the smell.

Antiseptic and something faintly floral, probably from the cheap air freshener they plugged into the wall socket near the door. Hospital smell. I had always hated it.

The second thing I noticed was Lucas, sitting in the chair beside my bed with his long legs stretched out in front of him, scrolling through his phone with the kind of unbothered energy that only truly unserious people possessed.

"You're awake," he said without looking up.

"Unfortunately," I muttered, pushing myself up slowly against the pillow. My head was still heavy, and my throat felt like I had swallowed a handful of gravel, but the burning heat from before had cooled down to something more manageable. The IV drip was still attached to my left hand.

Lucas finally looked up from his phone and gave me one of those long, assessing looks that I had always found irritating. Like he was checking me for damage.

"You look terrible," he announced.

"Thank you, Lucas. That is exactly what I needed to hear."

"I'm serious. When was the last time you ate a proper meal? Slept a full night?" He leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. "You signed those divorce papers looking like you had not slept in three days, collapsed in a courthouse hallway, and ended up here with a double infection. Boss, even by your standards, this is a lot."

"I did not collapse in the hallway," I said, pulling the blanket up. "I nearly collapsed. There is a difference."

"The doctors said another hour, and you would have been in serious trouble."

"But I was not, so let us move on."

Lucas shook his head slowly, like I was a child who had just said something exhausting. He reached over to the small table beside the bed and handed me a cup of warm water without being asked. I took it without saying thank you because that was just how we had always operated, him anticipating what I needed and me pretending I had not noticed.

I took a slow sip and let the warmth settle in my chest before I spoke again.

"Tell me what you found."

Lucas's expression shifted. Just slightly, but I caught it. That small tightening around his eyes meant whatever he was about to say was not going to be simple.

"You sure you want to do this right now? You literally just woke up."

"Lucas."

He sighed and sat back in his chair, running a hand through his hair. "Okay. So I started pulling threads on Adrian Blake like you asked, just to get a clearer picture of the timeline, right? When exactly did things start between him and Briar Whitmore."

I nodded, keeping my face neutral.

"They were together before you," Lucas said. "Not just a little before. A long time before. From what I can piece together, Adrian and Briar had been in a serious relationship for almost two years before your marriage was arranged."

I stared at him. "Two years."

"Two years," he confirmed. "But here is where it gets interesting. When the arrangement between your grandfather and his grandfather was made, Adrian did not fight it. His family expected him to put his personal relationship on hold and honor the agreement. And he did. He married you. But he never actually ended things with Briar."

The warm water in my cup suddenly felt cold.

I had spent four years wondering why Adrian was so distant, so closed off, so completely unreachable no matter how hard I tried. I had spent four years thinking that maybe I was not good enough, not interesting enough, not loveable enough to c***k through whatever wall he had built around himself.

Turns out there was no wall.

There was just another woman on the other side of it.

"So the entire marriage," I started slowly.

"He was with her the whole time," Lucas finished quietly. "I am sorry, Maya."

I sat with that for a moment. Felt it settle into my chest like something heavy dropping into still water. The ripples spread outward, touching things I thought I had already made peace with.

Four years of cooking his meals. Four years of attending his family events and smiling at people who probably already knew. Four years of lying awake at night wondering what I was doing wrong.

Nothing. I had been doing nothing wrong.

I had just been in the way.

I exhaled slowly and set the cup down on the table. "Okay."

Lucas frowned. "Okay? That's all you have to say?"

"What do you want me to say?"

"I don't know, maybe something louder than okay?"

"I am in a hospital, Lucas. I cannot be loud."

He stared at me for a second and then let out a short, disbelieving laugh. "You are something else, you know that?"

I ignored him and stared at the ceiling for a moment, letting my thoughts settle into something more organized. The anger was there, sitting quietly underneath everything, but it was a different kind of anger now. Not the hot, messy kind that makes you cry or scream. The cold, clear kind that made you think.

"What else?" I asked.

Lucas hesitated again, and this time the hesitation lasted long enough to make me sit up straighter.

"Lucas. What else did you find?"

He leaned forward again, lowering his voice even though we were completely alone in the room. "The law firm you asked for in the settlement. Blake and Associates."

"What about it?"

"Adrian thinks it is worthless. His whole family does. They have been using it as a vehicle for internal legal work and basically running it on autopilot for years." Lucas paused. "But three months ago, a sealed court document was filed under that firm's registration. I could not access the full contents, but the case number traces back to something big, Maya. Like, life-changing big. Whoever controls that firm when that case unseals is going to be sitting on something that the Blake family does not even know exists yet."

The room was very quiet for a moment.

Then, slowly, I started to smile.

"So I accidentally asked for the right thing," I said.

"I do not think it was an accident," Lucas said, watching me carefully. "I think whatever instinct made you ask for that firm was the same instinct that kept you alive and functioning for four years in a house where nobody was rooting for you."

I looked at him then, this ridiculous, loud, fiercely loyal man who had picked up the phone after four years of silence without a single question.

"Do not get sentimental about me," I said.

"I am not being sentimental. I am being accurate." He leaned back and crossed his arms. "So what is the plan, boss? Because something tells me Adrian Blake is already asking questions about you."

I glanced toward the window. Outside, the sky was turning that pale grey color that came just before evening properly set in. Somewhere out there, Adrian was probably home by now, probably sitting in that big quiet house, probably thinking.

Good. Let him think.

"The plan," I said calmly, smoothing the blanket over my lap, "is to get better, get out of this hospital, and take everything that was always supposed to be mine."

Lucas grinned, wide and genuine. "Now that sounds like the boss I remember."