Chapter5
882 Words
Chapter Five: Her Move
POV: Stella Anderson
“He watched me raise my glass, thinking he saw the whole game. But what he didn’t see is that I never bluff.”
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“I assume that wasn’t your husband watching us just now?” Kelvin asked with a faint smile, though I could hear the edge in his voice.
I turned my cup slowly between my palms, feeling the heat bleed through the porcelain.
“It was,” I said, not looking back toward the window.
“Should I be worried?” he added.
“No. He needed to see it.”
Kelvin leaned back in his seat, his expression unreadable. “That sounds calculated, even for you.”
“I’m not calculating anything,” I said softly. “I’m just reminding him he’s not the only one who can play a role.”
“You sound like someone who’s not sure she wants to keep playing at all.”
I looked up at him then. He hadn’t changed much since university. His face was still boyishly handsome, eyes still kind, but now there was something more in them. Distance. Control. He had learned, like I had, how to protect his soft edges.
“Why are you here, Kelvin?”
“Because you called,” he said simply. “Because I still remember the girl who used to hide in the library during lunch breaks, who kept a box of rejection letters under her bed and marked them like trophies.”
I smiled faintly. “She doesn’t exist anymore.”
“She does. She’s just wearing armor now.”
I didn’t respond. We sat in silence for a moment. I sipped my coffee again, slower this time, forcing myself not to look toward the sidewalk where I knew Jeremy had been standing.
“Does he treat you well?” Kelvin asked at last.
I took a deep breath. “He doesn’t treat me like I matter.”
“And do you?”
I didn’t answer.
Kelvin leaned forward. “You deserve more than strategy, Stella. You always did.”
“He needs me,” I said, finally. “For now, that’s enough.”
“And when that need runs out?”
I folded the napkin on my lap into a small, sharp square. “Then I walk away with more than I came with.”
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By the time I returned to the new house, Jeremy was gone.
The silence suited me. The place was massive too clean, too glassy but the quiet allowed me to think.
I wandered into the master suite, peeled off my coat, and sat at the edge of the bed. My reflection in the wall-length mirror looked foreign. Expensive. Controlled.
Exactly what they wanted. Exactly what I hated.
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An hour passed before I heard a voice in the hallway.
I assumed it was staff, maybe Peter on speaker again, but the sound was muffled, half-whispered.
I stood slowly, moved barefoot to the door, and eased it open.
The voice grew clearer.
“…she’s already asking too many questions,” someone said.
It was a man. Not Jeremy. Not Peter either.
“I told you not to write anything down. It has to stay verbal, face-to-face only.”
My pulse quickened. I followed the sound quietly, stepping down the hall toward the study.
The door wasn’t fully shut. I crept close enough to hear more.
“…if she finds out what was in the first draft of the prenup, it’s over. He loses everything.”
First draft? I leaned forward, heart thudding now.
“Stella’s smart,” the voice continued. “Too smart to think this is just about an heir. She’ll dig. She’s already started.”
There was a pause.
Then the reply. “Then we have to distract her.”
The voice sent a chill down my spine. It was Jeremy.
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I moved back before I could hear more. My bare feet slid silently against the floor as I returned to the bedroom, closed the door gently behind me, and stood there, staring at my own reflection.
So I had, been right. The clause about the heir wasn’t the only thing he kept from me.
There was more. Another document. Another secret. And now they were trying to distract me. But the mistake they made was simple.
They thought I could still be distracted.
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I opened my phone and pulled up Kelvin’s number.
He answered on the second ring. “You okay?” he asked immediately.
“No,” I replied. “But I need a favor.”
“Anything.”
“I need someone to help me dig.”
“On Jeremy?”
“No,” I said. “On his lawyer. And whoever changed the contract after I signed the engagement agreement.”
Kelvin didn’t hesitate. “Send me the names.”
I exhaled, staring at the closed bedroom door.
This wasn’t about inheritance anymore. This was about the truth.
And whoever thought I was just going to play the part of a trophy wife… Had picked the wrong girl.
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Stella overhears Jeremy and someone else discussing a hidden first version of the prenup. She calls Kelvin, not for comfort, but to start digging. The game has officially changed.
- Writer
