Chapter 1

On our fifth anniversary, Grayson handed me a plate of sliced apples and told me the woman he had been sleeping with was pregnant.

He could not even look me in the eye.

"Her name is Chloe. She's seven months along," he mumbled, rubbing his face. "She swore that if I sent her to Europe, she'd disappear forever."

"It's a life, Jenna. I wanted you to hear it from me. Not from her when she showed up at our door."

My mind went blank.

It took me a full minute to find my voice.

"Are you sure… it's yours?"

"I'm trash, baby. Please forgive me."

His eyes were red.

I looked at our twin girls stacking blocks on the rug.

My fingers trembled.

The words "she's lying" almost slipped out.

I swallowed them.

Because the moment I exposed that woman, I would have to tell him the truth too.

He was sterile.

He could not father a child if his life depended on it.

And those two little girls on the carpet?

They were not his either.

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Grayson mistook my silence for heartbreak.

He tried to pull me into his arms.

I stepped away.

"When?" I asked.

His hand froze in the air.

"Seven months ago. That business trip to Miami. I got wasted—"

"Wasted enough to still get it up?"

I let out a cold laugh.

His face turned red.

"Honey, it was one stupid night. The doctor says her body is weak. Ending the pregnancy could put her life at risk. Chloe is a sweet girl. She doesn't want a title. She just wants the baby. She won't touch our family."

"And she agreed to leave for Europe?"

"Yes. Just a settlement check. She signs an NDA and never comes back."

He was practically begging.

He grabbed my hand.

His eyes were dripping fake devotion.

"Jenna, you've always been the reasonable one. Once the baby is born, we'll bring him home. You'll raise him. Chloe leaves. Forever."

Raise the kid he had with another woman?

"And if I say no?"

His face went cold.

He dropped my hand.

"Jenna, don't be selfish. You ruined your body having those twin girls. You can't give me a son. Now someone else is willing to. You should be grateful."

Grateful.

I stared at this man I had lived with for five years.

Five years ago, at our pre-wedding physical, the doctor pulled me aside.

"I'm so sorry, Mrs. Sinclair. Your husband has congenital azoospermia. There is no chance of natural conception. There is no cure."

Grayson was the most arrogant, macho man I had ever met.

If he found out he could never father a child, he would lose his mind.

He would probably put a bullet in his head.

On his deathbed, his father begged me.

"Please. Give the Hunt family a child."

To protect Grayson's pride, I buried the report.

I told him we both needed "fertility support."

Under his father's arrangement, I did IVF.

We used a sperm bank donor.

The day I found out I was pregnant with twins, Grayson spun me around like a little boy, laughing.

"God's greatest gift to the Hunts."

For five years, he worshipped those girls.

And now he was telling me he had gotten another woman pregnant.

The absurdity was so crushing I could not even cry.

"Grayson."

I stared straight at his face.

"How much is this settlement check?"

He held up five fingers.

"Five hundred grand."

I actually laughed.

Use our joint savings to raise some other man's child?

"And if I say no?"

His jaw tightened.

"Jenna, cut it out. That's a life. That's my blood. I'm already trying to make this right with you. Don't push your luck."

I took a deep breath and swallowed the nausea rising in my throat.

"Fine."

I nodded.

"I agree. As long as she stays out of my face."

But baby, not one dime of the Hunt fortune is going to that child.

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