Chapter 2

Cindy only frowned. "Miss Cooley, you're being so extravagant. There's clearly nothing wrong with you, yet you keep running to the hospital to waste money. Isn't it just to get Stanley's attention?"

I was there for a routine prenatal check-up, and she called it wasting money.

Yet the thirty-million-dollar necklace at her throat glittered blindingly.

"Running to the hospital every other day. Don't you realize that if something happens to the baby in your belly, Stanley and I lose our wager again!"

"I don't even want to stay by your husband's side. Every time he does that sort of thing he's so overbearing about it. Last night he actually hurt me. Miss Cooley, do me a favor and keep your husband in line!"

The wager again.

My poor seven unborn children. They left me forever before they could ever call me Mommy.

I dug my nails into my palms.

Eyes red, I glared at her, hard.

"Miss Pruitt, you've got legs, don't you? If you want to leave, you can go anytime. Nobody's stopping you. Is being a mistress something to be proud of?"

Cindy's eyes reddened, and she clutched at her chest as if wounded. "Miss Cooley, you think I want this?"

Stanley steadied her by the shoulders, his cold gaze cutting toward me. "You know perfectly well how proud Cindy is, how she keeps her word. She couldn't leave unless she won the wager. Why do you have to humiliate her like this?"

Cindy kept pounding on Stanley's chest, sobbing until her eyes swelled red. "It's all your fault, all your fault. If you hadn't tied me to your side, how would I ever be branded a mistress?!"

Stanley's voice softened.

Gently, he wiped away her tears.

"The one who isn't loved is the real mistress."

My breath caught, and I lifted my head in disbelief.

"Stop crying. You've only just gotten pregnant. Crying too much isn't good for the baby."

I was shaking all over. My chest felt like it had split open, wind whistling straight through the crack.

A baby?

Cindy was pregnant?

"Why didn't you tell me?"

"I didn't want to tell you. This is exactly the reaction I was afraid of."

Stanley's voice was calm, and that disgusted look in his eyes stabbed deep. "Now I can see Cindy was right. You really are jealous of her."

Something like blood lodged in my throat, and I kept swallowing it down.

He looked at me the way he'd once looked at the driver who hit me with his car. Vicious, unhinged, beating that driver like a madman.

He didn't stop until I wrapped my arms around him.

He'd cried and said he loved me, that he couldn't stand anyone hurting me.

Yet now, for another woman, he hurt our children again and again, distrusted me again and again.

Cindy buried her face shyly against Stanley's chest, lifting her chin at me in triumph. "No name, no standing. Either way, I'm not going to give birth to your child. Not unless... you divorce her!"

Slowly, I looked at Stanley.

I clenched my fists, uneasy.

Would he agree to what Cindy asked?

Stanley's brow furrowed, and he glanced at me.

His tone was light.

"Fine."

The stone in my chest dropped, and dropped again.

It struck until everything was crushed to a bloody pulp.

The instant I turned to leave, tears streamed down my face.

Home again, I began packing my things.

The vow Stanley had written at eighteen.

"I, Stanley, will never do wrong by Teresa as long as I live. I will always cherish her, trust her, love her. If I ever break this, let me grow old alone, forever losing the one I love."

So a lifetime had only ever been seven years.

Stanley walked in just then.

He didn't see me toss the paper into the trash.

He still thought I was carrying his child.

"It's only for show. You're still pregnant. There's no need to actually clear the whole place out."

I let out a soft, mocking laugh. "If I didn't, how would you ever coax Cindy? And when she gives you the cold shoulder, you'd be the one hurting, wouldn't you?"