Husbands were supposed to be anchors. The one steady thing you could hold onto when life tossed you around. And best friends… best friends were supposed to be safe harbors.

But fate had a cruel way of twisting the very things you trusted most into the blade that slit you open, you never thought the two people you loved most would become the ones to ruin you.

Your marriage had barely seen its first anniversary, but it was enough to make you believe. It wasn’t born of passion, no. It started as duty, a union written in contracts and signatures.

But over time, something softer bloomed. Or at least you thought it did. You let yourself believe that maybe love could grow out of obligation. That maybe you weren’t a fool.

But love, it turned out, was a mirage. A cruel trick. It was raining that night, heavy enough to blur the dread within you. You had stayed late at work and when he didn’t answer your calls, you thought little of it at first.

But the silence dragged on and worry knotted in your chest. His office was closer than home, so you went there instead, soaked through and shivering, desperate for him to just pick up, to just be there waiting so you could drive home together.

The building was quiet as you climbed the stairs, each step echoing in the emptiness. Hope was fragile in your chest, but it was still there.

When you reached his office, you heard it before you saw. The sounds you couldn’t mistake. A woman’s voice, breathless, gasping. A man’s laughter, low and cruel. Your stomach lurched. Your body begged you to turn away. But your hand, trembling, pressed against the door and pushed it open just enough.

Only to be met with a sight that would haunt you. Him. Her. Together. His hands gripping her waist, buried deep within her from behind, his mouth pressed to lips that had once whispered secrets in your ear.

And then her voice, breaking you further. “Your wife… my foolish best friend… she never stood a chance. You’ve always been mine.”

He chuckled, his voice older than ice. “You’re nothing but a toy. She’s my wife. My delusional little wife. That’s all she’ll ever be.”

Your knees nearly gave out. Your fingers dug into the wood of the door just to stay upright. The betrayal seared into you and your chest caved under the weight of it.

All the moments, the laughter, the nights you thought were real, they weren’t love. They were ownership. You weren’t his partner.

You stumbled back, tears blinding you, as you panted for air. You wanted to scream, but all you could do was run. Purse clutched against your chest like it could stop your heart from bleeding out.

That night, you broke in a way that couldn’t be fixed and for the first time in your life, you didn’t care. You let yourself be taken. You let yourself fall into the arms of a man whose name you didn’t even ask.

A stranger who held you like you weren’t broken and touched you like you weren’t drowning. For a few fleeting hours, the ache was quiet.

But when morning came, so did guilt, you ran from the warmth of a man who wasn’t your husband, straight back into the cold reality of a home that was no longer yours. And there he was. Your husband. With her. Smiling. Pretending. As if nothing had happened.

They didn’t know you knew. And so you lived with it, day after day, swallowing the poison, letting it rot you from the inside.

Then came the test. The two lines that changed everything. Pregnant. And when you told him, his face lit up with pride. He thought it was his. And you let him believe it.

Until the night he decided to announce it to the world, families and friends gathered in their mansion, but before he could, reality walked in like a punch to the gut.

“A cheater,” a voice rang out, cold and sharp, “shouldn’t call another man’s child his blood.”

You turned, every breath caught in your throat. The stranger. No—not a stranger. His older brother, Leandro. The successor of their family. The man whose bed you had fled that night and whose child you were carrying.