I turned instinctively, but Grayson’s bodyguards had already sealed off the exit. Within seconds, a swarm of guards pressed in from the corridors. I had nowhere to run; they pinned me to the floor.
From across the room, a pair of red heels clicked closer.
Alyssa, the woman he’d said he’d “sent away,” walked up and planted herself in front of me, alive and steady.
She grabbed my hair and started slapping me, one hard blow after another. “Bitch! You killed my baby. You think you deserve anything? You fell for a fake miscarriage report and got fooled. Stupid!”
Grayson cleared his throat, looking shifty. “Amara, I already know that Alyssa was the one who pulled me out of Grayridge. I won’t hold your lies against you, but you shouldn’t have hurt Alyssa and my child. Today, she needs to get her revenge.”
I looked at him and laughed, a raw, incredulous sound. To carry a severely injured man out of Grayridge, I’d taken crippling damage; three-quarters of my meniscus was gone from the injury. And now he calls the woman who betrayed him and turned informant his savior?
He pushed a divorce agreement into my hands and ordered the staff to force me to sign. Three days earlier, he wouldn’t give me that paper; now he shoved it in my face like it was nothing.
“Alyssa is my new bride,” he announced afterward, as if handing me a verdict. “She’ll be my wife from now on. But Alyssa’s magnanimous. If you agree to stay with those homeless men for a day and a night, she’ll even let you remain my mistress.”
His voice had the false tenderness of a man who believed he’d done something reasonable. When he saw my stare had gone dead, he crouched down and tried to soften it. “Amara, I still love you. But this time you were wrong. Learn from this. Apologize to Alyssa. She’s more reasonable and generous than you. She’ll forgive you.”
I ground my teeth until they ached. “Apologize to Alyssa? In your dreams!”
He scowled like a child who’d been denied a toy. “I really spoiled you. Lock her in.”
The homeless men surged forward. I held my hands tight, but I couldn’t stop a group of animals. My nails scraped the floor, and they left two bright, ugly streaks of blood.
I glared at them and spat, my voice raw with despair, “Grayson, I regret it. I should’ve let you die on Grayridge.”
Third Person's POV