Natalie clutched her abdomen.
Barely healed, her body started bleeding again.
“An ambush? Looking for death!”
I raised my hand for another slap—
but the strike landed on my own face.
Ethan towered over me, looking down, eyes colder than I had ever seen.
I touched my cheek and found blood at the corner of my mouth.
“Don’t be afraid. It’s okay, I’m here…”
He gathered Natalie into his arms,
letting her tears soak his expensive shirt.
The tenderness and panic in Ethan’s eyes—I’d only seen it once before,
on the day I lost our child.
That sunset had bled like an open wound.
He pressed my hand to his heart, eyes wet,
still forcing a smile as he stroked my face, repeating the words he’d told me a thousand times:
“Don’t be afraid. It’s okay, I’m here…”
But now, when he looked at me, his eyes held only ice.
“If you want a divorce, then divorce.”
I laughed.
I had failed to force this divorce even with my life.
Turns out, all it took was Natalie getting a little hurt.
A violent cramp knifed through me again—
worse than the day I lost the baby.
I doubled over; a shoulder slammed into mine.
Ethan carried Natalie out.
I fell to my knees.
