Chapter 1His Shadow Vow

The divorce proceedings between Grant Harrison and his society-arranged wife finally concluded in their eighth year.

I was carrying a thermos of chicken soup that had been simmering for five hours when I went to Grant’s office.

The ultrasound picture was folded carefully in the pocket closest to my heart.

As I reached his office door, the voice of his best friend leaked through the gap.

“Grant, this farce has been going on for seven years. When are you finally going to sign the papers?”

“Audrey was twenty when she got with you, you dated for three years, and she’s waited another seven through this sham of a marriage. She’s almost thirty now. If you have no feelings for your wife, then end it and give Audrey the life she deserves.”

The smile on my face hadn't yet faded when Grant's voice reached my ears.

“His wife is pregnant.”

I froze. He was talking about the other woman. The one he was divorcing.

His friend's voice shot up, incredulous. “Pregnant again? Your first kid is already five, and you’ve been hiding him from Audrey this whole time, terrified she’d find out.”

“You’re about to be divorced, and now there’s a second on the way. What the hell are you going to do?”

Grant was silent for a moment.

“I’m having her keep the baby. I won’t have children with any other woman. That was one of my conditions for agreeing to the divorce.”

My hand clenched the thermos, the searing metal edge digging into my palm.

So this is what it felt like to have your heart carved out.

I pulled out my phone and dialed a number I hadn’t called in a very long time.

“Aunt Helen? I’ll go to Africa with you.”

* * *

After hanging up, I hailed a cab and went home.

The cityscape blurred past the window, a frantic retreat mirroring the absurd decade I’d spent with Grant.

He had said, “Leah, our families are worlds apart. My mother will never approve.”

He had said, “Leah, it’s just a strategic marriage. There are no feelings involved, I swear.”

On his wedding day, he even brought me before his new wife, Audrey, to lay the cards on the table.

That brilliant, vivacious woman swirled a glass of red wine and smiled at me.

“Miss Evans, please. Don’t feel burdened by any of this.”

“I have someone I love, too,” she’d said. “Grant and I are just… mutually beneficial. A means to an end.”

“We’ll divorce when the time is right. You just have to be patient.”

And I waited. For seven years.

Looking back, there were countless opportunities for them to divorce.

Perhaps it wasn’t that they couldn’t.

It was that they didn’t want to.

I dug my nails into the soft flesh of my thigh, hard enough to break the skin, but I felt nothing. Tears streamed down my face in silence.

The driver glanced at me in the rearview mirror and passed back a tissue.

“Hey, whatever it is, you’ll get through it. Don’t give up on yourself.”

“You’re young. You should be out there seeing the world.”

I looked out the window, repeating his words in my mind.

You’ll get through it.

It’s time to go find yourself again, Leah.

When I got home, the sound of the shower was running. Grant was home.

I turned on the television. My aunt was on a live broadcast from Africa, the great wildebeest migration unfolding magnificently behind her. It was the first time I’d watched her photojournalism segments since college.

Seven years ago, Aunt Helen had offered to pay for my graduate studies abroad, to have me join her, flying across the globe.

I was tempted, but I couldn't leave Grant.

He held me and cried the entire night, then had my name tattooed over his heart. The Harrisons were an old-money dynasty with strict rules; tattoos were forbidden.

He broke the cardinal rule for me.

And for that, I loved him with a devotion that left me defenseless. A single gesture from him, and my world would fall apart.