Chapter 1Torn Between Me and His Ex

The year my son, Charlie Pattison, turned seven, my husband, Jim Pattison, stopped hiding it.

He brought a poor mother and her son into our world without a shred of shame. Word got around fast, and no shortage of people came sniffing for gossip, eager to watch me fall apart. I swallowed my pride and said nothing.

Then that woman's son slapped Charlie at school.

That was the last straw. I told Charlie to hit him back.

That night, Jim—who hadn't set foot in our house in a month—showed up out of nowhere. Charlie burst into tears of joy and threw his arms open to run to him.

What he got in return was a slap across the face.

* * *

That slap knocked the smile off my son's face and shattered my composure right along with it.

For the first time in my life, I threw away every scrap of the composure I'd been raised with and shoved Jim Pattison, hard.

My son's face was streaked with tears, but he rushed straight into my arms.

"Mom, it doesn't hurt," he said, panicked. "Please don't be angry."

Hearing Charlie comfort me like that only made my chest ache worse. In a boy of just seven, I could see a maturity that had no business belonging to someone his age—enough that even after being struck himself, his first instinct was to protect what was left between his parents.

Jim didn't seem to notice any of it. He looked at me for two silent seconds, his eyes cold and indifferent beneath his brow.

"You two already have more than enough," he said. "Don't be so ungrateful."

Fury surged through me. Ungrateful? What did I have to be grateful for?

Back then, it was Jim who'd approached my family for this marriage. I'd heard the stories about him—that he'd once fallen for an orphan girl, only for his family to step in and end it before it went anywhere. So I'd turned him down outright.

He hadn't given up. He'd chased me across the country and then all the way to Scandinavia. Wherever I went, by the next day someone had already picked up the tab on my behalf. He was refined but decisive, commanding without ever overstepping. A year of that kind of pursuit, and I'd fallen for him.

The first five years of our marriage were passionate. We fought sometimes, sure, but we rarely stayed angry more than a few days before things were right between us again. My mother used to say we bickered like an old married couple who couldn't stay mad at each other if they tried.

Then Elizabeth Johnson came back into his life, and all of it fell apart with barely any effort at all.

Jim's attention started drifting. First, he forgot our anniversary, then our son's birthday. Then came the long absences, always excused as work. And now, he didn't even bother pretending anymore—he'd started bringing that woman and her son into our social circle, in full view of everyone we knew.

It was a slap to my face, plain and simple. I could live with being humiliated myself. But watching her son bully my own child? That was something no mother could just accept.

So I calmly had the housekeeper take Charlie to his room, then turned to Jim and said, "Let's get a divorce."

The living room went dead silent.

Jim had been drinking water. He stopped mid-sip and turned to look at me, his eyes full of mockery.

"You want a divorce over one slap?"

Before I could answer, he stepped closer, his meaning unmistakable. "Your family's Brightwater project is about to launch, isn't it? Does your father even have time to deal with your problems?"

He'd gone straight for the throat. My family's cash flow had been tight the past two years, and Jim really had helped more than once. But he'd read the situation wrong—my parents would never trade my happiness for money.

Seeing me go quiet, he must have assumed I was scared, because he reached out on instinct to touch my face. His hand found nothing but air the moment I turned away, and his expression went dark.

He scoffed and turned to walk out—and that was when our son suddenly burst forward, as if he'd been listening for exactly this moment.

"Dad, Mom and I made dinner together tonight. Eat with us."

His voice was earnest, his small hand fisted so tight in Jim's jacket that his knuckles had gone white.

Jim didn't answer. He just looked over at me instead, that unhurried, unbothered expression making it clear he was waiting for me to be the one to back down.

Anger flared in my chest again, but then I looked at my son—the handprint still red on his cheek, and still, somehow, hungry for his father's love.