Ficorpio
Chapter 1
Cold light spilled from the crystal chandelier in the gilded private lounge. Adrian Sterling ran a fingertip over the frosted side of his whiskey glass. Condensation slid down the crystal and soaked a small dark stain into the expensive cashmere carpet.
He remained silent for a full thirty seconds. His throat worked before he finally said, “Victoria came from the wrong kind of family. The Sterlings never approved of her to begin with, and after Alexander died, they only tightened the screws. I had no choice but to find a fraud and announce that she was the only woman I would ever marry. That way, my mother would direct all her anger at Chloe.”
Across from him, his childhood friend Noah Reed took a sip of his drink and tapped his fingers against the table.
“Honestly, Adrian, Chloe may have lied about who she was, but the way she looks at you? That love is real. When your ulcer put you in the hospital, she stayed beside your bed for three days and nights. Her eyes were bloodshot by the end. And when your mother deliberately sent her across the city in the middle of the night for pastries from that exclusive bakery, she searched through a blizzard without a word of complaint.”
Adrian’s brow tightened almost imperceptibly. His fingers closed around the glass, and a ridge of ice bit painfully into his skin.
“Everything I’ve done has been to secure Victoria and Andy’s place in the family. She suffered too much when she saved my life all those years ago. I owe her.”
“As for Chloe…” He paused, his voice as detached as if he were discussing an insignificant business arrangement. “We both got what we wanted. She wanted to be Mrs. Sterling. I needed someone to draw the fire away from Victoria. That’s all.”
Noah swirled the amber liquor in his glass, his smile loaded with meaning.
“If you can’t let Victoria go, why not divorce Chloe and marry her? Alexander’s gone. There’s no one left to stand in your way.”
“I’ve never considered divorcing Chloe.” The answer came too quickly, a trace of urgency slipping into Adrian’s voice. “I plan to send Victoria and Andy abroad. When Andy comes of age, he’ll take over the Sterling family.”
Noah raised an eyebrow. “Anyone listening would think Andy was your biological son. You even had a vasectomy for his sake. If Chloe ever finds out, she’ll lose her mind.”
Adrian tipped back his head and drained his glass. The whiskey burned his throat, but resolve flashed in his eyes.
“I’ll never have children of my own. Victoria’s son is my son.”
On the other side of the door, I clutched the Pregnancy Ultrasound Report so tightly that my knuckles turned white and the paper crumpled beneath my fingers.
The tiny black speck on the scan was our child.
I had gone to the hospital alone that morning, keeping the appointment secret from everyone because I wanted the news to be a surprise. Our wedding anniversary was three days away. I had planned to give Adrian the greatest gift imaginable.
Chapter 2
Instead, I had arrived in time to hear the truth, each word dipped in poison.
No wonder the staff at the Sterling estate had always looked at me with a mixture of contempt and pity. No wonder my mother-in-law had asked the same question every time I visited: “Are you pregnant yet?”
Whenever the answer was no, she made me kneel outside in the snow, even in the bitterest depths of winter.
And every time, Adrian had returned just in time to save me. He would rub my frozen fingers between his palms, fumbling with worry as he called me foolish.
I had even nuzzled against his chin and told him, “I’m not cold. Not when you’re here.”
It turned out I had been a joke from the very beginning.
They had always known I was a fraud. They knew I had fabricated the identity of a wealthy heiress educated abroad to get close to him. Instead of exposing me, they had used my lie against me, deliberately placing me in the line of fire so I would endure every insult and ounce of hostility meant for Victoria.
I lowered my eyes to the tiny black shape on the ultrasound.
My fingertip brushed over it gently.
Then I slowly crushed the report into a ball and hurled it into the trash.
It landed with a dull thud, like the sound of my heart breaking apart.
Divorce.
I had to divorce him.
The attending physician studied my chart, checking it several times before looking up at me.
“Ms. Bennett, your condition is unusual. Your uterine wall is thinner than normal. This is your first pregnancy, and it may be your only chance to conceive naturally. If you terminate now, your chance of becoming pregnant again will be less than five percent. You may lose the ability to have children altogether.”
I sat frozen in the examination room, cold from head to toe. Something seemed lodged in my throat, choking off every word.
My grandmother Margaret Hayes’s smiling face flashed through my mind.
When I was little, my parents divorced. My mother took my older sister, the sweet one who knew how to charm people, while my father chose my younger brother, the son he wanted to carry on the family name.
Only Grandma pulled me into her arms.
“Our Chloe is precious,” she told me. “Grandma will always love you.”
She scrimped and saved to put me through school, keeping the best of everything for me. She taught me how to paint and told me to live like a sunflower, always turning toward the light.
But eventually, Grandma left me too.
I became a weed growing unseen in an empty field, struggling to survive every storm alone.
Then Adrian Sterling appeared.
Chapter 3
He was the first person to notice me in a crowd. The first person to say, “I’m taking you home.”
All those moments when he had chosen me without hesitation, all those memories of his tenderness and care, had made me secretly dream of having a child with him after we married. A tiny life carrying something of us both.
I wanted to give that child all the love Grandma had given me, along with all the love I thought Adrian had given me.
Now I finally understood.
Every tender moment had been an illusion. Every promise had been a lie.
He didn’t love me.
He had only used me.
I clenched the hem of my shirt and was about to say, “I understand,” when my phone suddenly vibrated in my pocket.
The screen lit up.
Victoria Sinclair - Sister-in-Law.
My fingers trembled as I answered.
“Chloe, let’s meet.” Victoria’s gentle voice came through the phone, edged with a subtle sense of superiority. “I’m waiting for you at Rendezvous Café downtown. There are certain things we should clear up face-to-face.”
The call ended.
I looked at the concern in the physician’s eyes and forced a bloodless smile.
“Please give me a little more time. I need to think.”
Soft piano music drifted through Rendezvous Café, but it did nothing to dispel the chill inside me.
Victoria sat beside the window in an ivory cashmere suit, her makeup flawless and a slim cigarette poised between her fingers. Curling smoke blurred her features.
The coffee in front of her had long since gone cold, untouched. She stirred it idly with a spoon.
“Were you the one who asked Adrian to send Andy and me abroad?”
“I wasn’t.”
I sat down across from her, my voice so calm that it surprised even me.
She gave a quiet laugh, took a black card from her handbag, and slid it to the middle of the table.
“Divorce Adrian. There’s five million dollars on this card. More than enough for a fraud like you to live comfortably for the rest of your life. Take the money, disappear from Adrian’s world, and never bother us again.”
I pushed the card back.
Its cold surface brushed my fingertips, as cold as Adrian’s heart.
“I don’t want your money.”
“Oh?”
Victoria arched an eyebrow and finally looked directly at me, her eyes thick with mockery.
“Then what do you want? Are you planning to fight me for Adrian?” Her lip curled. “Chloe Bennett, have you ever taken a good look at yourself? You’re a fraud whose entire identity is a lie. What makes you think you’re worthy of competing with me?”
She set down her spoon, her voice turning smug.
“Do you know what Adrian was like when he pursued me? Back in college, I once casually mentioned that I wanted oatmeal from an old café on the south side of town. It was well below freezing, but he stood in line for two hours. He kept the container tucked inside his coat so it was still warm when he brought it to me.”