I Gave Him Freedom ,He Came Crawling Back in Tears

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When I walked into the break room at the office and saw my husband with the intern, tangled together in front of the mirror, I didn't lose my mind. I didn't scream or take photos for evidence. I didn't swallow it down and plot my revenge in silence.

Instead, I went to the legal department, had a divorce agreement drawn up, and sat in his office waiting for them to finish.

When they finally came out, Damien Ashford had the girl wrapped up tight, shielded behind him like something precious.

"I lost control. That's on me," he said. "Tell me what you want. Just don't go after her."

I stared at the way he stood in front of her, protective, fierce, like she was the most important thing in the world.

Exactly the way he'd stood in front of my parents ten years ago, fighting for me.

"You won't pay for her treatment? Then I will! It's just cancer! I'll sell everything I own to save her! You don't want her? Fine. I do. From this day forward, I'm the only family she has!"

The memory cut through me like a blade.

I smiled through the ache in my chest.

Calmly, I slid the divorce agreement across the desk toward him.

"Consider this my way of repaying the debt I owe you for saving my life. After this, we're even."

The girl's trembling, breathy moans had announced the end of their little session.

Damien had strolled out with Joanna Mason on his arm, taking his time.

When he saw me, a flicker of panic crossed his face.

It vanished just as quickly.

He pulled Joanna, still unsteady on her feet, onto the couch beside him and settled back, expression flat.

"I was planning to find the right time to tell you. But since you found out on your own, I'll just be straight with you."

"The passion between us is gone. All that's left is habit. As long as you can make room for her, nothing has to change."

His words sliced through my heart like a knife.

I never imagined he'd sleep with his secretary.

And I certainly never imagined he'd confess to it so casually, as if cheating were no worse than telling a small lie.

My fists clenched at my sides. My voice shook.

"How long."

He twisted the wedding band around his finger.

"A year and a half."

That was when I'd finished my last round of chemo.

I opened my mouth to say something.

Before I could, Joanna clutched her stomach.

"Mr. Ashford, I... my stomach hurts."

Damien didn't bother asking what I'd been about to say. He called the family doctor immediately.

Dr. Toby Dickerson arrived within fifteen minutes. After checking her pulse, his expression turned uneasy. His gaze drifted to me for just a moment before he spoke.

"Ms. Mason is pregnant. The frequency of intercourse likely caused some irritation. She should go to the hospital for a proper exam."

Joanna's eyes reddened. She swatted at Damien's arm, half-pouting, half-scolding.

"This is your fault. You didn't use protection last time. And just now you were so rough, going so many rounds even after I told you to stop."

Damien lowered his head as if no one else existed in the room.

"My fault. It won't happen again."

The tenderness in his voice sent a tremor through me.

He hadn't spoken to me that gently in a very long time.

I dug my nails into my palms to keep the tears from falling.

Only then did Joanna seem to notice I was there. She pulled away from his embrace, putting on a wounded expression.

"Mr. Ashford, please don't act like this in front of her. She'll be hurt. And this baby... maybe we shouldn't keep it. It's not exactly proper, is it?"

Damien's brow furrowed. He caught her hand and held it tight.

"What do you mean, 'shouldn't keep it'? I chose to be with you, and I'll take responsibility. You focus on carrying this baby to term. Don't worry about anything else."

"We're going to the hospital. Now."

He scooped her up and rushed toward the door.

As he swept past me, the gust from his coat knocked me off balance. I stumbled backward.

His stride faltered for half a second. He didn't turn around.

"Go home. And don't come by the office unless you have to. She gets nervous around you."

The pain I'd been holding back for so long spread from the place where I'd been knocked aside, flooding every inch of my body. Tears streamed down my face, one after another, and he never once looked back.

I knew I was no longer the woman whose single teardrop could send him into a panic.

I stood there, alone in his office, surrounded by traces of a younger woman everywhere I looked.

Contraceptives in the drawer. Matching sets of Joanna's lingerie.

Sometime, without my noticing, a handful of pretty-colored lipsticks had appeared in the pen holder.

A cutesy label stuck to the file rack read: Think of me today too!

So that was what it all meant. The indifference at home. The phone I was never allowed to touch. The nights he slipped out at two or three in the morning, always with some excuse. It was all because he'd found someone more important.

And the life I owed him meant I couldn't even look him in the eye and demand to know why.

I laughed bitterly at myself.

Then I called my lawyer.

"Draw up a divorce agreement. I won't claim a single asset."

I sat alone on the couch and waited until well past midnight before Damien finally came home.

When he saw my face, the smile he'd walked in with faded. Out of habit, he reached for my sleeping pills.

"Can't sleep again? Didn't I tell you not to stay up late?"

I didn't answer. I handed him the signed divorce agreement.

My voice was hoarse.

"She's pregnant. I've thought about it for a long time. Since you love her, I'll step aside. Consider it repayment for saving my life."

Damien paused. A flash of anger crossed his eyes, barely perceptible.

He tore the agreement to shreds.

"Her getting pregnant was something I planned for. Your health has been too poor to carry a child all these years. Her baby will be your baby."

"I'm not divorcing you. After all this time, I'm the only person you have. I'll give you respectability and dignity. But love? All of it goes to her now. I owe her that."

"She and I already talked it through. She doesn't want a title. She just wants to be with me. You don't need to worry about her threatening your position. Just focus on raising the child when it comes, and stop overthinking things that don't matter."

A delayed, wrenching pain bloomed behind my ribs.

I couldn't reconcile the distant man standing in front of me with the boy who'd once sat at my bedside, holding my hand, swearing he would never let go.

Right after college, I'd been diagnosed with early-stage cancer.

My parents had been planning to marry me off for money. The moment they found out I was sick, they disappeared.

Damien gave up his graduate studies and threw himself into the business world.

He clawed his way up from nothing to CEO of a publicly traded company.

He gave me the best medical care money could buy, and I got to love him for a few more years.

During that time, Victoria tried more than once to push me out.

He fought her off by threatening his own life, telling her I would be his only wife, his only love, for as long as he lived.

For a while, I truly believed we were the couple from a fairy tale who'd weathered every storm and finally earned their happy ending.

But reality delivered its blow the moment I let myself believe the happiness would last.

Damien saw the color drain from my face. His tone softened.

"There's nothing wrong with you. I just... don't feel it anymore."

"It's late. Get some rest. I've reassigned Dr. Dickerson to look after her. Your health is more or less stable now. If anything comes up, just go to the hospital."

Dr. Dickerson had taken care of me for five years. A top-tier physician Damien had hired at an exorbitant salary, just for me.

I'd told him before that I was nearly recovered, that I didn't need a personal doctor anymore.

He was the one who'd insisted my condition should never be taken lightly.

I said nothing. I gathered my things and headed for the guest bedroom.

Damien caught my wrist on instinct, then stopped himself.

"That's probably for the best. She's pregnant and emotionally fragile. Separate rooms will give her a sense of security. Tomorrow, find time to move all your things into the guest room."

During chemotherapy.

The pain had kept me up whole nights, and my restlessness kept him from sleeping too.

Once, I'd crept to another room in the middle of the night. He'd been furious. He carried me back to bed.

Back then, he said he couldn't rest easy unless he was right beside me.

That he couldn't settle down unless he could breathe in my scent.

From that night on, for more than two thousand days and nights, we'd fallen asleep in each other's arms.

All those arguments, all those cold wars, and none of it had ever driven us apart.

Now he was saving himself for someone else.

I bit down on my lower lip until I tasted copper, and I walked out of that bedroom step by agonizing step, each one like treading on nails. That bedroom that had held the full weight of everything we'd been to each other.

That night, tears soaked through my pillow.

I had lost the last person in this world who loved me.

The next morning, I dragged myself out of bed with a pounding head and took the divorce papers to Victoria Ashford's house.

She had never liked me. In her eyes, I was dead weight shackled to her son's ankle.

The moment she heard Joanna was carrying the Ashford heir, she couldn't wait for me to disappear.

She drew up a new divorce agreement with barely concealed delight.

Out of what she called my "self-awareness," she offered me ten percent of the assets.

Every other word was a warning, spoken and unspoken: take the money and never come near Damien again.

I didn't refuse.

After all, two weeks ago, doctors had found the tumor had come back.

They still weren't sure whether it was benign or malignant.

She had no interest in small talk, but for once, she softened her tone.

"I'll find a way to make him sign. You just focus on planning your next chapter."

The housekeeper escorted me out of the Ashford residence with polite efficiency.

I walked home in a daze.

But before I even made it through the door, Damien's men grabbed me and hauled me to the hospital.

Outside the operating room, he stood with bloodshot eyes. His hand cracked across my face.

"Who told you to go running to my mother about Joanna's pregnancy? You know she despises illegitimate children! If I'd gotten there a minute later, she would've dragged Joanna to get an abortion!"

"Yesterday you sat there acting so calm and above it all. Turns out you were playing hard to get the whole time! If anything happens to her, what could you possibly do to make up for it?"

The sting blazed across my cheek, then faded into numbness.

Years ago, he had stepped in front of my father's hand and taken a slap meant for me.

He'd promised me that day that he would never let another person hurt me for as long as he lived.

And now he was the one who struck me without a shred of mercy.

I swallowed my tears and opened my mouth to speak, but the operating room doors swung open.

The panic on his face was worse than when I'd had my miscarriage a year ago.

The surgeon's expression was grim.

"The patient is showing signs of hemorrhaging. She's still in critical care. Family members need to arrange a blood source immediately."

Damien's eyes locked onto me, fury spilling over.

"Are you satisfied now? If anything happens to her or the baby, don't think for a second you'll walk away unscathed!"

He dragged me to the blood donation room.

"She's the same blood type as the patient. Draw hers and have it on standby."

I stared at him in disbelief.

A year ago, we'd had a child of our own.

But my health had been poor, the anemia severe.

Shortly after it was discovered, the bleeding started, and I lost the baby.

Dr. Dickerson frowned.

"Mr. Ashford, your wife's health isn't great either. After her last hemorrhage... why don't you use mine instead?"

A flicker of hesitation crossed Damien's eyes, but the surgeon was pressing, and his voice turned cold.

"Use hers. The blood type's a match."

The needle twisted inside my vein, and I couldn't stop myself from trembling.

He never once looked at me. His gaze stayed fixed on the operating room doors.

The surgery light finally went dark. Voices murmured nearby.

My consciousness had blurred too far to make out the words.

After what felt like forever, I thought it was finally over. I thought I could leave. Then hands pressed my arms down.

A second needle pierced my other arm.

Damien's urgent voice cut through the haze beside me.

Not because I was losing consciousness.

Because

"Don't switch donors! Joanna's constitution is fragile. It's better if one person provides all the blood to avoid complications. However much it takes, I need her and the baby safe!"

As the world dimmed around me, I almost wished I would just die right there.

Give this life back to him. Call us even.

But I didn't die.

When I opened my eyes again, the sky outside was stained with the amber light of dusk.

I was about to sit up when I heard hushed voices from the other side of the curtain.

"It's all my fault. If I hadn't been so insecure back then, if I hadn't begged you to get rid of her baby, she wouldn't have hemorrhaged like that. Her health wouldn't have fallen apart."

"You already lied to her for my sake, and now she's been hurt again because of me. I feel terrible about it."

Damien let out a heavy breath.

"Getting rid of her baby had nothing to do with you. I didn't want it. Her health was already bad. Keeping it would've just been a burden. Besides, I can't give you a title anymore. The only children I'll have will be yours."

"If you really feel guilty, then focus on protecting our baby from now on."

Their voices clung to each other, sickeningly intimate.

It felt like someone had carved a chunk of flesh straight out of my chest.

The pain was suffocating.

He'd told me we'd be just as happy even without a child.

He'd told me I was the only person he'd ever need in this lifetime.

Never in my worst nightmares could I have imagined that the baby I'd mourned through countless sleepless nights had been deliberately taken from meby the man I loved mostjust to soothe his mistress.

I clenched the bedsheets until my knuckles went white. The tears came anyway.

A dull sound of water hitting the floor. Then the curtain was pulled open.

Damien met my eyesdevastated, shattered.

A flicker of guilt crossed his face.

He reached out to wipe my tears.

I flinched away.

He sighed, so faintly it was almost imperceptible.

"Since you heard everything, there's nothing left to explain. Your health was already fragile. Losing the baby was for your own good. Get some rest. I'm taking her to a new room."

The door closed behind him.

I couldn't hold it in any longer. The sobs tore out of me.

I destroyed everything in that room like a woman possessed. The IV stand. The water pitcher. The vase on the nightstand. Everything I could reach, I hurled.

The IV needle ripped sideways through my vein and punctured the skin.

I didn't feel a thing.

If I could choose, I wished I'd died on the operating table during my cancer surgery all those years ago.

Rather than lie here, powerless, while the man I loved most drove the knife in again and again.

Perhaps out of guilt, the gifts poured in throughout the week I spent in the hospital. IV nutrient drips. Herbal tonics. Custom meal plans. Designer jewelry. They flowed into my room like water.

But Damien himself never came.

The doctors mentioned he hadn't left Joanna's side for days. Hadn't slept. Hadn't gone to the office.

The day I was discharged, he came to pick me up.

He reached out to help me stand. I pulled away.

His brow creased for a moment, but he didn't insist.

"I know you're hurting. I'm taking you to an auction tonight. Bid on whatever catches your eye."

"Try to let it go. Don't worry about the money. It's the only thing I can give you now."

That evening, his driver brought me to the auction house.

When I stepped out of the car, Damien was helping Joanna out of another one, his arm wrapped around her waist.

The way they moved together, easy and intimateit was identical to the way we'd been when we were in love.

I followed them inside and took my seat, numb.

As if venting every ounce of rage in my body, I bid on every single lot. Items worth a few thousand dollars, I drove up to hundreds of thousands. Millions.

But from start to finish, Damien's attention stayed on Joanna and the pieces she liked.

He didn't look at me once.

Disgust. Hatred. They gnawed through me until there was nothing rational left.

I set down my paddle and fled to the restroom.

Ice-cold water hit my face. I looked up at the mirror. The woman staring back was gaunt, sallow, hollowed out.

Joanna appeared behind me. I hadn't heard her come in.

Porcelain skin. A face full of youth and collagen.

We couldn't have looked more different.

I said nothing. I turned to leave, but she caught my arm.

She ran her hand over her still-flat belly.

"That day at the hospital, I said all of it on purpose so you'd hear every word."

"You saw it yourself. He only has eyes for me now. If it weren't for years of obligation and duty, he would've left you a long time ago."

"If you know what's good for you, you'll leave while he still has a shred of feeling left for you. Stop standing in the way of our happiness."

I paused. The words she wanted to hear were right on the tip of my tongue, but when I saw the brazen provocation in her eyes, I swallowed them back down.

A cold laugh escaped me instead.

"I know you're desperate to push me out so you can take my place. But no matter how desperate you are, it won't change a thing. As long as I'm here, you'll always be the other woman, and the baby in your belly will always be illegitimate."

"That child will still have to call me 'Mom.' He'll be the one taking care of me in my old age. And I'll make sure he grows up knowing that homewreckers are the most despicable creatures on this earth." I tilted my head. "Does that sound like a happy life to you?"

Joanna's fury was impossible to hide. Her eyes went bloodshot as she glared at me.

"You won't shed a tear until you see your own coffin! Fine. Keep running your mouth. Since you refuse to leave on your own, I'll help you on your way."

I ignored her empty threat.

When I stepped out of the restroom, Damien's worried gaze landed on me and instantly hardened into suspicion.

It wasn't until Joanna emerged behind me, perfectly unharmed, that his shoulders finally dropped and he exhaled.

The auction ended, and Damien got a work call. He told the driver to make sure both Joanna and I got home safely, then climbed into a separate car and headed to the office.

The ride was silent. Neither of us said a word.

But I noticed the road we were on wasn't the route home. It wasn't the route to Joanna's place either.

I opened my mouth to say something, and a sharp chop slammed into the back of my neck.

When I came to, the roar of waves crashed against my ears. Wind tore through me, and I couldn't stop shaking.

My arms were bound behind my back. No matter how hard I struggled, the restraints wouldn't give.

I looked up. Several men in black balaclavas stood before us, flipping knives lazily between their fingers.

Joanna was tied up too, standing right beside me on the edge of a cliff.

But she looked perfectly at ease, watching me without a trace of the panic a kidnapping victim should have.

"What are you doing?" I demanded.

She let out a quiet, mocking laugh.

"Making sure you die knowing exactly why."

The moment the words left her lips, a thick strip of duct tape sealed my mouth shut.

They grabbed the ropes and lowered us over the cliff's edge, dangling us above the churning sea.

A phone rang, the sound swallowed and thrown back by the open water.

Damien's frantic voice came through the speaker.

"What do you want? Whatever it is, take it up with me! Let them go!"

One of the men laughed, dragging the edge of his blade across the rope in slow, deliberate strokes.

"What do I want? Payback. You ruined my life back then."

"Now your wife and your mistress's baby are both in my hands. Pick one. The other goes over the edge to feed the sharks."

Joanna burst into tears, sobbing so hard her whole body shook.

"Mr. Ashford, don't worry about me! You're the rising star of the business world. Everyone's watching you. I can't let you be branded a cheater who abandoned his wife and child because of me."

She turned to me, tears streaming. "Millie, I'm willing to die for him! Please, just make this stop!"

That single performance sent Damien into a blind rage.

"Millie Rowe, your jealousy has finally driven you over the edge! I already told you I wouldn't divorce you. What more do you want from me?"

"Now you're staging a kidnapping to threaten me? I don't have time for your games. If a single hair on Joanna's head is harmed, I will make you pay!"

I couldn't speak. All I could do was let the tears fall.

The kidnapper fixed me with a chilling stare.

"So you're choosing to let your wife feed the sharks?"

Damien faltered. A thread of unease coiled through him.

A flicker of doubt crossed his mind, but the instant he saw the terror on Joanna's face, it vanished without a trace.

"Cut the act! I'm not falling for this little stunt! She wants to jump? Let her jump! Maybe the ocean can wash that filthy heart of hers clean! Just bring Joanna back to me in one piece!"

I never imagined that in his eyes, I'd become someone whose life was worth gambling with.

I struggled, desperate to explain.

But the tape sealed my mouth shut, and the rope frayed strand by strand beneath me.

I watched Damien's face on the screen. Not a flicker of emotion. Not a single flinch.

Somehow, the weightlessness and the suffocation didn't feel so unbearable anymore.

Tears streamed from my eyes, caught by the wind and smeared across the camera.

His brow twitched, just barely.

He started to speak, but before a word left his lips, the rope snapped with a sharp hiss, and I plummeted into the void.

Through the camera, his panicked face grew smaller and smaller, blurring into nothing.

I closed my eyes.

But the instant I truly hit the water, sinking into the cold black depths, I heard it.

His voice, raw and shattered, screaming my name.

"Millie! No!"