Carrying His Baby Into the Grave

Grace's POV

Everyone says he loved me more than anything. So I chose to answer that love with death.

Forbes cover stories, tearful speeches at charity galas, shutting down Fifth Avenue every Valentine's Day just to watch fireworks with me. They said he ruled a business empire but would kneel in front of the entire world and call me his reason to live.

I used to believe it.

Until I discovered my perfect husband had built another home with another woman. A warm one, filled with laughter and his child.

So I chose to disappear the night the storm swallowed everything.

They say he spent three days on his knees at the cliff's edge, screaming my name into the black ocean. The man worth billions couldn't even find his wife's body.

When the rescue team recovered that burned-out car, he finally opened the safe I'd left for him. Inside was a positive pregnancy test and a divorce agreement that would never be signed.

By then, nothing mattered anymore.

I stand in the kitchen making dinner when a video comes through from an unknown number.

He's on a couch in the video, kissing a little boy's forehead. The child laughs and calls him "Daddy," and I recognize that look in his eyes - I know it too well.

The woman standing nearby - I know her too. Sarah Collins. The one who saved him from an avalanche three years ago.

I tell myself it's fake. That someone's trying to destroy our marriage.

But I can't shake the feeling. I hire a private investigator.

When the detective's email arrives, my entire world collapses.

A lease agreement from June, two years back. Monthly bank transfers, fixed amounts, memo line reading "living expenses." Pediatric records for a child with his last name. A preschool parent-teacher conference sign-in sheet with his handwriting, messy but unmistakable.

I stare at those cold numbers and dates on the screen, realizing what lay behind every "business trip," every "client dinner," every "project negotiation" for the past three years.

The phone slips from my hand. The world spins. My heart pounds, and all I can think is: How could you be this stupid?

Everything goes black.

When I wake up, he's beside my bed.

Bloodshot eyes. Two days of stubble on his jaw.

"Grace." He grips my hand, his voice raw. "You're awake. Thank God, you're finally awake."

The housekeeper tells me Alexander was in the middle of a cross-border acquisition when he got the call. He said nothing, just shoved past everyone and ran out of the building. Manhattan to Long Island, he had the driver push it to 120.

Two days, two nights without sleep.

I look at the fear and love in his eyes. So real. Real enough that I almost doubt the evidence I saw.

But that makes it hurt worse.

If he didn't love me, the betrayal might not cut so deep. But he does love me, and he still chose another woman, another home.

I saved his life. Seven years ago in that car accident, I threw myself in front of him. In return, I got a grand wedding and a love story the whole world knew.

Sarah saved him too. Behind my back, she got a child and a warm family.

Is this how he thanks every woman who saves his life?

"Who hurt you?" he asks, his thumb brushing the back of my hand. "Tell me and I'll handle it."

I smell perfume on him. Sweet and floral, nothing I'd ever wear. And fainter, the scent of baby powder.

My stomach lurches.

I push him away and stumble toward the bathroom, dropping to my knees in front of the toilet.

He follows, kneeling beside me, wiping my face with a warm towel.

"It's okay, I'm here," he says quietly. "I'm not going anywhere."

The words remind me of that car accident seven years ago.

When I threw myself in front of that out-of-control car, my uterus was severely damaged. The doctor said my chances of getting pregnant were under five percent. Seven years of medications, countless treatments, three failed IVF attempts. Each one a cycle from hope to despair.

So much pain I almost gave up.

Then last month, two lines appeared on the pregnancy test.

I'd prepared a delicate baby shoe box, planning to surprise him tonight at a candlelit dinner. I wanted to see that look of disbelief and joy on his face, hear him say "we're finally having a baby."

But now, kneeling on this bathroom floor while he takes care of me, all I feel is nausea.

Not from morning sickness. From disgust.

Disgust at his lies, at my own stupidity.

"I need to tell you something..." I lift my head. I want to ask why he betrayed me, tell him I'm pregnant, hear his explanation.

His phone vibrates.

He glances at the screen. His expression shifts.

"Sorry babe." He kisses my forehead. "Emergency at work. I'll have the housekeeper take care of you."

Then he leaves.

Just like that.

Forty minutes later, the same number sends another photo.

It's a children's hospital ER corridor. Alexander holds that little boy, looking exhausted but gentle. The angle is deliberate. Meant for me.

She wants me to know - even late at night, even after I collapsed, if that child needs him, he'll drop everything.

I stare at the photo and force out a laugh. It sounds like broken glass.

After telling the housekeeper I'm fine, I go back to the bedroom and call my best friend Emma.

"I need you to help me stage a car accident," I say. "One that's real enough nobody questions it."

Three seconds of silence on the other end.

"What? Are you insane? You..."

"Alexander's cheating." I cut her off, my voice steady. "But he won't let me leave. He'll use every connection to find me. The only way out is to die."

After hanging up, I start destroying the past.

Every piece of jewelry he gave me goes into the garbage disposal. I watch the blades tear them apart. Ten years of love letters, ripped up and flushed down the toilet. I burn the wedding vows he wrote by hand.

And that baby shoe box I'd prepared.

I stand in front of the fireplace, watching the pink ribbon curl and blacken in the flames.

Forever turned out to burn pretty fast.

My phone vibrates again.

Emma's message: "You're really doing this over a guy?"

I reply: "Not for him. For myself. He won't let go, so I have to disappear."

3 AM. The final message arrives. "Coastal highway. Three days from now. Everything's ready."

I turn off my phone and stare out at the dark ocean. "Enough."