Secretly pregnant for the billionaire

The sound of a silver knife scraping against a ceramic plate filled the dining room. It was an unpleasant noise that pierced the silence Aysel had worked hard to create all afternoon.

She glanced at the man sitting across from her. Her husband.

David was cutting into the steak she had marinated for six hours. He didn’t bother looking up.

He didn’t notice her new dress or the way she had pinned her hair back, revealing the delicate curve of her neck. He was focused only on the food in front of him and the phone vibrating next to his wine glass.

Aysel took a sip of water to swallow the lump in her throat. This was their routine. She created perfection, and he consumed it without tasting anything.

“The steak is good,” David said, finally looking her way. His eyes were empty. They used to be warm and full of promises and laughter, but now they just reflected her own desperation.

“I’m glad,” Aysel replied. Her voice sounded thin to her. “I tried a new recipe.”

He hummed in response and grabbed his wine. He drank deeply before putting the glass down with a loud clink, then he cleared his throat.

Aysel froze, she knew that sound. It was the sound he made before he delivered bad news or a lie. She gripped the edge of the table, her knuckles becoming white.

“Aysel,” he started. He didn’t use her pet name. He hadn’t used it in years. “We need to be realistic about us.”

She stayed silent. She had learned that silence was safer than asking questions she didn’t want answered.

“I have needs,” he continued, his voice gaining a strange confidence. “And I know you have been unhappy. We are stuck in a rut, I read some books, and I believe there’s a way to fix this without tearing everything apart.”

He paused, waiting for her to nod, to agree, to be the compliant wife she had been for five years.

Aysel didn’t nod, she just stared at the candlelight flickering between them.

“I think we should open the marriage,” he said. The words hung in the air like smoke.

Aysel felt as if she had been physically struck. A dull, heavy sensation settled in her chest. She looked at him, really looked at him, searching for a sign of a joke in his expression.

There was none, he appeared to be a man who had finally found a way to have his cake and eat it too.

“Open the marriage,” she repeated. The words felt strange on her tongue. “You want to sleep with other women.”

David sighed, an impatient sound that made her skin crawl. “It isn’t just about sex, Aysel, It’s about freedom, It’s about relieving the pressure on us. I wouldn’t need to hide things, and you wouldn’t have to worry. We could stay married, keep the house, the life, the image. We just wouldn’t pretend we are enough for each other anymore.”

He admitted it so easily, he wasn’t confessing a mistake, he was confessing a lifestyle. All those late nights at the office and business trips stretching into weekends, the unfamiliar perfume on his shirts that she had convinced herself was just detergent.

He wasn’t asking for permission to start cheating, he was asking for permission to stop lying about it.

Aysel looked down at her plate. “And me?” she asked softly. “What do I get out of this?”

David shrugged and picked up his fork again. “You get to keep your life as Mrs. Vance. If you want, you can find someone too, I won’t stop you, do what you need to be happy, as long as you are discreet.”

He didn’t think she would do it, she could see it in the arrogant set of his jaw. He thought she was too weak, too conservative, and too in love with him to ever let another man touch her. He was offering her a freedom he believed she would never embrace.

He was counting on her brokenness.

Something inside her shifted.

For five years, she had cried and pleaded, she had starved herself to be thinner. She had changed her hair to always look new for him, she had read books on how to be a better wife, she had swallowed her pride until she choked on it.

And this was her reward.

She looked at David, he was already checking his phone again, a small smile on his lips as he read a text message. He didn’t think about her pain, he thought about the woman waiting on the other end of that phone.

The tears Aysel expected did not come. Instead, a cold numbness spread through her veins. It began in her fingertips and moved up to her heart, freezing everything it touched.

If perfection meant nothing to him, she would stop trying to be perfect.

“Okay,” Aysel said.

David’s head snapped up. He looked shocked, as if he hadn’t expected it to be this easy. “Okay?”

“Yes,” she said. Her voice was steady, which frightened her. “If that is what you want, an open marriage.”

David smiled, it was the biggest smile he had given her in months. He reached across the table and patted her hand.

“You are making the right choice, Aysel, you will see, this is going to save us.”

He returned to his steak, cutting into it with vigor. He had won, he had his wife and his freedom.

Aysel picked up her wine glass and drained it in one long swallow, she set the glass down and stood up.

“Where are you going?” David asked, his mouth full.

“I have a headache,” Aysel lied. “I’m going to bed, you can clean up.”

She didn’t wait for his response, she walked out of the dining room. Her heels clicked on the hardwood floor as she climbed the stairs, passing the wedding photos in the hallway, the guest room she had decorated with hope, and into their bedroom.

She closed the door and locked it.

She walked to the mirror and stared at her reflection. She looked the same in every way, but the woman staring back at her felt like a stranger.

David wanted an open arrangement, he wanted a deal.

She reached for her phone, opened the browser, and typed in the name of the exclusive agency her friend had whispered about months ago. A service for elite women wanting discretion and quality.

She wasn’t going to cry tonight and wouldn’t wait up for him, she wouldn’t even wonder whose bed he was in.

She scrolled through the site until she found the booking page, she didn’t look at the profiles, she didn’t care about the names or faces, she just wanted someone who wasn’t David.

She selected the most expensive option, the Platinum Package.

One night, she typed in the request box. No talking, no names, tonight.

She hit send.

Aysel looked at the ring on her finger. She twisted it, feeling the weight of the diamond.

“You want to play a game, David?” she whispered to the empty room.

She pulled the ring off her finger and dropped it onto the dresser. It spun for a moment before settling with a hollow sound.

“Let’s play.”

The taxi ride blurred with lights and rain-streaked windows. The hotel lobby was worse, It was too bright, too quiet, and smelled overwhelmingly of lilies.

Aysel kept her head down as she walked toward the elevators, clutching her purse tightly against her side as if it were a shield. Inside was the envelope of cash she had withdrawn from the emergency fund she had started three years ago. Her heart pounded against her ribs, a frantic rhythm that made her hands shake as she pressed the button for the top floor. She wondered if anyone could see the shame branding her skin or if she just looked like another wealthy wife meeting her husband for a drink.

The elevator climbed, and her stomach dropped, twisting with nausea, fear, and a terrible thrill that made her knees weak.

She had never done anything like this. She had never stepped outside the lines David had drawn for her. But the memory of his indifferent face at dinner burned in her mind and spurred her steps as the doors slid open.

The hallway was lined with thick carpet that muffled the sound of her heels. The silence was heavy, pressing in as she counted the numbers on the brass plaques until she reached the suite at the end of the hall.

The door was heavy and dark. She hesitated, her hand hovering over the handle. For a second, she almost turned back. She was Aysel Vance, a good woman who didn’t buy men. But then she remembered the empty side of her bed and how David looked through her like she was glass. She bit her lip until it bled and pushed the door open, slipping inside before her courage could crumble.

The suite was dim, lit only by city lights filtering through the floor-to-ceiling windows. The air smelled of scotch and cedar. She closed the door behind her.

“You’re early.”

The voice came from the shadows near the window, deep and rough. Aysel froze, her breath catching as a figure stepped into the light.

He was taller than she expected, broader in the shoulders. The darkness hid his face, but she felt the weight of his gaze. He wasn’t wearing the suit she imagined an escort would wear—just a white dress shirt with the top buttons undone and sleeves rolled up, revealing muscular forearms. He held a glass of amber liquid in one large hand.

“I didn’t want to wait,” she whispered, her voice trembling. She forced herself to step forward. This was a transaction, and she was the one paying. “I was told the agency said you would be discreet.”

He didn’t respond immediately. He took a slow sip from his drink and watched her.

“Discreet,” he repeated, rolling the word off his tongue with dark amusement. “Is that what you need?”

“I need a lot of things,” Aysel said, she walked further into the room until she stood just a few feet away from him. She could see his face now—a sharp jawline, a straight nose, and eyes dark and frighteningly intense. For a moment, panic flickered within her. He didn’t seem like a man who took orders, he looked like a man who gave them.

But she was too far gone to stop now, so she reached into her purse and pulled out the envelope, placing it on the small table between them with a trembling hand.

“That’s for your time,” she said, her heart pounding so hard she thought he might hear it. “I don’t want to know your name, and I don’t want you to ask for mine because this is just for tonight.”

He looked at the money and then back to her face, his eyes narrowing slightly as he swept his gaze over her nervous hands and flushed cheeks. A strange expression crossed his face that made her skin prickle.

"No names," he murmured, setting his glass down on the table next to the money without checking inside the envelope. "And no talking?"

"No talking," she breathed. She closed the distance between them, reaching out to touch the front of his shirt. If she thought about it for one more second, she would run away. "Just make me forget everything."

His body went rigid under her touch, warm and hard as stone. She thought he was going to push her away, but then his hand came up and wrapped around her wrist. His fingers were long. He pulled her closer until her chest brushed against his. The scent of him filled her nose and made her head spin.

"Be careful," he warned, his voice a low rumble that vibrated through her bones. He leaned down until his lips were hovering just inches from hers. "If we start this, there is no going back."

"I don't want to go back," Aysel whispered, and she meant it. She closed her eyes and tipped her head back, surrendering to the darkness and the dangerous stranger who felt nothing like the mistake she knew he was, and everything like the disaster she had been waiting for.