Chapter 1
I’m the laughingstock of Manhattan’s elite social circle, all because in our five years of marriage, my childhood sweetheart husband Lucas Sinclair has cheated on me a hundred times.
The day his new girl deliberately pushed me down the escalator, I overheard his conversation with friends.
“Luke’s got serious skills-five years and he’s turned that cold, proud Warren family heiress into a total doormat.”
Lucas slowly exhaled his cigarette smoke. “Hate lasts longer than love. Even though I’ve loved Vivian to my core and that’s never changed, I can’t let her know.”
“Dude, you’re fucking brilliant. If Vivian had any clue how obsessed you are with her, she’d never be able to leave you no matter how much hell you put her through.”
I listened in silence for a long time, then turned and walked away.
The fact that Lucas Sinclair has loved me desperately from the very beginning-I’ve known that all along.
But what he doesn’t know is that out of the hundred chances I gave him to hurt me, now there are only three left.
As soon as I walked out of the Sinclair Corporation building, I collapsed on the ground.
When I opened my eyes again, I was in the hospital.
The nurse who’d just finished my IV looked at me with pity.
“You just had a miscarriage. Your body’s really weak right now-you should probably call your family.”
I stared blankly as my hand moved to my flat stomach.
It felt hollow and sharp with pain, yet ice cold-like a blizzard was raging inside for the child who’d left in such a hurry.
After sitting there dazed for a while, I called the police.
Less than thirty minutes later, Lucas rushed into the hospital with his new girl Jessica Manning trailing behind him.
She looked like she’d been crying for hours-her eyes and face were all puffy and swollen.
The second she saw me, she dropped to her knees in front of my bed.
“Vivian, I swear what happened today was totally an accident. I didn’t mean to push you, I really didn’t-I fell down that escalator right along with you.”
When Lucas looked at me, his eyes were full of anguish, but the moment our gazes met, that look vanished completely.
As soon as I walked out of the Sinclair Corporation building, I collapsed on the ground.
When I opened my eyes again, I was in the hospital.
The nurse who’d just finished my IV looked at me with pity.
“You just had a miscarriage and your body’s really weak right now-you should probably call your family.”
I stared blankly as my hand moved to my flat stomach.
It felt hollow and sharp with pain, yet ice cold-like a blizzard was raging inside for the child who’d left in such a hurry.
After sitting there dazed for a while, I called the police.
Less than thirty minutes later, Lucas rushed into the hospital with his new girl Jessica Manning trailing behind him.
Chapter 1
She looked like she’d been crying for hours-her eyes and face were all puffy and swollen.
The second she saw me, she dropped to her knees in front of my bed.
“Vivian, I swear what happened today was totally an accident. I didn’t mean to push you, I really didn’t-I fell down that escalator right along with
you.”
When Lucas looked at me, his eyes were full of anguish, but the moment our gazes met, that look vanished completely.
“Vivian, she’s just a kid who entered the workforce this year-innocent and sweet. Look, her hand’s broken too. Be a good girl and drop the charges.”
I let out a bitter laugh.
“I’m not dropping anything.”
“Whether she pushed me on purpose or not, the cops will figure it out.”
Jessica sobbed as she knelt on the floor, bowing her head repeatedly. “I’m so sorry, this is all my fault. I’m nothing, I’m trash. You’re way better than me, Vivian. I deserve to die.”
My defiance made Lucas’s expression turn dark and ugly in an instant.
“Vivian, don’t piss me off. Jess is… different. I want to keep her around and really invest in her future.”
I looked at him with pure mockery.
What’s so special about her? She just happens to look a bit like me.
But of course she does-she’s my half-sister from my mother’s side. How could she not?
“Lucas, we grew up together-you know how much I hate my birth mother. You can screw around with whoever you want, but you should never have touched Jessica Manning.”
A crack suddenly appeared on Lucas’s stone-cold expression, but he quickly covered it up.
“None of that matters. Jess is young-she can’t have something like this on her record. Drop the charges.”
“What if I refuse?”
“Vivian, I’m not asking you, I’m telling you. Don’t forget-those signed divorce papers are still sitting at my lawyer’s office. You’re not afraid I’ll actually divorce you?”
Scared? The old me would’ve been terrified.
To win back my cold, cheating husband, I cried and begged.
I didn’t even know what I’d done wrong-I could only grovel for his affection.
He said I was too uptight, so I learned to smoke and drink. At my most desperate, I even hired prostitutes to teach me bedroom tricks to please him.
On a snowy winter night, I brought Lucas homemade chicken soup to his office, only to walk in on him flirting with his secretary.
I sobbed my heart out, and he responded by not coming home for days.
But now? I’m really not scared anymore.
I stared at him quietly for a long time, then nodded.
“Fine. I’ll drop the charges.”
Lucas’s face lit up with a smile, his eyes betraying barely concealed relief as he reached out to gently stroke my hair.
“That’s my good girl. Rest up now-I’ll come see you when I get a chance.”
After watching them leave, I pulled out my phone and opened the ‘Countdown’ app.
After I found out that Lucas’s love for me had never changed, I’d screamed at him hysterically, demanding to know why he treated me this way.
I’d cried myself to sleep night after night, drowning in self-loathing.
Finally, I decided to give him a hundred chances.
In the beginning, every red slash mark was drawn through my tears, each one tearing my heart apart.
But now, looking at the screen full of blood-red “X”s, I felt absolutely nothing.
The ninety-seventh “X”-for the baby that died in my womb.
The ninety-eighth “X”-for his new girl, my half-sister Jessica Manning.
I’ve known Lucas since we were five years old.
He used to hate his father more than anything-a man who had illegitimate children scattered across the globe.
But somewhere along the way, he became convinced that only hate lasts forever.
He wanted to turn me into his mother-a woman who spent her life crying and begging on her knees for his father to come back, right up until the day she died.
He never bothered to ask if that’s what I wanted.
Two chances left. Once they’re gone, our story ends.
