---- Chapter 4 Harley Pennington POV: When Marcus dropped me back at the mansion, | walked in to find Katerina in the kitchen, humming to herself as she poured herself a glass of my most expensive orange juice. She was wearing one of my cashmere robes. My home, my things-she was settling in like a parasite. "| hope you don't mind," she said, her voice dripping with false sweetness. She gestured with the glass. "Connor told me to make myself at home." She took a delicate sip, her eyes mocking me over the rim. "I'm so glad we could work things out." The sight of her, so comfortable and smug in my space after what had just happened, made a fresh wave of nausea roll through me. "That's mine," | said, my voice flat. She feigned surprise. "Oh, this robe? | can take it off if you want it back." "No," | said, disgust curling my lip. "Keep it. I'll just burn it later." Connor walked in then, his expression hardening when he saw my face. "Harley, that's enough. Kat is our guest. She's been ---- through a traumatic experience." "A traumatic experience?" | stared at him, incredulous. "You think she's the one who's been through a trauma?" "She's pregnant and you had her kidnapped!" he yelled. "What was | supposed to think?" | didn' t have the energy to argue. | just felt dirty. The feel of Henderson' s hands, the smell of the warehouse, the leering eyes of the crowd-it was all still clinging tome. + "| need a shower," | said, turning my back on both of them and walking up the grand staircase. | stood under the scalding spray for almost an hour, scrubbing my skin until it was red and raw, but | couldn't wash the feeling away. | couldn't wash him away. Exhaustion finally took over, a heavy, boneless fatigue. | sank down into the water, letting it surround me, and fell into a dead sleep right there in the tub. | woke up in our bed. For a disoriented moment, | thought I' d dreamed it all. Then | saw him. Connor was sitting on the edge of the bed, a tray with a bowl of soup and a glass of water on his lap. "You're awake," he said softly. His voice was gentle, the way it used to be after we'd had a fight. "| was worried. You were asleep in the tub for hours." He tried to touch my forehead, but | flinched away, recoiling as ---- if from a hot iron "Don't touch me," | whispered. His hand froze in mid-air. A flicker of hurt crossed his face before it was replaced by frustration. "Harley, can you stop this? | said | was sorry." "You're sorry?" | asked, my voice dangerously quiet. "| didn't mean for it to go that far," he said, setting the tray aside. "Henderson wasn't supposed to touch you. | was watching on a monitor the whole time. | was there. | came in before he could do anything." The confession hung in the air between us. He was there. He watched. He waited. He let that man terrify me, tear my clothes, put his filthy hands on me, all while he watched. He only intervened at the last possible second. The pain was a physical thing, a crushing weight on my chest that made it hard to breathe. The man who had once promised to be my shield had held me down while another man tried to hurt me. "We need to find a way to move forward," he said, his tone infuriatingly reasonable, as if we were discussing a business deal. "Katerina is going to have this baby. There' s nothing we can do about that. But she doesn' t have to live here. I' Il buy her a condo. I' Il support her and the child, but you and |... we can go back to how things were." ---- "And the child?" | asked, my voice hollow. "What happens to the child?" He shrugged, a casual, dismissive gesture. "We can raise it as our own if you want. Or | can set up a trust, hire a nanny. The kid will never want for anything. It doesn't have to change our lives." | stared at him, at this stranger sitting on my bed, casually discussing the disposal of his own child like an inconvenient piece of furniture. The ambitious, dreaming artist | fell in love with was truly dead. In his place was a monster. "The Connor | knew would never say that," | whispered. "The Connor you knew was broke," he sneered. "People change. | changed. For the better." "No," | said, sitting up. "No, you didn't." | looked him dead in the eye. "You need to make a choice, Connor. It's her and the baby, or it's me. You can't have both." He looked at me, a long, calculating stare. "I'm not letting you go, Harley." "Then get rid of them." The words were cold and hard, and | meant them "I'll talk to her," he said after a long pause. "About... options." He was actually considering it. The thought should have made me feel victorious, but it only made me feel sick. ---- Just then, a crash echoed from downstairs, followed by a theatrical sob. Katerina. Connor was on his feet in an instant, his face a mask of alarm. "Kat!" He bolted from the room without a second glance at me. | followed him slowly, my heart a dead weight in my chest. | already knew what | would see. | already knew what his choice would be. ---- Chapter 5 Harley Pennington POV: | found them in the living room. Katerina was on the floor, surrounded by the shattered remains of a porcelain vase, clutching her stomach and sobbing. Connor was kneeling beside her, his hands hovering over her in a panic. "What' s wrong? Are you hurt? Is it the baby?" he asked, his voice frantic. "| heard you," Katerina wailed, tears streaming down her face. "You were talking about... about getting rid of our baby." She looked up at him, her eyes wide with betrayal. "How could you, Connor? After everything?" She launched into a sob story, a monologue of her tragic life, of how she had spent years looking for him, the only person who had ever been kind to her in the foster home. "I' ve loved you since we were kids," she cried, her voice thick with emotion. "| never stopped loving you. You promised you' d come back for me. You promised you' d marry me." Connor looked stricken. "Kat, |... | didn' t forget you." "Then why are you with her?" she demanded, pointing a trembling finger at me as | stood in the doorway. "Is it ---- because she looks like me? Am | just a replacement for what you couldn't have?" The words hung in the air, venomous and sharp. | saw the truth of them instantly in the way Connor flinched, in the sudden guilt that washed over his face. He had never told me | looked like anyone. But our first date, he' d stared at me with an intensity that felt like more than just attraction. He' d told me my eyes were the exact shade of blue he' d always dreamed of. He loved the way | wore my hair, the way | laughed. Looking at Katerina now, | saw it. We weren't twins, but there was a resemblance. The same blue eyes, the same heart-shaped face. | had been a stand-in. A substitute for the girl he' d left behind. "You told me you loved me," Katerina pressed, her voice breaking. "You said she meant nothing to you." "It's true," Connor whispered, his voice so low | almost didn't hear it. He was talking to her, but his eyes were locked on me, full of a strange mix of pity and defiance. "Harley was... she was a Substitute. Because she looked like you." The floor fell out from under me. Five years. Five years of love, of sacrifice, of believing | was the center of his universe. It was alla lie. | wasn't the love of his life. | was a ghost. A copy of a girl he' d lost and found again. The pain was so immense, so all-consuming, it was silent. There were no tears, no screams. Just a vast, echoing ---- emptiness where my heart used to be. | stumbled back, my hand flying to my mouth to stifle a soundless gasp. My heel caught on the edge of the rug, and | knocked into a small side table. A lamp wobbled, then crashed to the floor. "Who's there?" Connor called out, his attention finally pulled from Katerina' s tear-streaked face. + Katerina, ever the actress, saw her opportunity. She threw her arms around Connor's neck and pulled his face down to hers, silencing any further questions with a desperate, hungry kiss. The sounds that followed-soft moans, the rustle of clothing- were a new kind of torture. He was comforting her, making love to her, while | stood broken just a few feet away, the wreckage of my life scattered around me. | fled. | ran back to the master bedroom, the sounds from the living room chasing me like demons. It was over. It was really, truly over. | was numbly pulling clothes from the closet when Marcus, my security guard, appeared at the door. He wasn't alone. He was with a man in a sharp suit, a lawyer from my family' s firm. "Ma' am," the lawyer said, his voice respectful. He held out a file. "Your divorce has been finalized. We expedited the process as you requested." ---- He handed me the documents. The divorce certificate. It was real. It was done. A strange sense of calm washed over me. The pain was still there, a dull, heavy ache, but it was no longer overwhelming. It was just... a fact. Like the color of the sky or the force of gravity. "Thank you," | said, my voice steady. "There' s one more thing." Marcus handed me another file. It was the complete opposition research on Katerina Wells. Her life wasn' t just tragic; it was sordid. A string of wealthy older men, a history of blackmail, and a gambling addiction that kept her perpetually broke. Her story of pining for Connor was a fabrication woven to ensnare him. | looked at the photos of her with other men, at the bank statements showing massive debts. | almost laughed. Connor, the self-proclaimed genius, had been played for a fool by a common grifter. | placed the divorce certificate and the file on the nightstand. | twisted the diamond ring off my finger, the one Connor had given me, the one that symbolized an empire | built and a love that was never real. | dropped it into the drawer, next to the certificate. A weight | didn' t even know | was carrying lifted from my shoulders. | was free. ---- | walked to the bar in the corner of the room and poured myself a tall glass of scotch. | needed it. As | took the first sip, the door opened. Katerina stood there, wrapped in my cashmere robe again, a smug, triumphant look on her face. "He' s all mine now," she purred, leaning against the doorframe. She ran a hand down her neck, deliberately drawing my attention to the faint red marks blooming there. Love bites. "I'm going to be Mrs. Tate," she said, her voice a triumphant whisper. "And you are going to be nothing."