The Heir He Needed, the Wife He Betrayed Chapter 03
New messages kept flooding my phone.
On my birthday, Madison had spiked a high fever.
Cole held the child in his arms and stayed by her hospital bed all night.
When I went to St. Anne’s Shrine to pray for a baby, Cole was with her at St. Michael’s Church, getting a blessed medal for their child.
Last New Year’s Eve, I went back to the Hawthorne family estate alone and sat through a dressing-down in the private family chapel.
Meanwhile, he was setting off fireworks with her at the house in New York.
Every time I had felt hurt and alone, Cole had chosen her and betrayed me.
“You always ask if I’ll ever get tired of us.”
“I say it’ll only happen the day I die.”
The singer’s voice tore through the opening of my ringtone, raw with heartbreak.
My attending doctor was calling.
“Evelyn, your uterus was injured before, and your uterine lining is very thin.”
“For the first three months, you need strict rest. Avoid major emotional stress, and it would be best for you to stay on bed rest to protect the pregnancy.”
“This may be your… last chance to become a mother.”
I touched my belly, which had not yet begun to show.
It felt as if the entire world was forcing me into a corner.
My body reacted before my mind could catch up.
I ran out the door without caring about anything else.
But all I saw was Cole’s car speeding away right in front of me.
With trembling hands, I called him.
After several long rings, a mechanical female voice answered, “Sorry, the number you dialed is currently on another call.”
He had rejected my call.
At the same time, Madison sent one final screenshot.
It was a message Cole had just sent her.
Cole Hawthorne: [Madison, I promise I’ll handle everything.]
Cole Hawthorne: [Once you give birth, I’ll give you and the baby a real home.]
Cole Hawthorne: [Wait for me. I’m coming right now.]
“Go, then.”
My words scattered into the night wind on the empty road.
“I should have left a long time ago too.”
Three years ago, when I first discovered his affair, I dragged my suitcase out this very door in a daze.
When a sports car came racing toward me, Cole had chased after me and pushed me out of the way.
The hospital told me he was in critical condition.
The doctor said that perhaps only the voice of someone he cared about could wake him.
Mrs. Hawthorne Sr. cried and begged me to go back.
I sat by his bed and called his name again and again.
“Cole, if you wake up… I’ll forgive you.”
But now, I did not want to forgive him anymore.
I could not let everything end with so little consequence.
I could not let him off that easily.
I wanted him to suffer the way I had suffered.
I returned to the bedroom and smoothed out the creases in the pregnancy test result.
Then I printed out every message Madison had sent me.
These were all things I would one day hand back to Cole.
When that day came, would he regret all the lies he had told me?
Cole finally found a moment to call me back.
“What’s wrong, babe?”
“I’m sorry. Something urgent came up, so I left in a hurry.”
“When I get back, I’ll make it up to you properly.”
My voice was thick with tears, but I still insisted on testing him. “Cole, can you come back right now?”
“I have something very important to tell you.”
“Don’t leave. Don’t go there…”
“Evelyn, don’t be difficult at a time like this.”
Cole’s voice turned cold. “This is business.”
“Whatever you want to say, we can talk about it when I get back, okay?”
“It will be too late by then.”
The call ended.
Cole had hung up with no room for argument.
I lowered my phone, and a bleak smile tugged at the corner of my mouth.
On the day the truth came out, he would finally understand exactly what he had missed in that moment.
