My Husband Cheated with My Sister and Left Me Pregnant (Her Marriage in Crisis #76)

1. Jade

— ? —

Jade

Two pink lines.

I stare at them until my vision blurs, until the little plastic stick trembles in my hands, until I’m not sure if I’m breathing anymore.

Two pink lines. After three years of trying. After one devastating miscarriage that nearly broke me. After countless negative tests and disappointed sighs and Donald’s increasingly distant eyes.

It’s finally real.

Oh my God. Oh my God. Oh my God.

I sink onto the edge of the bathtub, my legs giving out beneath me. The pregnancy test clatters against the tile floor, and I watch it spin once, twice, before settling face-up. Still two lines. Still positive. Still real.

A laugh bubbles up from somewhere deep in my chest, hysterical, disbelieving, overwhelmed. I press my hand over my mouth to contain it, but my shoulders are shaking now, tears streaming down my face, and I don’t know if I’m laughing or crying or both.

Three years. Three years of temperature charts and ovulation tests and timed intercourse that stopped feeling like love somewhere around month six, of watching Donald’s face fall every time I got my period. Three years of feeling like a failure.

And now...

I grab my phone with trembling fingers and call Vivian before I can second-guess myself.

She answers on the second ring. “Jade? What’s wrong?”

“Nothing’s wrong.” My voice comes out strangled, weird. “Can you meet me? The café on Fifth? I need to show you something.”

“You’re freaking me out. Are you okay?”

“I’m... Viv, just come. Please?”

“I’m on my way.”

***

Vivian’s already at our usual table when I arrive, her perfectly manicured nails tapping against her coffee cup, worry lines creasing her forehead. She looks up the moment I walk in, scanning me head to toe like she’s checking for injuries.

“You look terrible,” she says. “What happened?”

Thanks, sis. Love you too.

I don’t answer. Just slide into the seat across from her and reach into my purse, pulling out the pregnancy test I’ve been clutching like a lifeline for the past hour. I set it on the table between us.

Vivian stares at it.

Then she screams.

“OH MY GOD!” She’s out of her chair and around the table before I can react, throwing her arms around me, squeezing so tight I can barely breathe. “JADE! Oh my God, oh my God, is this real? Is this actually real?”

“It’s real.” I’m crying again, and I don’t care that everyone in the café is staring. “Viv, it’s real.”

“I knew it!” She pulls back, gripping my shoulders, her eyes shining with tears that match my own. “I knew this would happen for you. I knew it. How far along? Have you told Donald? What did he say?”

“I haven’t told him yet.” I wipe my eyes with the back of my hand. “I wanted to tell you first.”

“Jade...” Her voice softens, and for a moment she looks like the big sister I remember from childhood, the one who held my hand on the first day of kindergarten, who taught me how to do my makeup, who promised she’d always be there for me. “I’m so happy for you. You have no idea.”

I want to believe that. I want to believe you so badly.

But even as she hugs me again, something cold uncurls in my stomach. Because Vivian’s smile is perfect - too perfect - and Donald has been different lately, and there’s a voice in the back of my head that won’t stop whispering something’s wrong, something’s wrong, something’s wrong.

I push it down. Bury it. Smile back at my sister.

“I’m going to tell him tonight,” I say. “I’m planning something special.”

“He’s going to be thrilled.” Vivian squeezes my hand. “This is everything he’s wanted. Everything you’ve both wanted.”

“I hope so.”

Please let that be true. Please.

But.

There’s always a but, isn’t there?

Because even as I’m sitting here, planning the perfect reveal, the doubts I’ve been suppressing for months come flooding back.

“Viv...” I hesitate, stirring my untouched tea. “Can I ask you something?”

“Anything.”

“Has Donald seemed... different to you lately? I mean, when you’ve seen him at family things or whatever?”

Vivian’s expression flickers, so fast I almost miss it. “Different how?”

“I don’t know. Distant, maybe. Cold.” I stare at the ripples in my tea, unable to meet her eyes. “He comes home past midnight most nights. He barely looks at me. When I try to talk to him, it’s like he’s not even there.”

“Jade.” Vivian reaches across the table and tilts my chin up, forcing me to look at her. “You’re being paranoid. He’s stressed - you know how crazy things have been at Castillo Enterprises. The merger, the board meetings, all of it. It has nothing to do with you.”

“But-”

“Tell him tonight.” Her voice is firm. Certain. “Tell him about the baby, and everything will change. I promise.”

I want to believe her.

God, I want to believe her so badly.

“Okay,” I whisper. “Tonight.”

***

I spend three hours getting everything ready.

Candles, the expensive ones Donald bought me for our anniversary, the ones I’ve been saving for something special. His favorite meal: filet mignon, roasted vegetables, that red wine he loves. Soft music playing from the speakers. The whole apartment glowing golden in the candlelight.

And on the table, wrapped in silver paper with a white bow: a box containing tiny baby shoes. Blue and white, impossibly small, the most precious thing I’ve ever held.

I check my reflection in the hallway mirror one last time. The green dress that Donald used to say brought out my eyes. Hair down the way he likes it. Makeup subtle but careful.

I look like someone trying too hard.

The thought comes unbidden, cruel, and I shove it away. Tonight is going to be perfect. Tonight is going to fix everything.

I text Donald: Please come home early. I have important news.

Then I wait.

The candles burn lower. The food gets cold. The music starts to feel less romantic and more pathetic, a soundtrack to my slowly dying hope.

Finally, my phone buzzes.

Working on something critical. Home late. We’ll talk tomorrow.

I read it three times, waiting for more. An explanation. An apology. Something.

Nothing comes.

You’re being paranoid. He’s stressed. Tell him tonight and everything will change.

Vivian’s words echo in my head, but they sound hollow now. False.

I stare at the elaborate dinner I prepared. At the candles that have burned down to stubs. At the gift-wrapped box that suddenly looks desperate instead of sweet.

He doesn’t know. He doesn’t know about the baby, and that’s why he’s being distant. Once he knows, everything will be different.

The thought propels me to my feet. I blow out the remaining candles, grab my keys from the counter, and head for the door.

If Donald won’t come to me, I’ll go to him.

I’ll tell him at the office. Right now. And then everything will change.

It has to.

***

Castillo Enterprises looms against the night sky, all glass and steel and cold ambition. Most of the windows are dark - it’s almost nine o’clock - but I can see lights on the executive floor. Donald’s floor.

The security guard recognizes me and waves me through. I take the elevator up, rehearsing what I’m going to say. Donald, I know you’re busy, but I couldn’t wait. I have news. The best news.

The executive floor is quiet. Empty desks. Silent phones. The soft hum of climate control and nothing else.

But as I approach Donald’s office at the end of the hall, I hear voices.

His voice. Low, murmuring.

And then a woman’s laugh.

I know that laugh.

No.

My feet stop moving. My heart stops beating. Everything stops except for that voice in my head, the one I’ve been ignoring for months, screaming now: I told you. I told you something was wrong.

The door to Donald’s office is cracked open. Just an inch. Just enough.

I step closer, even though every instinct is screaming at me to run. I peer through the gap.

And my world ends.

Vivian is perched on Donald’s desk, legs crossed, leaning back on her hands like she owns the space. She’s wearing the red dress I complimented her on last week - you look amazing, Viv - and her hair is down and her smile is sharp and satisfied in a way I’ve never seen before.

“She took the test today,” Vivian is saying. “Called me right after. It was positive.”

Donald is standing in front of her, his tie loosened, his jacket on the back of his chair. He runs a hand through his hair - a gesture I know, intimate and familiar and wrong in this context - and says, “What are we going to do?”

Not joy. Not excitement.

Dread.

“You need to decide,” Vivian says, reaching out to stroke his cheek with perfectly manicured fingers. “Her or me.”

No. No. This isn’t happening. This can’t be happening.

Donald doesn’t answer. He just leans in, and Vivian’s hand slides from his cheek to the back of his neck, and then they’re kissing - not the way you kiss someone for the first time, but the way you kiss someone you’ve kissed a hundred times before, familiar and hungry and practiced-

His hands slide under her skirt.

She moans against his mouth.

I stumble backward.

My hip catches on something - a plant stand, maybe, or a trash can - and it crashes to the floor with a sound like gunfire. Ceramic shatters. Soil scatters across the marble.

The voices inside stop.

“What the-” Donald’s voice, sharp with alarm.

I don’t wait to hear more.

I run.

The elevator takes too long. I slam through the stairwell door instead, taking the steps two at a time, my heels clicking against the concrete like a countdown to my complete collapse. Seventeen floors down. Seventeen floors of my sister my husband my life is over my baby what about my baby-

I burst out of the building into the cold night air, blind with tears, not looking where I’m going-

And crash directly into someone.

Hands catch my arms, steadying me before I can fall. Strong hands. Warm.

“Jade?”

I look up through my tears.

Dark eyes. Sharp jaw. A face I know but don’t know - I’ve seen it across awkward dinner tables, in holiday photos, in the background of family events where he never quite fit.

Donald’s brother.

Damian.

His grip tightens as he takes in my face, the tears, the devastation, the way I’m shaking so hard I can barely stand.