Chapter 1
present time...
Another night, another lie.
One heartbeat away from witnessing my downfall.
I linger at the edge of the glamorous event hall, nothing but an empty shadow behind my towering husband, Law, as he holds a steady conversation with his business associates.
Their voices blur into meaningless chatter, the kind that feeds his empire and ego.
I stare down into the depths of my glass of water, the clear liquid catches the spotlights in sparkling glints as I swirl it, a heavy sigh slipping from me before I can stop it.
As soon as he hears my boredom, his head snaps sideways, the cold, long glance a clear warning.
It slices through the air and holds me in place, my bruised spine locking rigid, gut twisting hard enough to ache.
And all at once the thunder of my heart numbs out the music, the laughter, and the world around me.
After a few seconds of him thinking carefully, I can’t tell what his next move will be.
I know Law, well, sometimes I do. Other times, I wonder if I ever really knew him at all. All I know now is that one accidental sigh could have cost me everything tonight. Even if it’s just a normal human reaction, it’s like he wants me to be completely numb.
Be pretty.
Be silent.
Don’t look up.
Don’t say or do anything without his say so.
Just pretend to be the obedient, little trophy wife.
When he suddenly turns to face me, his knuckles are bone-white, gripping his champagne flute with such force it could shatter in his hand.
My body trembles under his scrutiny.
Once, twice, three times.
His jaw locks tight, icy blue gaze dragging down the length of me like a razorblade.
“Is this your wife, Law?” A male asks from behind him.
But I don’t look at him, I don’t even flicker. Though the outline of the figure is there right beside my husband, I keep my eyes fixed on Law’s. To glance away or acknowledge another man, would be a mistake I can’t afford to make.
Law stares at me, like a threat and dare all at once.
But I’ve been good tonight—I’m sure I have. Haven’t I? Yeah, I sighed, but no one else heard it. Did they?
“It is,” Law finally answers, the annoyance in his tone enough to make a lump rise hard in my throat, my eyes burning at the edges.
When the man steps around my husband and extends his hand toward me, the instinct to run nearly overpowers me. I can’t see Law now. I can’t see his reaction, and the not knowing coils tighter.
If I take the hand, will it offend him? If I don’t, will it humiliate him? Anxiety floods through my veins, my thoughts sprinting too fast to catch up.
“Nice to meet you,” the man says, but my gaze is already lowered before I even catch a glimpse of his face, keeping my eyes fixed on the black tiled floor below.
I can still see the shadow of his hand through my lashes, waiting, like an offered leash.
And for a moment, I’m at war with myself. But, eventually, I take a shaky breath, force my fingers to be steady, and slip my hand into his.
It’s warm, nothing like Law’s freezing cold grip, and for a second the world narrows to the small, traitorous contact. I keep my eyes down regardless, until I catch the flash of Law’s polished shoes to my left and everything inside me snaps.
I yank my hand back as he moves, like he owns the space, his hard chest brushing my shoulder. Then his fingers slide up the back of my long, silky dress, under my black hair, and closes around it with a discreet, yet harsh handful.
He tugs once, just enough, and I lift my chin, obliged to meet the motion he’s forced. My eyes lock onto his associates face, a man I’ve never seen before.
“Nice… nice to meet you too,” I mutter, voice thin and automatic, a puppet tied to a string I can feel wrapped around my neck.
The man studies my face, noticing the fear that pools in my shaded eyes. His expressionless stare flicks to Law as he slides behind me, fingers unwinding from my hair.
Before I can think, his large hand comes around my front, palm flat and fingers splayed over my stomach, using the contact to press me back against his solid body.
From the outside it might read as possessive, even intimate; from anyone else’s view point it could be mistaken for protection.
I know better.
I now know Law with every aching part of me.
He never touches me to show he cares—not anymore. His hands have learned only one language. To mark, to punish, and to remind me what I am beneath him.
Nothing.
My husband. The man who saved me. The man I loved with every part of me. The man I said my vows to just one year ago.
I didn't know then that I’d sold my soul to something extremely malicious. I thought I was safe beside him, but now I’m starting to realize he’s an outright psychopath.
Our marriage has taken a dark turn I don’t know how to escape from. He’s made his rules clear that the vows still stand, but their promise has been completely burrowed out.
What remains is something colder, an ownership wrapped in love’s name, and I’m left learning how to live in that loneliness.
I fear only death will part us now. I’m trapped in a closing chasm—an ending that smothers me a little more every time the sun rises.
My sanity is being pried loose, inch by inch, by a steady, joyless handsaw; every scrap of strength I built over the years is now being wrenched from its roots until I feel like an empty shell waiting for his next act of cruelty to finish the job.
When Law leans down, his whiskey infused breath scorches the shell of my ear. And as I catch a glimpse of him from the corner of my gaze, I notice he’s holding intense eye contact with the man in front of me.
“Go wait in the car,” he says darkly, the words coiling down my spine.
I swallow, my throat dry and useless when he finally lets me go. My fingers tremble against the glass in my hand as I set it down, the water rippling from my unsteady touch.
And with legs that feel like lead, I slip past the circle of men and my husband, every step a silent countdown to whatever waits for me outside.
◆◆◆
Exiting the luxurious building in a rush, I stumble outside, dragging in a huge gulp of breath I hadn’t realized I’d been holding.
The night rain pelts down on my overheated skin, like cold needles piercing through. I tip my head back, letting it wash over me, black streaks of mascara bleeding down my cheeks like cracks in porcelain.
A jagged flash of lightning splits the sky, and through its crackle, a voice cuts the night.
“Blaire?” Brad’s deep, familiar tone reaches me, reverberating against the storm.
My tear-blurred eyes blink open, head tilting forward.
And there, through the rain-slicked glass of the car, I spot Law’s driver. His gaze is locked on me, unblinking and patient. Watching and waiting for me to obey Law’s command.
When Brad’s footsteps draw nearer behind me, I slowly turn, rain slicing between us as my eyes find his.
He stops in front of me and studies my face, then the half-hidden bruise darkening my neck—something no one inside the hall bothered to notice.
“He’s hurting you,” he says, low but firm, his gaze darting back to mine, jaw clenched.
“Just stay out of it, Brad,” I snap, the words shredding as they leave me.
I start to turn away, but his hand closes around my sore wrist, gentle, but secure, and it halts me.
For a second I steal a glance at his face, and I see the concern lined in the set of his mouth, something close to anger in his eyes.
But I cast my gaze back to the puddled pavement like a habit.
“He’s changed. I barely recognize him anymore. He’s not the man I used to know,” he mutters, tone thin, brows pinching together as though I’m holding the missing pieces to a puzzle he can’t seem to solve.
Law and Brad have been best friends and business partners for years, way before I ever knew them. He has to see it too, the way everything has twisted and darkened around Law.
We used to be close, all of us. Me, Law, Brad, and his wife. Vacations, dinners, and warm summer nights filled with laughter and drinks. But that’s all gone now, just stripped away piece by piece until nothing remains but distance.
“He… he wants to end our partnership,” Brad confesses, his voice hesitant. “He wants me out. And he’s doing everything he can to make it happen.”
My brows knit as I turn to face him fully, anger bubbling hot beneath my skin.
“You mean the business that never stopped?” I spit, and his face falls. “Tell me, Brad—how long have you both still been drowning in the filthy underworld?”
His chest rises, stiff, and he breathes out.
“What?”
He releases my wrist, straightening to his full height, rain running down the streaks of his strawberry-blonde hair.
“I’ve known for a few weeks,” I admit, the words tasting like dirt of my past life.
He looks away with a tight nod, jaw flexing.
“I needed to understand,” I continue, my voice rough with the truth. “I needed to know why my husband has suddenly turned into a stranger. And now I do. He’s corrupted to the core. Corrupted, and fucking rotting me with him.”
He shakes his head once and buries his hands in his wet pockets.
“Blaire, that’s not it... He loves you so much. He…”
“Love?” I snarl, dragging the collar of my dress down, exposing the dark, purple bruises blooming there—proof of what he’s been doing for the pettiest of things.
“Does this look like an act of love to you?”
We stare at one another for a few seconds, thunder rolling like a brutal reminder in the distance.
And then it hits me—we’re both falling into the same lie. Both of us are holding onto the ghost of a man we once adored and trusted, pretending he still exists somewhere beneath all that violence.
“He’s a liar,” I choke out. “He’s a fucking psychopath… A narc…”
The words die on my tongue as fresh tears burn behind my eyes. I squeeze them shut, but the grief still claws its way up my throat like acid, scorching everything it touches.
“He played us. He played me. This is exactly what he's always been. He has just been good at hiding it behind his handsome face and soft words.”
Brad’s hands settle on my shoulders, warm and steady.
“I’ll get to the bottom of this, Blaire,” he says gently. “But you need to leave. I can help you—if you’ll let me.”
Leave?
A broken, bitter sound escapes my lips because it's so fucking easy to say that, especially coming from someone who has never been on the receiving end of the man you love’s fist.
I remember I tried to convince myself to leave once. With split lips, and trembling hands, I packed in the dark. But the bag stayed in the closet, and I stayed in his captivity.
Now the hammer is back in my hand, driving the final nails into a coffin I built for myself.
Plank by plank, excuse after excuse.
Nail by nail, forgiving each purple bruise.
I am both a survivor and my very own undertaker, and the lid is slowly closing over me.
I used to hear about women like me, abused and trapped in marriages like this. I’ve heard it more than once whilst being with Law. And stupidly, I pitied them from a distance, told myself I’d never let that happen to me.
But pity doesn’t prepare you for reality.
I used to ask myself, why don’t they just leave?
The answer feels like it’s carved into my very bones now. Because leaving isn’t simple—it’s terrifying and dangerous. And when you’ve loved someone that deeply, part of you will bleed yourself dry trying to resurrect the version of them you lost.
So here I am, the fucking fool, clinging to the last brittle threads of love, convincing myself I can fix him, change him, and save him—just as he did me.
Because that’s the sickness of it, isn’t it? These toxic, poisoned bonds.
You stay not because of the bruises and tears, but to stupidly dispute them. You stay because of some strange hope.
And before you even realize it, you’re dead inside, your mind numb and spirit broken, long before the final blow ever lands.
I should have left that night. I should have ran and never looked back.
A throat suddenly clears behind Brad—Law’s throat.
The sound stabs through the rain, and my entire body stiffens into an aching lock.
I want to sprint to the car, act like we never spoke, pretend he didn’t hear a single word. But a small, dreaded part of me already knows he has probably been standing there the whole time, listening and gauging every syllable.
Brad lets out a heavy sigh that shudders through his chest, eyes closing for a beat before he turns to face Law.
My heart pounds against my ribs, each breath feeling shallower than the last.
“Hey, I was just talking about the four of us hanging out again. Just like old times,” Brad insists coolly, the words edged with something that wants to pass for truth, but it sounds fake, a thin varnish over a fucking lie.
Without warning, I spin on my heel and stumble toward the black car.
When I slip inside, I slam the door hard enough to rattle the frame, my chest heaving, eyes wide and wet as they lock onto the driver.
“Please… drive,” I rasp, my voice breaking on the plea, thick with panic.
He doesn’t move, but his gaze finds mine in the rearview mirror, cold and unblinking. Loyal not to me but to the man who owns us both, and the silence is worse than the refusal.
The door to my left swings open without warning, a rush of rain spraying in, and my hand instinctively shoots to the opposite handle, desperate to escape.
But a sharp click resounds through the car, final and metallic, like a lock sealing my cage.
Law settles in beside me, calm and careful, every motion dripping with power and control. His hand rests lazily on the front of his black suit, as though he’s sliding into a throne.
I keep my gaze fixed forward, unseeing, my vision blurred with frantic tears. Every nerve screams that I’m trapped now, trapped completely, and there’s no way out.
“Home,” Law orders, his voice resonant and carrying the kind of tone that doesn’t need to be raised.
Home.
The word twists inside me like a dagger. Whose home? His? Ours? Because it hasn’t felt like mine in what seems like forever.
The driver obeys without hesitation, pulling the car smoothly into the rain-slicked night.
Through the window, I catch a final glimpse of Brad still standing outside the event hall, his figure distorted by the storm.
Our eyes meet, just for a heartbeat, just long enough for me to feel the ache of everything unsaid, before the car turns, and he vanishes into the dark.