Too Late, Billionaire I Already Divorced You

At twenty-two, I slipped back into the country to have some fun. At a friend's party, I fell for Victor Vance at first sight, and I went after him. At first he thought I was too young. Later it was me chasing without a shred of shame, carrying my whole heart out and holding it up to him. Flowers, jewelry. I was the one who proposed. People laughed at me, said a girl shouldn't throw away her dignity like that. But I didn't care. When you love someone, isn't that exactly how brave you're supposed to be? In the end, we got together. Dated a year, then married. Four years of marriage, and every single day, I was the one walking on eggshells, the one giving. He'd respond, just a little, every now and then, and to me it felt like the sky had lit up. It wasn't until I got pregnant that I noticed he turned happier, that he even gave me more of himself than usual. And yet something inside me went uneasy. I kept clinging to him, asking whether he loved me. He never said the word "love," but he answered gently enough: "I'll come home early." It wasn't until this time, when the private phone even I wasn't allowed to touch got picked up by someone who fired off message after message, that I finally understood. From beginning to end, he'd never held me in his heart at all. But it was fine. It was over. I didn't have any love left to give either. Seeing me stay silent, he must have thought I'd softened. He came to my side, bent down, reached to hold me. "All right, stop overthinking it. I had the housekeeper make you some soup. Drink a little and turn in early. Tomorrow's the weekend, I'll take you out…" "I got rid of the baby." I said it softly. His whole body locked up. His arm stayed where it was, half-raised, frozen mid-reach. The living room went so quiet I could hear the clock ticking on the wall. One. Two. Three. Then he straightened, looking down at me, as if it hadn't registered. "What did you say?" I lifted my head, met his eyes, and said it word by word: "I said, the baby's gone." "After you finished sending those messages, I went to the hospital and had the procedure. The miscarriage." The color drained from Victor's face, inch by inch. Five years of knowing him, and I'd almost never seen him lose his composure. In front of everyone, he was always perfectly in control, his emotions steady as a precision instrument. But in that moment, the instrument jammed. For some reason I found it novel, and I kept watching him. "You didn't talk to me about it. You just got rid of the baby?" My lips were still curved. "Yes." "Valerie." He said my name, his voice shaking. "That was my baby too." I gave an indifferent shrug. "I know." "You know?" His voice shot up, his eyes flooding red in an instant. "You knew, and you still went to the hospital alone and got rid of the baby, without so much as a word to me!" "Valerie! In your eyes, do I even count as your husband?" He'd never raised his voice at me like that. Before, when we'd argue now and then, the worst he'd do was go cold and silent and wait for me to bow my head first. In that moment, I suddenly started to laugh. "Victor, so you do get angry? So your eyes do go red? So you're capable of losing your composure after all? And here I thought all you'd ever do was freeze me out." Victor went blank for a second, then his hand clamped around my chin, fire in his eyes. "Valerie! What the hell are you pulling? I already told you, those texts weren't from me. Why won't you believe me!" "And that wasn't just your baby, it was mine too. What gave you the right to go and get rid of him on your own?" "Since you've got the nerve to abort my baby all by yourself, then you'll give me a new one!"

He bent down without warning and bit my lip. The metallic taste of blood spread fast, and I winced at the pain. One year of dating, four years of marriage, and he had never once kissed me first. Even in our most intimate moments, it was always me reaching for him. There was a time I used to dream he'd come to me on his own, just once. But now, all I felt was disgust. I bit him back, hard. He flinched at the pain and shoved me away. I lifted my head, eyes red, glaring at him. "You want a child? Go find another woman to give you one. That little assistant of yours looks like she'd jump at the chance." Victor froze. "What did you just say?" My eyes burned as I screamed it out. "I said, if you want a kid, go make one with that little assistant of yours! Stop coming around here making me sick." "Victor, the man you are right now truly, truly disgusts me!" He stared at me, hard, as if he could nail me to the spot. Three seconds later, he suddenly laughed. "Fine! Since you're so generous, I'll give you exactly what you want." "Don't you dare regret it! And don't come crying to beg me!" The door slammed shut behind him. Silence settled in. I stared at the closed door, tears falling without a sound, until I finally broke and sobbed out loud. As if to cry out every grievance of all these years at once. Victor, this time, I won't regret it. And I won't grovel and beg you ever again. I raised a hand to wipe my tears and made a phone call. "Hayden, the funding we gave Victor back then. Pull it." Victor didn't come home all night. Early the next morning, I went to the law firm to draw up the divorce papers. It was the weekend, so he didn't have to work. But I had no idea where to find him. Just then, a video popped up on my phone. Right behind it, my best friend's voice came blasting through. "Val! Isn't this that ice-cold, untouchable husband of yours?" "I was shopping at Lumiere One and saw him out with some woman! He actually crouched down and tied her shoelaces for her!" "You're only four months pregnant, and he's already out hunting for fresh meat? That bastard, does he have any shame left at all? Ugh, I swear I'm going to kill both of those lowlifes!" I tapped the video open. On the screen, the man who had always loomed over me, untouchable, gave in to a few coaxing words from the girl beside him and crouched down to tie her shoelace. She laughed and filmed him with her phone, and he was smiling too, helpless against her. My heart still ached, no matter how I tried to stop it. It wasn't that I'd never wanted that from him. It was just that back then, he always wore that look of being above it all. He never refused, but he never did it either. He left me to awkwardly find my own way out of the moment. I tugged at the corner of my mouth and texted her back. "He and I are getting divorced." The message had barely sent when an unknown number called in. "Is this Ms. Pruitt? Your husband got into an altercation with a friend. Please come down to the police station as soon as you can." My best friend had a temper, but I never expected her to move this fast. I hurried out and flagged down a cab. The moment I reached the door, the shouting was still going strong. "Victor! Can you live with what you've done to Valerie? She's only four months pregnant, and you couldn't even keep it in your pants! You actually paraded your mistress around shopping and tied her shoes for her! Why don't you just go die!" "Our Val was so good to you, loved you so much—" "Wasn't that her own choice, throwing herself at me?" Victor cut her off, his face cold. I froze where I stood. Victor's voice kept going. "Did I ask her to be good to me? Did I ask her to love me? Wasn't she the one who debased herself back then, the one who came chasing after me, who climbed into my bed, who married me the second I crooked my finger? So what does her devotion have to do with me? I don't love her. Why should I owe her anything in return? Now she's pregnant. Does that mean I'm supposed to stay chained to her forever?"

Stella was livid. If the officers hadn't held her back, she'd have lunged straight at him. "Victor! You son of a bitch, do you have a shred of conscience left? If it weren't for Val back then, you'd already be rotting behind—" "Stella!" I cut her off and stepped inside, turning to the officer. "I'm taking her home." Before the officer could answer, Victor's voice came low and gravelly. "Someone hits my people, and they just walk away?" I looked at the woman beside him—red-eyed, cradling her cheek, leaning into him. Then I looked at him. "So what do you want?" His brows were cold and flat. "Your friend slapped one of my people. Now I want it paid back." Stella laughed like she'd heard the world's worst joke. "You want her to slap me? You—" "Who said I wanted it from you?" Victor cut her off, his gaze settling on my face. "Valerie, your friend made the mistake on your behalf. The bill's yours to settle, isn't it?" "You absolute—" Stella was shaking with rage, ready to charge in and tear the two of them apart. The next second, I spoke. "Fine." Stella's head snapped around. "Valerie, are you insane? He's the one who cheated. He's the one who wronged you!" I ignored her and walked up to Victor and Judy. "Go ahead." Judy's eyes were rimmed red. Softly, she said, "Mr. Vance, don't put Mrs. Vance in a hard spot. I—" "Slap!" Before she could finish, Victor grabbed her hand and swung it hard across my face. A scorching sting spread out at once. When it was done, I turned to leave. "Did I say you could go?" His voice was cold as ice. "She slapped Judy once. I want it back tenfold." He dragged Judy forward. Before I could react, the slaps came down one after another. "Slap! Slap! Slap—" Nine slaps, each one heavier, each one crueler than the last. With every blow, the last sliver of love in my heart faded a little more. When the final one landed, I felt nothing at all. Something warm trickled from the corner of my mouth, and my mouth filled with the taste of rust. Not one officer dared to step in. Because the man doing it was Victor Vance, the one who had all of Capital City under his thumb. When he finished, Victor rubbed Judy's hand for her. His voice dropped into a warning. "Keep your friend in line. Next time, don't let her bark like a rabid dog and frighten my people." With that, he took Judy's hand to leave. "Victor." I called him back and pulled out the divorce papers. "Let's get divorced." Victor stared in disbelief. "You want to divorce me?" I nodded. "Yes." He fixed his eyes on me for a good dozen seconds. Then he laughed. "Valerie, I haven't even settled the score with you for getting rid of the baby behind my back. And now you come to me with divorce. Playing hard to get?" I tugged at the corner of my lips. "You're overthinking it." His face darkened in an instant. He snatched the divorce papers, scrawled his name across them, and flung them back in my face. "Valerie, a friendly piece of advice: without me, you're nothing." "The day you come crawling back in tears, begging me to forgive you, I won't spare you a single glance."