From Scorned Wife To Billionaire Bride

They Took My Devotion for Granted - I Made Them Regret It for the Rest of Their Lives

At a college alumni gala in downtown Chicago, my husband Brody's first love Destiny looked down her nose at me and sneered:

"I heard you're just a graphic designer who does promotional brochures. Earning that pitiful little salary of yours must be exhausting."

Five years ago, Destiny and Brody crashed their car together, and Destiny fled the country to dodge the charges, leaving behind two hundred thousand dollars in medical bills and legal debts.

It was me who worked seventy-hour weeks and drained my entire savings to pay off Brody's mountain of medical bills.

Back then, he knelt on the ground in tears, begging me to marry him, calling me the woman who saved his life, the love of his life.

But the moment Destiny returned to the country, he snapped right back into the groveling lapdog he'd always been for her.

In front of the whole table, Brody sighed loudly for everyone to hear, shaking his head with a bitter smile:

"Marriage really does change a man. You think you're signing up for stability and warmth, and all you get in the end is someone nagging about money in your ear all day."

If marriage had changed him, then this marriage was over.

I slapped the expedited divorce papers right into his face, froze his bank accounts, and walked out without looking back.

Next, I was going to make his life a living hell.

Chapter 1

Cathy Webster's POV

Five years ago, Brody Hamilton's wealthy girlfriend, Destiny Johnson, fled the country after a car accident she caused with Brody behind the wheel, leaving two hundred thousand dollars in medical bills and legal debts in her wake. To pay off that mountain of debt for him, I worked seventy-hour weeks at a brand strategy agency like a woman possessed.

Back then, Brody dropped to his knees in that hospital room, kissed my calloused hands, called me the woman who saved his life, and wept as he begged me to marry him.

And tonight, at a college alumni gala in downtown Chicago, Destiny made her triumphant return in a backless silk evening gown. All night, Brody had been hovering around her like a pampered lapdog - then turned around and introduced me to his friends as a "baggage he couldn't shake off."

Destiny walked straight toward our table, tilting her manicured hand to angle her champagne glass.

She stopped a few inches from my chair and looked down at my plain gray cocktail dress.

"So you're Cathy," Destiny said, her voice dripping with unconcealed pity. "Brody told me about you. A graphic designer who does brochures. Earning that pitiful little salary must be exhausting."

I straightened my spine and laid my napkin flat on the table.

"I run full-scale premium brand campaigns," I replied evenly. "And it was exactly my money that paid off the mess you left behind when you walked away five years ago."

Destiny gave a light laugh and simply turned her back on me.

In front of more than twenty old classmates, she reached out and laid her hand on Brody's bare neck, her fingers brazenly sliding into his hair.

"Brody, you're still wearing these stiff, buttoned-up shirts," Destiny murmured, leaning in so close her lips nearly brushed his earlobe. "You were so much more attractive when you used to leave the top few undone."

Brody didn't dodge. He didn't push her away.

Instead, his shoulders relaxed, a flush crept up his cheeks, and he even tilted his head to nuzzle into her palm.

"No one in all of Chicago has taste like yours, Des," Brody whispered, his voice trembling faintly with excitement.

He glanced around the table, clearly aware of every eye on them, and didn't move her hand an inch.

He cleared his throat, looked at his old college buddies, and let out a theatrical sigh.

"Marriage really does change a man," Brody announced loudly to the whole table, shaking his head with a bitter smile. "You think you're signing up for stability and warmth, and all you get is a never-ending list of bills, chore schedules, and someone nagging in your ear about the electric bill every night."

The table went silent for a beat, then a few of the men laughed awkwardly.

I picked up my wine glass and drained it to the last drop.

The alcohol burned down my throat, but my mind had never been clearer.

"If this marriage feels that suffocating, Brody, we can sign the divorce papers tomorrow," I said, my voice clear and cold, cutting through the clatter of silverware.

Brody's smile vanished instantly, replaced by a sullen, cornered scowl.

"Cathy, don't you dare make a scene here!" he snapped, waving me off like a pesky fly. "It was a joke. Can't you take a joke? Every single time everyone's having fun, you have to come out and ruin it."

Across the table, Mark, Brody's old college roommate, leaned forward with a peacemaker's fake smile.

"Oh, come on, Cathy. Destiny just got back from London," Mark cajoled. "She's an international art consultant now. Brody's just catching up, reminiscing about the old days. Don't be so sensitive."

"That's right, Cathy," another woman chimed in. "Back in college, Destiny and Brody were the couple everyone rooted for. Fate just intervened. There was always something between them - you can't blame them for that."

I looked at the woman and laughed out of sheer fury.

Fate? Fate had nothing to do with what tore them apart.

Selfishness and cowardice did.

Five years ago, Destiny and Brody, both drunk, had sped down Lake Shore Drive at nearly ninety miles an hour and slammed headlong into a concrete median.

Brody's pelvis was shattered and his spleen ruptured.

Destiny walked away with nothing but a scraped collarbone, because the passenger side had absorbed most of the impact.

Her wealthy family bought her a one-way ticket to Switzerland that very night, leaving Brody completely alone in the ICU - with no insurance payout to claim and a mountain of court summons piling up for the public property he'd destroyed.

I still remember the sting of antiseptic in the air the first time I walked into his hospital room.

Tubes ran through Brody's nose and chest. His face was swollen and purple, buried in a dirty pillow as he sobbed - because not one of his rich friends from the Destiny crowd would pick up his calls.

"Cathy, please..." Brody wept, his trembling, IV-bruised fingers clamping around my wrist. "The bank is foreclosing on my mom's house... Without a deposit, the hospital won't do my second surgery... There's no one left who'll help me..."

Back then I was just an ordinary classmate from the college design lab who had kindly dropped off his lecture notes a few times. But I was too soft-hearted, and I happened to have the savings my grandmother left me.

I emptied my account.

On top of my full-time job, I took on freelance work like a machine, working until three in the morning, every night, for two straight years.

I cleared his hospital bills, negotiated with the city attorneys on my knees, and paid out of pocket for his rehabilitation equipment.

When his mother, Betty Jean, rushed in from out of state, she was half-deranged with panic - at first she even pointed in my face and screamed, convinced I was one of the party girls who'd led her son astray.

"Were you the one who lured him into that beat-up car?!" she shrieked at me in the waiting room, her face drenched in tears.

From his hospital bed, Brody yanked his mother to his side and roared at her:

"Mom, stop it! If it weren't for Cathy, I'd be dead! She paid to save my life! She's the woman who saved me!"

Right there in that antiseptic-smelling room, Brody pulled a cheap silver ring from his pocket, seized my work-worn right hand, and dropped to his knees on the cold floor.

"Marry me, Cathy," he begged through his tears. "I'm a cripple now, I have nothing - but I'll spend the rest of my life honoring you, loving you! I swear I'll never look at another woman as long as I live! Please, let me be your husband!"

Looking at that tear-streaked, desperate face, I took pity on him, and I believed his vows.

I shouldered the entire burden, held off the debt collectors, and soothed his mother's hysteria.

For the first three years of our marriage, Brody really did play the part of a devoted, attentive husband.

He cooked dinner every night, even though the roast chicken was always burnt and the soup always too salty.

But I cleaned my plate with a smile every time, because to me, the intention mattered far more than the execution.

He swore up and down that he was tired of the wild life he'd led with Destiny.

He took a mundane clerical job at a logistics company, wore plain cotton shirts, and promised me solemnly that a quiet, ordinary life was all he ever wanted.

Until three weeks ago, when Destiny Johnson came back to Chicago.

And in a single instant, five years of marriage turned to dust.