Too Late, Mr. Scott: She's Someone Else's Wife

For six years, my husband, Corbin, used his severe mysophobia as an excuse for why he could never touch me. I believed him, until I saw him tenderly caress another woman-his ex-girlfriend, Annis. When I was later left bleeding on the pavement after saving her life, he walked right past me to comfort her, his eyes filled with a fury I'd never seen. He didn't ask if I was okay. He didn't call for help. He just looked at me with disgust and said, "My priority is you," to her, before walking away. The final blow came when Annis smugly revealed the truth: Corbin only married me for my family's connections. He called our marriage a "contract." I wasn't his wife; I was a business deal. So, while he was distracted by Annis's "anxiety" in my hospital room, I had him sign a document he thought was a template for a friend. It was our divorce agreement. He's about to find out he's not just single-he's also broke. Because I just gave away every last cent of the fortune he gave me to win me back.

For two years, I lived in hiding, a ghost. But they found me. When Liam Stone' s team locked down the hospital, I lay there, a skeleton. What was coming had finally arrived. He stood in the doorway, my husband, his handsome face a mask of indifference. "You deserve this," he said, his eyes devoid of pity. The man I loved still hated me. He wouldn' t let me die. He spent a fortune keeping me alive, just to torment me. Every bone in my body felt corroded by poison. It was a living hell. Even my own mother, driven to despair by Liam' s relentless persecution of our family, plunged a knife into me. "Why are you still alive? It would be better for everyone if you were dead." Her words echoed louder than the pain. My family, the people I had tried so hard to protect, betrayed me. My only sin, I murmured to myself, fading, was falling in love with him. Liam' s words, a brutal reminder: "Only by living a life worse than death can you comfort my sister' s spirit in heaven." But Ella' s death had nothing to do with me. I never envied her relationship with him; I cherished it. My love for him burned with a purity he never saw. Now, it must end. On the rooftop, overlooking the city, I prepared to leap. Soon, I would be free.

Eight years ago, I gave up everything to save the man I loved. I was an award-winning investigative journalist, Ava Miller, and I put Marcus Thorne in prison - a choice that broke us both. I promised myself he' d be safe, even if it meant he' d hate me forever. But the truth was far more complex than a simple betrayal. A cruel family secret, a hidden illness eating away at my mind, turned me into a stranger even to myself. Now he' s back, richer and colder, engaged to my former best friend Chloe, and determined to make me pay for a crime I didn' t commit. He thinks I' m a liar, a gold-digger, broken and pathetic. He doesn' t know the real reason I did what I did, or that my memory is failing, turning my past into a terrifying blank. With nowhere left to turn, and my mind slipping away, there' s only one way I can tell him the truth, one last desperate message before I lose it all… or myself. I have to make him understand, even if it' s the last thing I ever do.

My husband, Ethan, always told me my grandmother' s priceless Martin guitar was "just an old guitar." My heart, a delicate melody, had spent years devoted to his dreams, sacrificing my own. Then, at his startup' s glitzy SXSW party, he gave it away. As a "bonus" to his new intern, Sabrina, a girl barely out of her teens. I watched, helpless, as she fumbled, faked a fall, and the antique wood shattered on the marble floor. Ethan didn't even glance at the rubble. He cradled Sabrina, his eyes cold daggers aimed at me, his "supportive wife." He then called my cherished legacy "just an old guitar," spitting venom that my Bluegrass grandmother was "just some hick musician." My world imploded. That night, the betrayal deepened. His phone, answered by Sabrina' s smug purr, confirmed the affair. "You really need to learn to let things go, Jocelyn," she taunted. The next morning, a frantic call: Sabrina had a severe "anxiety attack" and needed blood from my rare O-negative type. He abducted me, forcing a transfusion, making me miss a life-changing music meeting. Drained and helpless, I discovered a year-long scheme: my designs, my songs, my entire future-all stolen, registered in Sabrina' s name, and now she was calling herself a songwriter. Every piece of my identity, my dreams, twisted into a cruel mockery. How could the man I loved, the partner I built a life with, systematically dismantle my existence with such cold precision? I was erased. But in that sterile clinic room, bleeding from a forced donation for his mistress, a new, chilling resolve began to crystallize within me. They thought they had left me with nothing. They had only given me everything I needed to burn their world to the ground.

My last breath was a gasp of pure, stupid shock. The sterile white room, the doctor' s flat voice delivering my death sentence-a massive coronary, brought on by stress. But it wasn't stress. It was betrayal. My wife, Jennifer, stood over me, her sweet mask replaced by a cold, triumphant sneer. "The baby?" she hissed, her voice dripping venom. "It' s Ryan' s. It was always going to be Ryan' s." Ryan. Her childhood sweetheart. The man whose limp I pitied, whose medical bills I paid, fueling their luxurious life. She laughed, a harsh, ugly sound. "I came to your room right after I finished with Ryan. We planned it all, you pathetic fool. I never loved you. I despised you. Thanks for the easy life." The pain in my chest wasn't just my failing heart. It was the crushing weight of my own idiocy. My billions bought me the most elaborate, painful death imaginable. My vision tunneled, Jennifer' s hateful face the last thing I saw. Then, a roar filled my ears. The Texas sun on my neck. I was on one knee, a diamond bracelet glittering in my hand, facing Jennifer Smith. This was it. The exact moment I sealed my doom. The grand, public proposal that had cost me everything. But this time, I knew. I knew about Ryan' s fake limp. I knew they' d slept together less than an hour ago. I knew this was all a carefully staged play. This time, things would be different. This time, I' d rewrite my ending.

Five years ago, I stood alone in my simple white dress, abandoned at the altar by my high school sweetheart, Ryan Morris, for another woman. Heartbroken, I fled to Paris, found my passion, and built a new life as Jocelyn Blakely, wife to the powerful heir, Andrew. Now, three months pregnant, I returned to New Orleans, only to be met at the airport by none other than Ryan, who had become a petty valet. He and his new girlfriend, Sabrina, reveled in mocking me, physically shoving me to the ground, causing a sharp pain in my abdomen. The humiliation deepened at Andrew's grandfather's gala. Ryan and Sabrina publicly shamed me, shattered a precious sugar sculpture I crafted, and stole the locket Andrew gave me. Ryan even slapped me, sneering, believing I wanted him back, leaving me crumpled, violated, and utterly powerless. How could he, the man who once claimed to love me, stoop to such a depraved act? Why did he believe I was still that desperate girl, when everything about me screamed independence and strength? Just as I believed I might lose everything, the ballroom doors burst open, and Andrew Blakely strode in, his eyes blazing. He saw the wound on my cheek, the shattered gift, and his once-quiet fury was now a thunderous storm, ready to unleash retribution far beyond anything Ryan could ever imagine.