Chapter 4 - The Silent Drive Home
The interior of the black Mercedes-Maybach was a tomb of expensive leather and dead silence.
Madison sat in the passenger seat, sobbing uncontrollably, her designer handbag clutched to her chest like a shield against an executioner.
“Daniel, please,” she choked out, her voice grating against his nerves. “It was a mistake! I was insecure! I thought you wanted me so badly, but you were still talking about Claire in your sleep—you were still obsessed with her failure to get pregnant, and I just wanted to secure our future—”
Daniel didn't look at her. His hands gripped the steering wheel so tightly his knuckles were bloodless. His mind was racing through a labyrinth of humiliation, betrayal, and cold, hard corporate logistics.
He wasn't just a husband scorned; he was a multi-millionaire real estate developer whose personal life was now a toxic waste dump.
“Whose is it, Madison?” Daniel asked, his voice chillingly calm.
“I don't know!” she wailed.
Daniel slammed his foot on the brake so hard the Maybach skidded slightly on the wet leaves lining the Lake Forest driveway. The car came to a dead halt right in front of the massive wrought-iron double doors of his estate.
He turned his head slowly, looking at her with eyes that felt like broken glass.
“You expect me to believe,” Daniel whispered, “that you got pregnant naturally, swore up and down it was mine, trapped me into a divorce, married me within months, and you don't know whose child you gave birth to?”
“It was a consultant!” she blurted out, panic overriding her self-preservation. “From the downtown architectural firm! Liam—Liam from the zoning board! We had one night at the hotel during the downtown project rollout when you were in Zurich! I thought... I thought I was being smart, Daniel! I thought if I gave you a child, you’d never look back!”
Daniel let out a dry, humorless laugh that sounded more like a cough.
“Smart,” he repeated. “You committed fraud. You trapped me into a marriage under false pretenses. You stole my name, my house, and my life.”
“We’re married!” she screamed, grabbing his arm. “You signed a pre-nup, but we’re legally married! You can't just throw me out like trash!”
“Watch me,” Daniel said coldly.
He reached across her, popped the passenger door open, and hit the central unlock switch.
“Your clothes are already being packed by security,” Daniel said, his voice devoid of humanity. “My divorce attorney will have the paperwork for an annulment based on fraudulent paternity on your phone before dinner. If you contest it, I will sue you for every penny of financial support I’ve provided over the last eighteen months, plus legal fees. Get out of my car, Madison.”
“Daniel—!”
“Get out.”
She stumbled out onto the wet gravel, the rain starting to drizzle down from the gray Chicago sky. As she scrambled to grab her stroller and diaper bag from the trunk, the security guards stood like statues, watching her fall from grace with absolute indifference.
Daniel sped away down the driveway, leaving her standing in the rain.
May you like
He drove straight past his empty, echoing mansion, heading downtown toward the high-rise office of Marcus Vance—the most ruthless divorce and family law attorney in the state of Illinois.
It was time to talk about custody.
