Chapter One

Gwendolyn’s POV

Everyone thinks getting married to a rich man, not thinking about how to pay bills and all that would make one happy. It might be for them, but not me.

And also, everyone thinks getting married to their heartthrob would be a blissful feeling. Well, it was for me for the first year of my marriage to my sweetheart, but the year after was hel for me.

Here I am, five years later married to my sweetheart but still gets cheated on even after all his promises. I thought my life would be colorful as long as I was married to Henry, my first love and everything, but who was I kidding? My life has been hel after our first year of marriage, and I still decided to stay with him. Stay by his side to see if he was going to change his ways, it was old news to me that he was cheating and the media made it known every day. He always liked to twist his words, telling me that the women were his business partners and nothing was going on between them.

I used to believe that lie, believe that they were just his business partners and not his flings, but now I do not. Henry has made it a constant thing to come home late every day. It got worse when our daughter was born, I don’t see my husband face to face apart from the news and the constant media stalking.

I got fed up but I had to stay because of my beautiful daughter. She’s the sole reason why I was still here and also because I have nowhere else to go.

So, here I am checking the time every danm minute to see if my ‘dearest hubby’ would come home. It was almost midnight and Henry wasn’t back from his work. I knew he was bluffing when he promised his daughter that he was going to be here for her 4th birthday, yet he was nowhere to be seen.

He promised Jasmine, his daughter, that he would return home before 5 pm so he could take her out and let her enjoy her day. My heart broke as I watched my little daughter waiting patiently for her father as the hours ticked until she couldn’t wait for him anymore.

I watched with a broken heart as my daughter spoke lowly to herself about how her daddy didn’t love her. I was too heartbroken to correct her, as little as she was, she knew her daddy didn’t come home on time, and she was already used to it. But today was her birthday, she had high hopes of seeing her father home early because he promised to celebrate with us this year. Henry wasn’t a husband or father material in fact, he started running from his responsibilities when Jasmine was born.

He always nagged that she was always crying, and I always smelled of brea-st milk like it was our fault.

I sighed and went to check up on her again, I opened her door slowly and smiled when I saw her sleeping comfortably on her little bed. I hoped she would forget about this by tomorrow.

I came back downstairs and checked the clock again, past 12, and he still wasn’t back. I couldn’t wait any longer, so I took my phone and placed a call to him.

His line went through, but he didn’t take his call, I tried again and again before he finally picked up the call.

“Hello.” My brows furrowed. The first thing I noticed was his heavy breathing like he was in the middle of an intense workout. I sighed and rubbed my face, only god knows where he is right now.

“Henry, where are you?” I asked.

“I’m…uh…” he went silent after that and the heavy breathing continued. My heart hurt when I heard that, but I didn’t show any reaction that I knew what was going on, that even a danm call couldn’t hide something like that from you.

“You know what, Henry, you are a big as-shole! Your daughter has been waiting for you all day! All she ever wanted for her birthday was a cake and us by her side as she celebrates this new year, and you can’t even give that to her as her father.” I yelled at him, frustrated already with his acts. He was hurting my daughter with his act, and that’s something I can’t take.

“Why do you always nag all the time, Gwen? I gave you my card this morning because of something like this, you can get her something online or even take her out for her day.” He retorted. “You can get whatever she wants and there’s no need to consider the price, Gwen, she’s my daughter and can afford anything she likes.”

All this while my mouth was wide open and my hand was clenched by my side, he didn’t just say that. He thought giving his daughter expensive things would be able to make up for the time that he wasn’t here.

“Do you think giving Jasmine an expensive gift will make up for your presence?” I asked, breathing in sharply so I wouldn’t snap at him. As it is, I am angry and any more rubbish from him, I think I’m going to blow up.

“Oh shut up Gwen and do as you’re told!” He yelled and I became speechless.

“You do not….” I kept my mouth shut when I heard giggling from the phone. Was he with someone?

As if the person knew what I was thinking about, I heard her voice. He was with a woman on his daughter’s birthday!

“Who’s that babe?” The voice asked, and I froze. The hand holding the phone almost let the object down, but I held it more tightly.

It was her.

He was with her. Why didn’t I think of this? Of course, he would be with his lover by this time.

“No one important, get back to what you were doing.” My so-called husband said, and I gritted my teeth.

I heard a kissing sound before hearing her moaning his name and then his heavy breaths. I knew I should just end the call, and not listen to what they were doing, but my body couldn’t move due to the shock.

“I guess your wife likes listening to us having se-x, huh?” The voice taunted at the other side and a giggle followed.

My face burns red in shame, I guess she was right. After all, I was busy listening to them doing whatever they were doing without having the common sense of hanging up.

“I’ve told you what you can do, Gwen, get something good for my daughter and make sure that it is expensive.”

Beep. Beep.

The call was disconnected and I remained frozen where I was standing. My body trembled, and I slowly dropped the phone down before I threw it against the wall.

I slid down slowly next to the couch with my hands in my hair, I let the tears flow out, but they came out silently. I would rather not wake up Jasmine with my cry and let her know what was going on. She wasn’t supposed to know what was going on between me and her father. I didn’t want her to know about it but the more I tried to hide it the more the drifts became wider, and my heart hurt more. It felt like someone was plunging a knife into my heart over and over again.

This couldn’t go on for long, and I knew even when I wanted to make things work that it wouldn’t work.

I stayed there crying for some time and decided to have a glass or two of wine.