When the Act Ended, So Did the Marriage

Gavin, Natasha, and I headed to the courthouse to finalize the divorce.

We had barely reached the steps when Gavin suddenly froze. Then, right on cue, he grabbed his head like he'd been hit with some dramatic wave of memory. He staggered a little, then lurched toward me.

"This place… It feels so familiar. I think it's coming back to me. We got married here, right after college. You wore a white dress. You held my hand and said we'd be together forever. God, you were beautiful back then."

He knew exactly what he was doing. That day had been the happiest of my life.

He thought a few sentimental lines would stir up my best memories, make me go soft, and maybe even back out of the divorce. That move had always worked on me before.

But this time, he didn't know I had heard everything the night he and Natasha were tangled up in that room.

"Rhea was a genius researcher back in college. The only reason I married her right after graduation was to lock her down. That way, every discovery she made would be community property. I married her for what she could give me. I couldn't risk someone else scooping her up. And I made sacrifices for it, too—no more screwing around in the open. Now, I have to sneak out just to see you.

"But you're better anyway—younger, sexier, and way more creative in bed."

Their cuddling and cooing in the room made me sick.

I used to think he married me for love. Apparently, I was just a means to an end.

He once swore he'd build me a cutting-edge lab. But the moment his company took off, built on the back of my pharmaceutical research, he started chipping away at me, blocking me at every turn. All along, he'd been guarding against me, treating me like a threat.

I was still lost in that thought when Gavin suddenly grabbed my hand and asked if I remembered everything.

He was warning me with his eyes. He had offered me a way out, and I'd be smart to take it before I pushed my luck too far. I turned my face away, pretending not to notice.

"You must be thinking of Natasha. You're confused, but I can't blame you, though. That lab explosion did a number on your brain," I said.

Gavin's fists clenched, slow and tight. He hadn't expected me to brush him off so easily. His little performance had fallen flat, and the rejection hit him right where it hurt.

Just then, the media swarmed in like vultures, having caught wind of the divorce. Flashbulbs popped in my face, relentlessly.

"Mr. Chapman, is it true you're divorcing Ms. Lanner?"

"Are you leaving Ms. Lanner for the woman in your arms right now?"

I instinctively recoiled from the cameras, while Natasha leaned in as if it were her moment on the red carpet. She was proud to play the homewrecker for all the world to see.

And Gavin? His convenient "amnesia" made him bulletproof against the media.

In a week, he'd just claim his memory had come back, and every damning thing he had said would be waved off as the ramblings of someone with amnesia.

He grabbed Natasha's hand and raised it for the flash of the cameras. It was a cheap performance meant to make me squirm.

"That's right. Natasha's the only woman I'll ever call my wife. We're getting married once Rhea and I are divorced."

As Gavin finished speaking, he shot me a sideways glance. But when he saw I wasn't even fazed, a flicker of fury pulsed beneath his skin.

He pulled Natasha in by the waist and kissed her cheek right there in front of the flashing cameras. The reporters gasped.

He thought the stunt would make me mad and jealous, that I'd crumble and beg him to take me back. But I was done. And I wasn't about to lose my dignity over a man who had turned into a walking circus act.