Chapter 4
PART 4:
Claire’s voice cracked.
“Do what?”
“This,” Graham snapped. “The crying. The appointments. The false hope. The way you look at me like I’m failing you.”
Claire pressed a hand to her stomach.
“I never said that.”
“You didn’t have to.”
Diane lowered her voice, pretending kindness.
“Graham needs heirs, Claire. Not endless heartbreak.”
That was the night he asked for a divorce.
Not in court.
Not in therapy.
Not after a real conversation.
In the study, with his mother standing beside him like a witness for the prosecution.
Claire signed nothing that night.
She left with one suitcase.
Graham did not stop her.
Three weeks later, alone in a small apartment across town, Claire fainted in a grocery store.
An older woman helped her sit up.
The ambulance came.
At the hospital, a young doctor smiled at her chart.
“You’re pregnant.”
Claire stared at him.
“No.”
“Yes.”
“That’s impossible.”
The doctor turned the screen toward her.
Two small heartbeats flickered.
Twins.
Claire cried so hard the nurse had to sit beside her.
Not because she was unhappy.
Because the first person she wanted to tell was the man who had already decided she was broken.
She called Graham that night.
The number was disconnected.
She emailed.
No response.
She went to the Ellison Tower lobby.
Security told her she was not on the approved visitor list.
She mailed a letter.
It came back unopened.
Then Diane appeared at Claire’s apartment.
No cameras.
No lawyers.
Just Diane, a driver, and a look of disgust.
“You need to stop.”
Claire stood in the doorway with one hand over her stomach.
“I’m pregnant.”
Diane looked at her like she had said something filthy.
“No, you are desperate.”
“They’re Graham’s.”
Diane stepped closer.
“If you try to drag my son back with a lie, I will bury you in court until those children are grown.”
Claire’s hand shook.
“You know the treatment worked.”
Diane smiled.
“I know what people will believe.”
May you like
Then she left.
👉 And that was how Claire learned what it meant to be erased by rich people.
