The Obsidian Lounge in downtown Boston was buzzing like a disturbed beehive, the air heavy with the scent of roasted duck, expensive perfume, and the high-pitched squeals of children born into old money. Today, the Vance family was celebrating the fifth birthday of Preston, my nephew.
My mother-in-law, Victoria Vance, lived for these events. Not for the grandson she barely tolerated, but for the opportunity to gather the business partners, the movers, and the shakers under one roof to demonstrate the impervious unity of the Vance clan.
I sat at the edge of the table, wringing my cold fingers beneath the heavy white tablecloth. I felt like an alien species at this celebration of life. Around me, everyone was in pairs or trios—parents wiping mouths, grandmothers cooing over infants. Families were everywhere, and I was just an attachment to Julian, a decorative piece that had failed its primary function.
I tried to force a smile when the birthday boy ran past, smearing chocolate frosting on my modest gray dress. I reached for a napkin, but before I could clean it, Julian’s aunt, a woman who wore diamonds like armor, leaned in.
“Cassandra, darling,” she sang out, enveloping me in a cloud of cloying gardenia scent. “Why are you sitting all alone? Look at how precious the babies are. It’s past time for you, honey. That clock is ticking louder than the DJ.”
Heat rushed to my cheeks. I mumbled something incoherent about timing, about God’s plan. She patted my hand with condescending pity and drifted away. It was the fourth jab of the evening. Every word was a pebble thrown at a glass house that was already cracking.
It had been five years of marriage to Julian. Five years of negative tests, invasive procedures, and the silent, growing chasm between us.
Just then, a massive cake shaped like a pirate ship was wheeled out. Victoria Vance, dressed in a severe, tailored black suit with pearls that cost more than my parents’ house, tapped her champagne flute with a silver spoon. The room fell silent.
She kissed Preston on the head, then swept her cold, reptilian gaze over the room.
“Look at this joy,” she proclaimed, her voice ringing with theatrical pride. “My daughter has given us the future. Everyone here is contributing to the legacy.” She paused, her eyes locking onto me like a sniper’s scope. “Everyone except you, Cassandra. You are the only one who is useless to us.”
The word dropped into the silence like a stone into a frozen lake. Useless.
The music had cut off. Dozens of eyes turned to me. I felt the blood drain from my face, leaving me lightheaded. The world narrowed to a single point: my husband’s face. I looked at Julian, begging silently. Say something. Defend me. Tell her she’s cruel.
But Julian didn’t look at me. He stared at his plate, methodically dissecting a piece of salmon with his fork. His silence was louder than a scream. It was a verdict. He agreed.
The party rolled on, flattening me like a steamroller. I sat like a stone statue, waiting for the moment I could leave without causing a scene, though the scene had already consumed me.
The drive home was suffocating. Rain had begun to fall, large drops drumming against the roof of Julian’s luxury sedan. He drove with a white-knuckled grip on the wheel.
“Julian,” I whispered as we pulled into the driveway of the apartment we had furnished with such hope five years ago. “Why didn’t you say anything?”
He didn’t answer until we were inside the foyer. He didn’t even take off his coat. He turned to me, his eyes empty walls.
“Mother is right,” he said, his voice flat and lifeless. “I need a real family, Cassie. I need a legacy.”
I froze. “What are you saying?”
“Pack your things,” he cut me off.
The air left my lungs. “Julian, please. We can try again. The doctor said—”
“I don’t care what the doctor said. I’m done trying with you.” He checked his watch. “You have thirty minutes. Take what you can carry. I want you gone before I come back from the study.”
He walked away, leaving me swaying in the hallway. Thirty minutes to erase five years.
On legs that felt like cotton, I went to the bedroom. I threw clothes into a duffel bag blindly—sweaters, jeans, a toothbrush. In my haste, I swept a stack of books off the nightstand into the bag. Among them was an old, tattered journal belonging to Julian’s grandmother, Pearl, which I had meant to return to the attic. I didn’t care. I just zipped the bag.
Julian stood in the doorway, watching me not like a husband, but like a warden. When I walked past him, he opened the front door. The rain was pouring now, a freezing Boston sleet.
“Goodbye, Cassandra,” he said.
The door slammed. The lock clicked.
I walked out of the building, shivering violently. I had nowhere to go. My parents lived in the city, but Victoria would ensure they heard the worst version of this story before I even arrived. I couldn’t bring them that shame tonight.
I huddled under the awning of a closed bodega, fumbling in my purse for a tissue. My fingers brushed against a small, rectangular cardboard box I had bought that morning.
A pregnancy test.
I had taken it in the mall restroom before the party. Two pink lines. I had been planning to tell Julian tonight. It was supposed to be our miracle, the news that would fix everything.
I pulled it out, staring at it under the flickering streetlamp. Two lines.
I was pregnant. And the husband who had just thrown me into the freezing rain for being “useless” was the father.
A bitter, soundless laugh stuck in my throat. I looked at the test, then at the dark windows of the apartment above. He would never know. I would make sure of it.
I took the last train out of Boston, heading south. I had one friend who would take me in without questions—Elena, my college roommate who lived in Savannah, Georgia.
As the train rattled through the darkness, I clutched my bag like a life preserver. I didn’t sleep. The rhythm of the tracks seemed to chant: Useless. Pregnant. Useless. Pregnant.
Elena met me at the station at dawn. She didn’t ask why I was soaked or why my eyes were swollen shut. She just took me home, fed me soup, and let me sleep for eighteen hours.
The first weeks were a fog. But necessity is a brutal teacher. I needed money. I needed a future. I went to a local clinic under my maiden name, Cassie Price.
The ultrasound room was cool and dim. The technician, a kind woman with warm hands, moved the wand over my belly.
“Okay, Mama,” she murmured. “Let’s see… Heartbeat is strong. Everything looks good.” She paused, squinting at the screen. Then she chuckled. “Are you aware that you have a surprise in here?”
My heart stopped. “Is something wrong?”
“Quite the opposite. You don’t have one little heart beating in here. You have two.”
Twins.
I stared at the grainy black-and-white image. Two distinct flickers of light. My secret, my burden, my hope—everything had just doubled. I left the clinic in a daze, walking out into the humid Savannah air with a terrifying realization: I was alone, broke, and carrying two lives.
That night, needing distraction, I unpacked my bag. I found the tattered journal I had accidentally stolen—Grandmother Pearl’s diary. I sat on Elena’s porch, flipping through the yellowed pages, reading mundane entries about garden parties and weather from thirty years ago.
Then, I saw a name. Victoria.
May 15th, 1994: Had another difficult conversation with Victoria. She is losing her mind over the heir issue. My son, Thomas—Julian’s father—has confirmed the medical reports. The doctors say the chances are slim to none. Low motility, genetic factors. But Victoria acts as if it is a personal insult. She came to me yesterday with wild eyes, saying that if her husband can’t do it, a way must be found. She said the family name is more important than biology. She said she is ready to do anything. I am afraid of her. There is a bad fire burning in that woman.
I reread the entry three times. Julian’s father had fertility issues? Victoria knew?
If Julian’s father had issues, and Julian had issues… maybe the “uselessness” wasn’t mine. Maybe it never was.
I shoved the diary to the bottom of my suitcase. I didn’t have time for the ghosts of the Vance family. I had to survive.
I started baking. It was the only thing that calmed my anxiety. I baked peach cobblers, cinnamon rolls, and intricate cakes in Elena’s tiny kitchen. Elena took them to her office. The orders started coming in. Then more.
Three years passed.
Three years of flour, sugar, and sleepless nights. Three years of raising Leo and Luna, my double miracle. They were beautiful, with Julian’s dark curls and my resilience. I built a fortress of vanilla and buttercream. “Cassie’s Sweets” became a staple in downtown Savannah.
I was no longer the frightened woman in the rain. I was a mother. I was a business owner. I was free.
Until the phone rang.
“Cassie,” my father’s voice cracked over the line. “It’s your mother. She’s had a heart attack. It’s bad. You need to come home.”
Boston. The word tasted like ash. But I packed the twins and caught the next flight.
My hometown was gray and imposing. My parents, overjoyed to see me and stunned to meet their grandchildren, welcomed us with tears. But a city like Boston, specifically the circles the Vances ran in, is smaller than it looks.
I needed pomegranates for my mother. I took the twins to the central market, trying to keep a low profile. Leo and Luna were laughing, chasing each other around a fruit stand, when Leo pointed a chubby finger.
“Look, Mama! That man dropped his hat!”
I turned.
Ten feet away, freezing in mid-step, stood Julian.
He looked older. Harder. He stared at me, then his gaze dropped to the two toddlers clinging to my legs—children with his nose, his eyes, his chin. His face drained of color, leaving him gray.
But he wasn’t alone.
Clinging to his arm was a woman. She was stunning—glossy dark hair, cashmere coat, diamonds in her ears. Isabella. I knew her from the society pages.
“Cassie?” Julian whispered, his voice sounding like it was being dragged over gravel.
I pulled the twins closer. “Hello, Julian.”
He looked from me to the children, his mouth opening and closing. “Are these…?”
“Meet my wife, Isabella,” he blurted out, a reflex of panic.
Isabella looked at me, then at the kids. She didn’t look arrogant. She looked terrified. And then I saw it.
Her coat was unbuttoned. Beneath it was a very large, very round pregnant belly.
“We have to go,” Julian said abruptly, gripping Isabella’s arm hard enough to bruise. “We’re late.”
He dragged her away. He didn’t ask about the twins. He ran.
I stood there, watching them disappear into the crowd. He had replaced me. He had a new wife, a “real” family, an heir on the way. The very thing he claimed I couldn’t give him.
I felt a cold rage settle in my chest. Not for me—but for Leo and Luna. He had looked at his own children and run away.
But the real threat came two days later.
I was at the park with the kids when a shadow fell over me.
“I knew you’d come crawling back when the money ran out.”
Victoria Vance. She stood there in her black wool coat, looking like a vulture waiting to feast.
“Hello, Victoria,” I said, standing up to meet her eye-to-eye.
“Who are these bastards?” she sneered, gesturing to my children. “Did you drag some other man’s brood here to shame my son? To extort us right before his legitimate heir is born?”
“These are my children,” I said coldly. “And you will stay away from them.”
“You are a fraud, Cassandra. A useless, barren fraud. If you try to claim these children are Vance blood, I will destroy you. I will bury you in legal fees until you are living in a box. My son finally has a real wife. A fertile wife. Don’t you dare ruin this.”
She turned and marched away, her heels clicking on the pavement like gunshots.
I went home and called a lawyer.
“I want to file for paternity,” I told the attorney. “I want a DNA test. Immediately.”
It wasn’t about the money. It was about the truth. It was about wiping that sneer off Victoria’s face.
I expected a fight. I expected threats.
What I didn’t expect was a knock on my parents’ door late that night.
I looked through the peephole. It was Isabella. Julian’s wife.
She was soaking wet, shivering, her hair plastered to her face. She looked nothing like the polished socialite from the market.
I opened the door. “What do you want?”
“Please,” she sobbed, pushing past me into the hallway. “Please, you have to stop the lawsuit. You have to drop the DNA test.”
“Why?” I asked, crossing my arms. “Are you afraid I’ll take his money?”
“No!” She fell into a kitchen chair, burying her face in her hands. “I have money. Look.”
She opened her designer bag. It was stuffed with stacks of cash. “Take it. Go away. Please. If you do the DNA test… if you prove your kids are his… Zenobia will kill me.”
“Why?” I asked, bewildered. “If my kids are his, it just proves he’s fertile. That should make her happy about your baby.”
Isabella looked up. Her eyes were wide, haunted. “You don’t understand.”
She stood up. Her hands went to the hem of her oversized sweater.
“I’m not pregnant, Cassie.”
She pulled the sweater up. Underneath was a contraption of straps and buckles holding a realistic, silicone belly.
She unbuckled it and let it drop to the table with a hollow thud. Underneath, her stomach was completely flat.
“It’s a lie,” she whispered. “All of it.”
I stared at the silicone prosthetic on my mother’s kitchen table. It looked like a prop from a horror movie.
“Explain,” I demanded.
“Zenobia knows Julian is sterile,” Isabella said, her voice shaking. “She’s known for years. But the family business… the trust fund… it all depends on a direct heir by the time Julian turns forty-five. If he doesn’t have one, control of the company goes to the board of directors. Zenobia loses her power.”
She took a shaky breath.
“My father owed Zenobia millions. She bought me. I was the price of his debt. I was supposed to marry Julian and… provide an heir.”
