His Gilded Cage: A Husband's Escape

His Gilded Cage: A Husband's Escape

Gavin

5.0
Comment(s)
144
View
11
Chapters

It was our tenth wedding anniversary, but the party felt exactly like the nine humiliating ones before it. My wife, Vanessa Thorne, a dazzling socialite to the world, was my warden, and tonight, she paraded her newest "toy," a young model named Liam. "Show him the ropes," she purred, her eyes alight with cruel amusement, forcing me, her husband, to mentor her latest conquest in how to "please her." As the guests snickered, the subtext was clear: "Show him how to be my pet, just like you." For ten years, I had been her gilded prisoner, my father's mounting medical bills the chain around my neck, paid for by the Thorne family. But tonight, something inside me snapped. "No," I whispered, then louder, "No. I won't." I met her eyes and declared, "Vanessa, I want a divorce." The room erupted in laughter, and Vanessa sneered, "You always come crawling back. You have nothing. You are nothing without me." She was right; ninety-nine times, I had failed, but this was the hundredth. I pulled out a printed divorce agreement, a symbol of my resolve. In response, she snatched my champagne and flung it in my face, hissing, "Have you forgotten what you are? You belong to me." Then, for her audience, she commanded, "Get on your knees, Ethan. Crawl to me. Bark like the dog you are." Soaked, shaking, and utterly broken, I knelt, the marble cold beneath me, and whimpered, "Woof." That night, locked in my studio, the phone rang: my father was dying. I pounded on the door, screaming, "Vanessa! Let me out! He's dying!" Her reply, cynical and cold, echoed through the wood, "Another trick? It's pathetic." She left me there, and a primal fury ignited. I smashed the window, cut myself on the glass, and fashioned a rope from canvas. I barely made it down, landing hard and breaking my ankle, but I crawled through hedges, alarms blaring. On the street, a sleek black sedan pulled up. A woman, Sarah Jenkins, offered, "You look like you're in trouble." I gasped, "I need to get to the hospital. My father..." "Get in," she said, her voice calm and steady. At the emergency room, I heard it: "Mr. Miller... just passed a few minutes ago." My father was gone. The chain was broken. A strange, terrifying sense of freedom washed over me, a feeling of nothing left to lose. I clutched Sarah's card, a lifeline in my hand, and whispered, "I'm so, so tired of fighting."

Introduction

It was our tenth wedding anniversary, but the party felt exactly like the nine humiliating ones before it.

My wife, Vanessa Thorne, a dazzling socialite to the world, was my warden, and tonight, she paraded her newest "toy," a young model named Liam.

"Show him the ropes," she purred, her eyes alight with cruel amusement, forcing me, her husband, to mentor her latest conquest in how to "please her."

As the guests snickered, the subtext was clear: "Show him how to be my pet, just like you."

For ten years, I had been her gilded prisoner, my father's mounting medical bills the chain around my neck, paid for by the Thorne family.

But tonight, something inside me snapped.

"No," I whispered, then louder, "No. I won't."

I met her eyes and declared, "Vanessa, I want a divorce."

The room erupted in laughter, and Vanessa sneered, "You always come crawling back. You have nothing. You are nothing without me."

She was right; ninety-nine times, I had failed, but this was the hundredth.

I pulled out a printed divorce agreement, a symbol of my resolve.

In response, she snatched my champagne and flung it in my face, hissing, "Have you forgotten what you are? You belong to me."

Then, for her audience, she commanded, "Get on your knees, Ethan. Crawl to me. Bark like the dog you are."

Soaked, shaking, and utterly broken, I knelt, the marble cold beneath me, and whimpered, "Woof."

That night, locked in my studio, the phone rang: my father was dying.

I pounded on the door, screaming, "Vanessa! Let me out! He's dying!"

Her reply, cynical and cold, echoed through the wood, "Another trick? It's pathetic."

She left me there, and a primal fury ignited.

I smashed the window, cut myself on the glass, and fashioned a rope from canvas.

I barely made it down, landing hard and breaking my ankle, but I crawled through hedges, alarms blaring.

On the street, a sleek black sedan pulled up.

A woman, Sarah Jenkins, offered, "You look like you're in trouble."

I gasped, "I need to get to the hospital. My father..."

"Get in," she said, her voice calm and steady.

At the emergency room, I heard it: "Mr. Miller... just passed a few minutes ago."

My father was gone.

The chain was broken.

A strange, terrifying sense of freedom washed over me, a feeling of nothing left to lose.

I clutched Sarah's card, a lifeline in my hand, and whispered, "I'm so, so tired of fighting."

Continue Reading

Other books by Gavin

More
Contract With The Devil: Love In Shackles

Contract With The Devil: Love In Shackles

Mafia

4.5

I watched my husband sign the papers that would end our marriage while he was busy texting the woman he actually loved. He didn't even glance at the header. He just scribbled the sharp, jagged signature that had signed death warrants for half of New York, tossed the file onto the passenger seat, and tapped his screen again. "Done," he said, his voice devoid of emotion. That was Dante Moretti. The Underboss. A man who could smell a lie from a mile away but couldn't see that his wife had just handed him an annulment decree disguised beneath a stack of mundane logistics reports. For three years, I scrubbed his blood out of his shirts. I saved his family's alliance when his ex, Sofia, ran off with a civilian. In return, he treated me like furniture. He left me in the rain to save Sofia from a broken nail. He left me alone on my birthday to drink champagne on a yacht with her. He even handed me a glass of whiskey—her favorite drink—forgetting that I despised the taste. I was merely a placeholder. A ghost in my own home. So, I stopped waiting. I burned our wedding portrait in the fireplace, left my platinum ring in the ashes, and boarded a one-way flight to San Francisco. I thought I was finally free. I thought I had escaped the cage. But I underestimated Dante. When he finally opened that file weeks later and realized he had signed away his wife without looking, the Reaper didn't accept defeat. He burned down the world to find me, obsessed with reclaiming the woman he had already thrown away.

You'll also like

Chapters
Read Now
Download Book