Page 9 of The Vows He Buried

The words on the burner phone’s screen seemed to rearrange reality itself. You were never legally married to Maddox Vale.

I sank onto the edge of my bed, the phone slipping from my numb fingers. The room, my childhood sanctuary, suddenly felt too small, the air too thick to breathe. It wasn't the triumphant, liberating blow I had expected. It was a quiet, seismic shock that fractured the very foundation of my past.

Three years. A thousand and ninety-five days of my life, lived as a wife.

The public smiles, the private tears, the crushing loneliness, the systematic erasure of my identity—all of it had been predicated on a single, fundamental fact: my marriage.

And now, that fact had been revealed as a fiction. A fraud.

It meant the vows I had honored were never binding.

The name I had carried was never legally mine.

The woman I had been—Mrs. Maddox Vale—had never actually existed.

She was a ghost, a character in a play staged by the Vales, and I had been the unwitting lead actress.

The grief, the sacrifice, the child… it was all real.

But the marriage that had been the cause of it all was a lie.

A strange, hysterical laugh bubbled up in my throat.

It was a sound I didn't recognize, sharp and brittle.

I wasn't the wronged wife. I was the defrauded partner in a business deal gone horribly wrong.

The Vales hadn't just broken a marriage; they had orchestrated a three-year-long deception.

The forged notary stamp wasn't just a legal loophole; it was the key that unlocked the truth.

They had been so desperate to secure the BlakeCore connection, so arrogant in their power, that they hadn't even bothered to make their cage legally sound.

The rage returned, but it was different now.

It was colder, sharper, more focused. The emotional chaos began to recede, replaced by the crystalline clarity of a legal strategy.

This changed everything. This wasn't a messy divorce anymore.

This was an annulment. A clean, surgical severance.

And potentially, a massive fraud case against Evelyn Vale.

I knew I couldn't stay here, in this house full of memories of the girl I was. I needed my own space. A command center. A place untouched by the Blakes’ loving concern or the Vales’ toxic influence.

There was only one such place.

“I’m moving out,” I announced downstairs an hour later.

My father and Jasper looked up from the legal documents spread across the study desk.

“Out? Vannah, you just got here. You’re safe here,” my father said, his voice laced with concern.

“I know. And I’m grateful, more than you know,” I said, meeting his gaze. “But this is my fight. I can’t wage it from my childhood bedroom. I need my own ground.”

“Where will you go?” Jasper asked, though I could see in his eyes that he already knew.

“The penthouse,” I said. “It’s time to go home.”

The Zion Suites penthouse was the only major asset I had insisted on keeping solely in my name before the “wedding.” It was a lavish, extravagant purchase for a twenty-five-year-old, but it had been my declaration of independence, bought with the first significant profits from Lynelle.

It was a fortress in the sky, a place Maddox had visited only once and deemed “too modern, too cold.” In other words, it was too much me .

For three years, it had sat dormant, a ghost of a life I might have lived, managed and maintained by a discreet building staff paid for by a trust account Harper oversaw.

Jasper drove me into the city himself. We didn't talk much on the ride. He understood my need for silence, for space to let the aftershocks of the revelation settle. When we pulled up to the sleek, black-glass entrance of Zion Suites, I felt a flicker of something I hadn’t felt in years: anticipation.

The lobby was a masterpiece of minimalist design—soaring ceilings, white marble, and a single, stunning abstract sculpture. The air smelled of clean, empty space. The concierge, a man with a polite, professional smile, recognized me instantly.

“Welcome back, Ms. Blake,” he said, as if I had only been gone for the weekend. “Your apartment is ready. Ms. Lin was here this morning to ensure everything was in order.”

Harper. Of course.

The private elevator opened directly into my apartment, and I stepped out into the light.

The penthouse was a two-story glass box perched atop Manhattan, with a panoramic view that stretched from the Hudson to the East River.

The afternoon sun streamed in, illuminating the open-plan living space.

It was exactly as I remembered it. White walls, polished concrete floors, and minimalist furniture in shades of charcoal and gray.

My art collection—bold, challenging pieces I had collected from emerging artists—hung on the walls.

My baby grand piano stood in a corner, its black lacquer gleaming.

This was not a home designed for a corporate wife. This was the home of an artist, a free spirit. It was the antithesis of the Vale mansion’s oppressive, antique-filled rooms. Here, I could breathe.

“It’s good to have you back where you belong,” Jasper said, taking in the space.

“It’s good to be back,” I agreed. This wasn't a retreat. This was a reclamation. This was my war room.

After Jasper left, promising to have my things sent over, I explored my own home.

I ran a hand over the cool marble of the kitchen island, trailed my fingers over the keys of the piano, stood before the floor-to-ceiling windows and watched the city pulse with life below.

This was my kingdom. And from this fortress, I would launch my attack.

That evening, the sky opened up. A torrential, mid-autumn storm swept over the city, rain lashing against the vast windows, thunder rumbling in the distance.

The city lights blurred into a watercolor wash of neon and gold.

I was curled up on the large gray sofa, my laptop open, a glass of wine in hand, strategizing with Harper over a secure video call.

The divorce petition had been filed. The annulment proceedings were being drafted.

The Vales had been served. The first shot had been fired.

“The media is going to have a field day with this,” Harper said, her face glowing on the screen. “'Billion-dollar marriage a fraud?' It’s the headline of the century.”

“Let them,” I said. “Evelyn built her world on public perception. It’s time to tear it down with the same tools.”

We were deep in discussion about the relaunch of Lynelle when the chime of the elevator echoed through the apartment.

My blood ran cold. No one could come up without being announced by the concierge. No one.

“I have to go,” I said to Harper, quickly ending the call.

I stood up, my heart hammering against my ribs. I walked slowly towards the elevator, my bare feet silent on the concrete floor. The brushed steel doors slid open with a soft hiss.

And there he was.

Maddox.

He was drenched. The rain had plastered his dark hair to his forehead, and his expensive suit was soaked through, clinging to his powerful frame.

He wasn’t wearing a coat. He looked like he had walked through the heart of the storm to get here.

The arrogant, untouchable CEO was gone. In his place was a man who looked lost, broken, and utterly desperate.

It was the first time I had ever seen him look truly vulnerable.

He just stood there, in the elevator, water dripping from him onto the pristine floor. He didn’t step out. He just stared at me, his gray eyes a maelstrom of emotions I couldn’t begin to decipher.

“How did you get up here?” I asked, my voice surprisingly steady.

“I told the concierge it was a medical emergency,” he said, his voice raw, hoarse. “He believed me.” Of course he did. Maddox Vale could make anyone believe anything.

He took a hesitant step out of the elevator, into my home. My space. He looked around at the minimalist design, the modern art, the vast, empty spaces. He looked like a caged lion, out of place and dangerous.

“This is your place,” he stated, as if just realizing it.

“It always was,” I replied.

A long, heavy silence stretched between us, punctuated only by the drumming of the rain against the glass and the distant rumble of thunder. He didn’t move closer. He just stood there, dripping on my floor, his gaze fixed on me.

I should have felt a surge of triumph, of satisfaction at seeing him so undone.

But I didn’t. I felt a strange, hollow ache.

A ghost of the love I once had for him stirred, a phantom limb I thought had been amputated.

I saw the man I had once fallen in love with, the broken man hiding beneath the layers of power and arrogance.

My resolve didn't waver, but a flicker of compassion, an emotion I thought had been burned out of me, sparked to life. I would destroy him in the courtroom. I would dismantle his mother’s empire. But in this moment, in my home, he was just a man standing in a storm.

“You’re getting water everywhere,” I said, my voice flat. I turned and walked to a hall closet, retrieving a thick, white towel. I walked back and held it out to him.

He stared at it as if he didn’t know what it was. Then, slowly, he took it, his cold, wet fingers brushing against mine. The brief contact sent a jolt through me, a familiar, unwelcome current.

He didn’t use the towel to dry his hair or face. He just stood there, holding it, his shoulders slumped. “They served me the papers today, Savannah,” he whispered. “At the office. In front of everyone.”

“I know,” I said.

“Annulment,” he said, the word tasting like poison in his mouth. “Fraud. They’re saying… they’re saying we were never married.” He looked at me, his eyes pleading, desperate for an answer. “Is it true?”

I held his gaze. “Yes.”

He seemed to crumple from the inside out. The last bit of fight went out of him. He ran a hand through his wet hair, a gesture of profound defeat. “My mother…” he began, but his voice broke.

I didn't offer comfort. I didn't offer absolution. I just stood there, a silent witness to his unraveling.

He had left his wet suit jacket on, and he was starting to shiver. A part of me, the part that had been conditioned for three years to take care of him, wanted to tell him to take it off.

He must have seen the flicker of conflict in my eyes. A tiny, desperate spark of hope ignited in his. He took a step closer. “Vannah…”

“Don’t,” I said, my voice sharp, stopping him in his tracks.

He looked down at the wet shirt clinging to his chest. As if in a daze, he began to unbutton it, his fingers clumsy.

He shrugged out of the soaked suit jacket, letting it fall to the floor in a heap.

Then he pulled off the wet, white dress shirt.

He was left standing in my living room, bare-chested, the lean, powerful muscles of his torso slick with rain.

He dropped the wet shirt on top of the jacket.

He looked at me, his eyes stripped bare of all pretense. They were filled with a regret so vast it was like looking into an abyss. His gaze held a silent, desperate plea. Don’t give up on me yet.

He didn’t say it aloud. He didn’t have to.

He stood there for another long, silent moment, then turned and walked back to the elevator without another word.

The steel doors slid shut, leaving me alone with the storm, the puddle of water on my floor, and his discarded clothes—a sodden, intimate heap of him in the middle of my clean, empty life.

I stared at the clothes, at the ghost of his presence. His silent plea echoed in the room. Don’t give up on me yet.

I walked to the window, looking out at the rain-streaked city lights. The storm was raging, but inside me, there was a profound calm. The hollow ache was gone, replaced by the cold, hard certainty of my path.

I whispered the truth to his ghost, to the storm, to the city sleeping below.

“I already did.”