Saved By The Billionaire

The Betrayal

Athanashia's POV

"Oh yeah," Adrian gasps as I go down on him. "Just the way I like it. Harder. Faster."

I bob my head up and down as I take his full length in my mouth, swirling my tongue around the head of his c**k as he grips my head and laces his fingers in my hair. I look up at him, and a smile breaks out across my face. My handsome, breathtaking man, and all I can think about is how perfect he looks with his mouth open and his eyes darkened as he looks at me. A shiver runs down my spine, and I suck him faster as the bed groans with each move we move.

Finally, he holds me firmly in place as he explodes in my mouth, filling me up before he collapses on the bed from exhaustion.

"f**k!" he groans. "I'd forgotten how good that felt."

I swallow his seed before I lay down beside him, laying my head on his chest, and I begin to play with the tiny hairs on his chest. I snuggle up to him, but he doesn't wrap his arm around me like he used to. Instead, he reaches for his watch on the bedside table and glances at it with a frown.

"I should get going," he says. "I have to be at the office in half an hour."

"Can't you stay longer?" I ask. "Please? It's snowing already. Let's stay in bed a little longer."

"I can't ," he says. "I'm having a really important meeting with some potential investors today. If all goes well, we will be able to expand all across the country."

I frown as he slides away and heads to the bathroom, and the gaping hole in my heart returns. I hate when he does this, leaving as soon as we have s*x and making me feel like a cheap w***e. I miss the early days of our marriage, when we would lay in bed together for several hours after making love, sometimes calling in sick so we could have the whole day to ourselves. I miss his touch, the feeling of his skin against mine and the way he would look at me like I meant everything to him. But now, he didn't look at me like I meant anything to him. He looks at me like I'm a picture on the wall, someone he can just have s*x with whenever he wants and move on. We don't talk anymore, and I hate the rift that has grown between us.

I glance at the ring on my finger, a promise of things that were never going to happen. We've been engaged for two years now, and it still doesn't seem like we're ever going to get married. After much discussion and pleading on my part, Adrian finally conceded and picked a date. We're to get married on the second week of the new year, which is still a whole month away. But if I'm being honest, a part of me believes that it's never going to happen. We haven't even started planning anything. And knowing Adrian, he is probably doing this on purpose so he can push back the date by saying we don't have enough time to plan anything.

He comes out of the bathroom a few minutes later and heads straight for the closet, and I watch him as he quickly dresses up. He looks so handsome, and as he slips on his suit, I wonder what I did wrong that drove this wedge in our marriage. If only I knew what I did wrong, I could start trying to fix things between us.

"What time are you coming back?" I ask.

"I don't know," he replies. "It's probably going to be late though."

"I was going to make dinner for us," I say. "And we need to make plans for the cruise. We're leaving in three days, remember?"

He groans, and I know he has forgotten that we were supposed to go on any cruise. It hurts to think that he doesn't even want to spend time with me, and I almost yell at him for being so cruel and not taking our relationship seriously.

But then he walks out of the closet fully dressed, and he makes his way towards me. For a moment, my heart drops as I imagine he's about to tell me that the cruise has been cancelled. We've been planning this for over three months, and my heart will break if he says that.

But he simply crouches beside me, and he takes my hand in his. My heart leaps in my chest, and I melt into his touch as he pulls me close and plants a soft and tender kiss on my lips. It's only a fleeting touch, but it's enough to set my soul on fire. He pulls away, and I want to scream as I nearly reach out to him. I want him to stay with me, but I know he's not going to.

"I'm sorry," he says. "I know how much you want me to stay at home, but I can't be away from work for too long. We're entering a very critical phase in the firm's life, and the next few months will determine how big we could get. Regina is helping out, and I don't want to disappoint her."

My lips tighten as he mentions his stepmother's name, but I try not to look too upset. I know Regina cares about him and she wants the law firm to succeed, but I always get the feeling that she doesn't like me. Something about the way she looks at me just tells me that she has a problem with me, which I never understood because I've never even gotten a chance to have a conversation with her.

But for Adrian's sake, and for the sake of our family, I'm willing to overlook it.

"I'll see you when I get back," Adrian says. "And in case I come back late, you can just go to bed. Don't wait up for me."

He doesn't even wait for me to answer before he walks out of the room. I sigh and drop back onto the bed, struggling to keep my emotions in check. Maybe I’m just overthinking things. Maybe it’s the fact that I’m still extremely horny, and Adrian never stops to think about my own pleasure. As soon as he has an o****m, that’s the end of that. He couldn’t even look at me afterwards, or even ask me if I needed anything. It’s so frustrating, and I hate this feeling of knowing that I’m a walking lump of s****l frustration.

Well, it’s better to put all this pent-up energy to good use, so I roll off the bed and make my way to the living room. Cleaning the house should take my mind off things. Besides, I still need to pack.

I stand in the living room a few hours later with the vacuum humming under my hand, trying to ignore the sinking feeling in my chest. The house is quiet except for the steady roar of the machine, but even that doesn't drown out my thoughts. The house is spotless now, not that Adrian will notice. He never does. He says I stress-clean, and maybe he's right, but it's better than sitting still and letting my mind wander to places I don't want it to go.

The cruise is supposed to be a fresh start, and his way of fixing things. He said it was going to be romantic. I remember how his face lit up when he told me, like he'd just solved all our problems with one phone call to a travel agent. I didn't argue. I didn't tell him I'd rather stay home and face what's wrong between us than run away from it. Instead, I smiled, kissed his cheek, and started packing.

In the bedroom, our suitcases are still in the closet, half-filled with clothes I'm not even sure I'll wear. I toss in a swimsuit, the red one he says he likes, and feel a twinge of resentment. Not at him exactly, but at how hard I'm trying to make this work when it feels like he isn't. I also toss in a few sets of lingerie, hoping to reignite some of the magic we lost. I know he doesn’t think of s*x the way I do anymore, but men are visual creatures. I’ve kept myself in shape, and I’ve always been able to draw his attention when I’m wearing close to nothing. Maybe this will remind him of what our relationship is missing.

As I'm folding another dress, my phone buzzes on the nightstand. It's an email, and the subject line immediately catches my attention: URGENT: Cruise Documentation Needed. My stomach sinks. I skim the message quickly, my pulse quickening:

Dear Ms. Walsh,

We still need a copy of your travel insurance details to be submitted to our office within the next 24 hours to finalise your cruise booking. Kindly note that a failure to submit these documents will result in a cancellation of your booking.

Thank you,

Celestial Voyages.

I groan as I stare at the message, because I had specifically asked Adrian to submit them about a week ago. He must have forgotten, or he simply didn’t care. I immediately dial his number, but it goes straight to voicemail. I send him a text, but he doesn’t respond immediately, which means he’s probably in the meeting.

The travel agency is close to Adrian’s law firm. I could swing by and take the documents from him then submit them myself. I also need to get a few things for the cruise, so it would work out for me. Quickly changing, I head out of the apartment and call a taxi, giving the address to Adrian’s law firm before I settle into my seat.

There’s a slight chill in the air, and Christmas decorations are already being put up. You can almost smell the festive atmosphere, and shades of red and green are everywhere. I’ve always loved Christmas, and it’s my favourite holiday because that was usually the only time I got to see my dad.

I sigh as I stare out the window. It’s been six years since I last heard from him, and mom refuses to talk about him anymore. Last I heard, he’d moved to Italy and he was staying there with his wife and son. I’ve never met them, so it’s hard to think of them as family. The only time I ever heard about them was when I opened up my clothing store in Manhattan, and I got an email from dad’s wife, congratulating me and saying she wanted to talk.

I never responded.

We arrive at the law firm shortly afterwards, and I head up with my heart thudding wildly in my chest. For some reason, I can’t shake the feeling that something is terribly wrong. I don’t know what it is, but there’s something in the air that feels off. Maybe it’s just the weather, or maybe it’s just me being paranoid. Or maybe it’s a sixth sense thing, and I can already predict that something awful is about to happen. But I brush it aside and head upstairs, smiling at a few paralegals I recognise, who freeze when they see the boss’s wife showing up on a random Thursday.

The office is familiar to me. I know every nook and cranny, so I don’t need to ask for directions or wait for someone to show me to Adrian’s office. I walk past everyone, with a few people looking up and waving fondly, while others stare at me with a look of terror, like they know something I don’t know.

“Good morning, Ms. Walsh,” Adrian’s secretary comes running towards me. “I didn’t know you were around.”

“Morning, Sabrina,” I reply. “I’m just here to pick up some documents from Adrian, and I’ll be out of your hair.”

She stares at me with her eyes wide in terror, and I can tell that she’s trying to hide something from me. Her eyes shift towards his door and back to me, and she almost whimpers as she doesn’t know what to do.

My heart leaps to my throat, and I immediately realise that something is wrong. I make my way forward, and she doesn’t stop me as I grab the handle and push the door open, terrified of what I’m about to see.

“Yes, baby,” a familiar but sultry voice comes. “f**k me, Adrian! f**k me like you mean it!”

The words cut through me like a knife, and I cannot breathe as I stare at the horrifying scene in front of me. There, kneeling on the couch while my fiancé plows into her from behind, is Regina, his own stepmother.

And all I can do is scream.