The Colonel’s Claim: After the Divorce novel Chapter 3

Clara's brain completely short-circuited. It took her a long moment to force her trembling fingers to flip the pages.

There, on the final page of the divorce agreement, the man had already signed his name. Her signature was the only thing missing.-

It had clearly been prepared well in advance.

He had allocated a significant portion of their assets to her, with his sole demand being full custody of their daughter.

So, he had despised her all along, wanted a divorce, and then... planned to marry Scarlett?

Did he even care that Scarlett was technically his cousin? Did he not know about the bitter history between Scarlett's family and hers?

Did he have any idea how unspeakably cruel and humiliating this was to her as his wife!

Looking at it now, he obviously knew.

Perhaps by their second year of marriage, after he grew tired of her and fell for Scarlett, he had already made up his mind.

Clara felt as though a bucket of ice water had been dumped over her head, chilling her body and freezing her heart.

Honestly, if Rowan Reid hadn't abandoned her back then, leaving for the military without a word and moving on with someone else,

Dominic had simply shown up at the right time, pursuing her with a fiery intensity, warming her heart, and pulling her out of the darkness. She hadn't been obligated to marry him.

Suddenly, the phone in her pocket vibrated again.

It was a text from Dominic:

[Something came up. I'm not coming home.]

His tone was utterly dismissive, proving he cared nothing for her or her parents.

Then again, with the divorce papers already signed, why would he care about her?

Curling her lips in a mocking smile and fighting back her tears, Clara clutched the divorce agreement and left the bedroom.

She was Stella's biological mother, after all. If Stella wanted to be with her, she would fight Dominic for custody with everything she had.

But as she stepped into the hallway, she noticed that only their housekeeper, Beatrice, was left in the dining room.

"Where's Stella? Did she not come down to eat?"

Beatrice, who was clearing the plates, hesitated before replying, "The little miss didn't eat. She grabbed her backpack and went out..."

Went out?

Clara blinked, her face ashen. She didn't know if it was a woman's intuition or something else,

But she felt certain that Stella had gone straight to Scarlett, and that Dominic was likely with Scarlett as well...

A bone-deep chill seized her heart.

This was the man she had loved so deeply, the man she had moved across the country for, leaving her parents behind.

This was the daughter she had nearly died giving birth to, the child for whom she had sacrificed her entire career just to nurse through her premature frailty.

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