[BL] A Marriage Ruled by Family, Saved by Desire-Chapter 54: The Truth About Sarah’s Baby

~Alistair’s POV~

"Just now?" he repeated, his voice dropping an octave. "You got back just now, and you’ve already showered?"

I froze, my brow furrowing. "What do you mean by that?"

"I mean," Alex said, his voice thick with the whiskey and a sudden, sharp edge of venom, "that you were out for hours with a man I don’t know. You didn’t care that I was here losing my mind. And the moment you walk back into this house, the very first thing you do is shower, like you needed to rinse him off your skin?"

He let out a jagged, ugly laugh, staggering slightly as he stood up. The glass in his hand tilted precariously, amber liquid sloshing over the rim. "Was he that good, Alistair? Did he make you forget everything we had so quickly that you had to come home and scrub the evidence away?"

The air in my lungs turned to ice. I stared at him, a sharp, blinding fury surging through me, not fear, not hurt, just anger so cold it felt almost calm.

"You are actually standing there, stinking of alcohol and failure, and accusing me?" I stepped forward, my voice a low, lethal hiss. "You are the one who brought a woman between us. You are the one who is having a child with someone else. And you think you have the right to question what I do with my time?"

"I’m your husband!" he roared, slamming the glass down on the metal table. The sound cracked through the night air like a gunshot. "I am still your husband, Alis! I know I messed up, I know things look bad, but I haven’t spent the night in a hotel with a stranger!"

"No, you didn’t spend the night with a stranger. You spent it in bed with Sarah!" I shot back, my composure finally cracking. "And for your information, I showered because I’d been out all day and I felt filthy. That’s normal. But of course, your mind runs straight to the worst conclusion."

I glared at him. "Alex, you’re the one in the wrong, but you expect me to call this a ’mistake’? You want me to trust you, to believe you didn’t do it, even with Sarah in your parents’ house, carrying your child?"

I stepped closer, my voice shaking with a mix of fury and hurt. "Think about it, Alex. What if the roles were reversed? Would you be so ’easy’ on me? I haven’t done anything wrong! I went out with a friend, and all you can imagine is me in bed with him? Is that really how little you trust me?"

Tears spilled down, hot and bitter. "Is that why you didn’t call me? Because you were too busy imagining me with someone else instead of even wondering if I was okay?"

"I knew you wouldn’t pick up!" he yelled, his voice breaking. "How was I supposed to call when I knew you’d just ignore me, or leave my messages on read?"

"You let this happen, Alex!" I sobbed, jabbing a finger at his chest. "You let this chaos into our lives, and now you want to blame me for surviving it? You are wrong, so unbelievably wrong about everything. But worst of all... you’re wrong to accuse me."

I wiped my eyes with the back of my hand, feeling a cold skin of ice form over my heart. "You lost the right to be jealous the second that test came back positive. Don’t you dare try to make me the villain in a story where you’re the one who burned the house down."

Alex flinched, his bravado crumbling as quickly as it had appeared. He slumped back into the chair, burying his face in his shaking hands. "I’m sorry," he choked out, the anger dissolving into pathetic, racking sobs. "I’m just... I’m losing you. I can feel you slipping away, and I don’t know how to stop it."

I stood over him, watching him crumble, watching him beg. A flicker of something stirred inside me, but it wasn’t enough to close the chasm between us. I offered no comfort, no words of forgiveness. "Your mother wants us downstairs," I said, voice cold and unyielding.

He ignored me, hand reaching for the bottle. I was quicker. I grabbed the whiskey before his fingers could touch the glass, the cold weight solid in my palm. Without a word, I turned toward the elevator, leaving him alone in the dark, his tears the only company.

I went back to our room. I didn’t go downstairs; the "strategy meeting" could wait for a life that no longer belonged to me. Much later, I heard Alex stumble in. He said nothing, simply collapsed onto the bed, sinking into a drunken stupor so deep it left no room even for dreams.

I sat on the bed, scrolling through my phone, when the silence was suddenly broken.

A sharp, piercing shout rang out from Sarah’s wing of the house, followed by the muffled, violent echoes of an argument, the kind that seeps through walls. Beside me, Alex was oblivious, completely motionless, not even stirring.

I didn’t want to move, but curiosity won over exhaustion. I finally stood and stepped into the hallway and found a maid hovering near the stairs, looking startled.

"What is happening?" I asked.

She trembled, her eyes wide as she explained, "It’s Madam and Miss Sarah, sir."

I nodded, urging her to continue.

"Miss Sarah went out this morning and has only just returned. She looked troubled when she came back. Madam asked what was wrong, but Miss Sarah said nothing and went straight to her room. Madam was worried, so she went to check on her before bed, but when she reached the door, she heard Miss Sarah on the phone."

The maid leaned closer, her voice low and urgent. "I didn’t catch everything, sir, but from what I heard... Miss Sarah was on the phone, arguing. It sounded like she was lying about Sir Alexander being the father of her baby. Madam... she realized she’s been tricked. Everything Miss Sarah said about Alex being the father, it’s all a lie."

I stayed frozen as the maid hurried off. I didn’t run toward the noise, didn’t dive into the shouting. I just walked back into the bedroom and sank onto the sofa, my chest pounding in a way it hadn’t in days.

"So, Alex was telling the truth. He didn’t touch her."

A wave of nauseating, tangled emotion swept over me. Guilt struck first, I didn’t trust him. I looked into his eyes and saw a liar when he was actually the victim of a carefully orchestrated trap. But beneath that guilt, a darker question began to take root: If he never touched her, how could the hospital results come back positive? Especially the same week Alex traveled to Singapore. How deep did this conspiracy really run?

The timing of the pregnancy had been manipulated to trap Alex’s mother.

The realization settled over me like a cold, sweet wine. The irony was so thick I could almost taste it. Sarah hadn’t just trapped Alex; she had played his mother like a well-tuned instrument.

A slow, jagged smile crept across my face. I felt no pity for my mother-in-law, not a trace. Her desperate, obsessive hunger for a grandchild, for a "legacy," had nearly made her invite a stranger’s blood into her precious family line. So eager to replace me, so ready to cast me aside for a fertile womb, she almost handed the Montclair fortune to a con artist and a child who wasn’t even hers.

A low, mocking laugh bubbled up in my throat. All her high-and-mighty talk about "family honor" and "the situation," and she had been the biggest fool in the room. She had nurtured the very viper that was biting her now.

But as my laughter died away, the silence of the room felt heavier than before.

I looked at Alex’s sleeping form, his face peaceful in his intoxication, and the bitterness returned. The war with Sarah was over, shattered by her own greed, but the wreckage she left behind was still smoldering. I had looked at my husband and seen a cheater. I had listened to his pleas and heard only lies. Even if he never touched her, the fact remained that I didn’t trust him.

Our marriage hadn’t just been attacked from the outside; it had crumbled from within because, at the first sign of a storm, I had believed the worst of him.

The battle for us had just become much more complicated. It wasn’t about a baby anymore. It was about whether we could ever look at each other without seeing the ghosts of the last few days.

I stood up, the floorboards cold beneath my feet, and walked slowly to the bed. I slipped under the heavy duvet, the familiar scent of his cologne, now mixed with the sharp tang of whiskey, filling my senses. He shifted slightly in his stupor, his body instinctively seeking my warmth even in his sleep.

I moved closer, my heart aching with a heavy, complicated grief. I stared at his face in the moonlight, wishing time would simply stop. I couldn’t imagine what tomorrow would bring. When he finally found out the truth, would he turn on me? Would he look at me with the same coldness I had shown him, realizing I never truly trusted him? Would he lose his love for me because I hadn’t been his anchor when he needed it most?

I leaned in, my breath hitching, and pressed a soft, lingering kiss against his lips.

"I hope you understand," I whispered into the dark, my voice breaking.