The Billionaire Who Timed My Love And Gave Hers For Free Chapter 05

The Billionaire Who Timed My Love And Gave Hers For Free Chapter 05

Julian walked through the front door at four–twenty a.m.

Two steps inside, he stopped. Something was off.

My slippers were gone from the rack by the door.

No mug on the dining table. No hot tea waiting the way it always was.

In the bedroom, half the walk–in closet gaped open. Empty.

My pajamas, gone. The vanity, cleared down to the bare surface.

He pulled out his phone and called me.

The first call went straight to voicemail.

Second call, same thing.

By the seventh, it clicked. I’d blocked him.

Julian stared at his phone and let out a short, disbelieving laugh.

He probably thought it was ridiculous.

Three years married, and I’d barely raised my voice at him. The idea that I’d actually blocked his number must have felt like a joke.

He shrugged it off and walked into the study.

Then he saw what I’d left on his keyboard.

The ring. The test results. The medical records.

And an ultrasound printout, its edges crumpled where my hands had gripped too hard.

Six weeks pregnant. The words burned into him like a brand.

Julian’s hand stopped in midair.

He didn’t break. Not yet.

His first instinct was to verify.

He grabbed the medical records. His eyes found the timestamp on the ER admission.

7:49 p.m.

He’d been in a private dining room, stepping in to take drinks with a client so Sloane wouldn’t have

to.
Sloane had mentioned her stomach bothering her. He’d gotten her some tea, draped his jacket

around her shoulders.

While my calls kept coming in. One after another after another.

He opened my call history.

[6:47: one call from me.]

[7:00: he’d called back. Eight minutes.]

[After 7:08: nine more calls from me.]

He’d flipped his phone facedown because the buzzing annoyed him.

At 7:30, Focus Mode kicked in automatically.

Every call after that was silenced by the system.

A notification sat on his lock screen, clinical and final:

[Calls from Mara have been silenced during Focus Mode.]

Mara. His wife.

The only person whose access to him had been measured down to the minute, then shut off by an

algorithm.

His grip tightened around the phone until his knuckles went white.

The study felt gutted. Silent in a way that pressed against his ears.

He didn’t move for a long time.

Until his phone buzzed.

A voice memo from Sloane.

[Mr. Whitmore, I made it home. Thanks again for tonight. You don’t think Mara’s mad at me, you?]

Any other night, he would’ve typed back, “Get some rest.”

This time, he just stared at the message.

Then he set the phone down, screen facing the ceiling, and didnt touch it again.

The call at seven replayed in his head. I’d been trying to tell him something.

He was the one who’d told me not to pick that moment to remind him I existed.

He was the one who’d said a doctor would be more useful than his voice on the phone.

He picked up the wedding ring.

It was so small in his hand. Almost nothing.

But his arm wouldn’t move. Like the weight of it had settled somewhere deeper than bone.

She’d taken it off.

Clean. Cool to the touch. No trace of body heat left on it.

He’d always imagined that losing someone sounded like a slammed door. Like shouting, or

sobbing.

It didn’t. It sounded like drawers sliding open. Hangers emptied without a sound. A ring placed gently on a keyboard.

All that was left was proof of everything he’d missed while looking the other way.