The Billionaire Who Timed My Love And Gave Hers For Free Chapter 06

The Billionaire Who Timed My Love And Gave Hers For Free Chapter 06

Julian went to the hospital.

The nurse pulled up that night’s records, then looked up. “Are you her husband?”

He swallowed hard.

“I’m her husband.”

The nurse’s face went flat.

“She could barely stand when they brought her in. She kept checking her phone. We all figured someone was coming for her.”

His fist clenched around the medical file.

He wanted to say he didn’t know.

But the call log said otherwise. It said everything.

That system notification was still there, pinned to his screen like an accusation:

[Calls from Mara have been silenced.]

Julian read it until the words stopped looking like words.

He had seen them. That was the thing.

He’d seen them and decided they could wait.

From the hospital, he drove straight to the law firm.

The receptionist handed him an envelope.

“Ms. Langley said if you showed up, I should give you this.”

Divorce papers.

I hadn’t asked for a thing.

The house, the car, the savings: every asset split clean. No disputes. No demands.

My signature was already on the last page.

Mara.

Quiet. Final. No room left to negotiate.

He crushed the corner of the page in his fist.

“Where is she?”

The receptionist shook her head.

“Ms. Langley said everything goes through her attorney from here.”

That was when it hit him. The kind of panic that doesn’t start in the chest; it starts in the stomach

He tracked me down that afternoon. I was staying at Camille Sutton’s.

Camille came up the walk with a bag from the pharmacy. The second she saw him, her face shut

down.

“Julian. What are you doing here?”

He was standing in the doorway. No sleep, bloodshot eyes.

But his voice came out the way it always did: measured. Controlled.

“I’m here for Mara.”

“She doesn’t want to see you.”

“This is between me and my wife.”

Camille almost choked on that.

“Oh, now she’s your wife?”

“Where was ‘your wife‘ when she was curled up on a hospital bathroom floor bleeding? Were you

her husband then?”

Julian’s face lost its color.

He looked past Camille at the door. His voice dropped.

“Mara. I know you’re in there.”

I was on the couch inside, a mug of tea going cold between my palms.

His voice came through the door again.

“I saw the records, Mara.”

I didn’t answer.

Camille moved to shut the door. Julian caught it with his hand.

The edge of the door bit into the back of his hand. He didn’t flinch.

“That night, I was wrong.

The words came out like they cost him something.

“Come home. Yell at me, throw things, whatever you need. Just come home.”

I finally looked up.

“Julian.” My voice barely carried through the door. “You knew I was at the hospital, right?”

Silence on the other side.

“I knew.”

“You knew I was in pain.”

His breathing roughened.

“Mara.”

I watched the thin line of light under the door. My voice was barely there.

“But you still decided her needs mattered more.”

Nothing from the other side. Not a sound.

A long time passed before his voice came through, scraped raw. “I’ll do better. I swear.”

I’d waited so long to hear that.

Through the fever. Through the stomach pain. Through a baby dying alone on a hospital floor while his phone sat facedown on a dinner table.

And now that he’d finally said it, the words landed like dead air.

“Did you read the papers?”

“I’m not signing.”

No hesitation.

Like refusing to sign could undo everything.

A tired sound left my throat. Not quite a laugh..

“Then my lawyer will handle it.”

“Mara, don’t use this to punish me.”

I stood and walked to the door.

“I’m not punishing you.”

“I just don’t need you anymore.”

Right then, an alarm went off on the other side of the door.

Seven p.m.

Julian’s phone.

He scrambled to silence it.

Too late. I’d already heard it.

That thirty–minute window, the one he’d carved out of his life for me, showed up right on schedule.

Even now.

I pressed my forehead to the door. “Julian. Even your regret runs on a timer.”

I heard him breathing. Heavy. Ragged.

I didn’t give him time to answer.

“Your time’s up.”

“Go home.”