She Was Never Just the Billionaire’s Wife (Natasha and Chase) novel Chapter 1

The plastic chair in the maternity ward is a special kind of hell.

I’m fairly certain the chair was designed by someone who hates pregnant women.

I remember sitting there with both hands pressed against the heavy curve of my stomach, trying to breathe through the pressure in my ribs when the baby kicked again.

Sharp little jabs. Like it already had opinions about the world.

But at that moment, this baby is the only thing I had left of the woman I used to be.

That Natasha could outmaneuver CEOs in a boardroom and negotiate million-dollar mergers before finishing her first espresso.

This Natasha is swollen, exhausted, and sitting alone in a hospital hallway.

I’m just a body.

A vessel.

A stain on the Warren legacy, if you ask my husband.

The air in the hallway shifts suddenly.

It’s strange, but when you spend years around someone like Chase Warren, you start to recognize the disturbance he causes when he enters a space.

He doesn’t just walk into a room.

He annexes it.

I look up, already knowing what I’m going to see.

And sure enough—there he is.

Chase stands at the reception desk, tall and perfectly composed, wrapped in a charcoal suit that probably costs more than the annual salary of the nurse who checks my vitals every week.

He looks exactly the way the business magazines describe him.

Powerful. Untouchable.

For one stupid second, my heart actually jumps.

I think—maybe he came for me.

Maybe he finally decided to show up for one of my appointments.

Then my heart goes cold. Because he isn’t alone.

The girl clinging to his arm is young. Too young.

Beautiful in that effortless way that makes people turn their heads without realizing it. Willow-thin, bright, wearing a cream-colored sundress that shows off a waistline I haven’t seen on myself in three trimesters.

She looks up at him with open adoration.

And Chase—

Chase smiles back.

Not the polite public smile he uses for shareholders.

A soft one. The kind he has never once given me.

Her fingers trail along the expensive wool of his sleeve like she belongs there. Like touching him is something she does all the time.

Watching them together, I have the sudden, sick realization that this woman is emotionally closer to my husband than I’ve ever been.

I’m still sitting on that miserable plastic chair, trying not to stare too openly.

Across the hall, the glass partition reflects my own image back at me.

Swollen ankles.

Tired eyes.

A face that makes it very clear this pregnancy has not been kind to me.

Who can believe that only eight months ago, I was the CFO of Warren Global?

I was sharp, brilliant, indispensable, the only person Chase trusted to handle the volatility of the European markets.

Then Chase and I had a reckless one-night stand and I was pregnant.

Then we had a simple wedding that felt less like a romantic milestone and more like a corporate merger gone wrong.

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