The mansion was quieter now. No more shouting behind closed doors. No more icy glares across the dining table. It was... peaceful. Almost too peaceful.
Fini sipped her morning tea, her fingers curled around the warm porcelain cup. Across from her, Calvin was scrolling through something on his phone, his hair slightly tousled, still wearing his grey sleep shirt.
He looked more like a husband than ever.
And for once, Fini didn't hate the image.
He noticed her looking. "What?"
She blinked. "Nothing."
He leaned forward, a slight smirk on his face. "Were you checking me out, Mrs. Sahputra?"
"Don't flatter yourself," she replied, but she was smiling. He caught it.
That smile had become more frequent between them. More natural. Less strained.
---
That night, as they lay together in the dim light of their shared bedroom, silence stretched comfortably between them. The kind of silence that didn't need to be broken.
Then Calvin's voice pierced it.
> "What if we stop pretending?"
Fini turned her head slowly. "Pretending what?"
"That this is just a contract."
Her heart stuttered.
"We've fought," he said, "we've hurt each other, and still… you're the only person I want to see at the end of the day."
Her throat tightened.
"You're not saying this because you feel guilty, right?" she asked. "Not because of Ezra… or Liora… or what happened?"
Calvin turned on his side to face her fully. "No. I'm saying it because when I see you with your hair messy in the morning, or when you talk back to me at dinner—I start to wonder what it'd be like if this wasn't just an arrangement."
He reached for her hand.
"Have you ever thought about... a family?"
She froze.
A family.
A child.
A future?
It wasn't that she hadn't thought about it. It's that she didn't believe it could happen. Not with him. Not with this kind of marriage.
But now?
Her silence was enough for him.
"You don't have to answer now," he said gently. "Just... think about it."
---
Downstairs, Liora paced like a madwoman in her private suite.
She had heard everything.
The bedroom had been bugged for weeks. She'd been listening to every whisper, every sigh, every moment of growing intimacy.
But this?
A baby?
Her hand trembled as she clutched her wine glass too tight. The stem snapped. Blood dripped from her palm but she didn't care.
> "She's winning," she whispered to herself.
"She's replacing me."
And just like that, the plan in her mind sharpened. She wouldn't just remove Fini. She would ruin her.
---
The next morning, Fini opened the front door to get some fresh air—and stopped dead in her tracks.
An envelope.
No sender.
She picked it up and opened it, cautiously.
Inside was a photograph.
Her. Ezra. At nineteen.
A rooftop in Jakarta.
His hands on her waist. Her lips on his. A love that had long since died—or so she thought.
She flipped the photo over.
> "You still think you're done with your past?"
Her stomach dropped.
Who sent this?
Ezra?
Liora?
Someone else?
And why now?
She didn't tell Calvin. Not yet. She needed time to breathe.
---
But time was the one thing she didn't have.
That afternoon, as she walked through the living room, the sound of a car pulling into the driveway caught her attention.
It wasn't Calvin's.
She peered through the window.
A sleek black Rolls-Royce.
The door opened.
And a woman stepped out.
She wore black heels and a wine-red dress. Long dark hair. Sharp red lipstick. She looked like she'd stepped out of a magazine and onto a battlefield.
Calvin appeared beside Fini at the window.
He went still.
"…Arora," he muttered.
Fini turned to him. "Who is that?"
Before he could respond, the doorbell rang.
Then the knock.
Sharp. Demanding.
They answered together.
The woman smiled. Cold. Possessive.
"Hello, fiancé," she said, her eyes fixed on Calvin.
Then she looked at Fini.
"And you must be the placeholder."
---
End of Chapter 8.