He Saw My Soul, Not My Scars

My husband, Jeremiah, let me die from an allergic reaction because he couldn't pause his video game. He dismissed my kidnapping as a prank and refused to come to the hospital when I was miscarrying our child.

But the final straw came when he ordered doctors to carve skin from my body for his mistress's minor burn.

He thought he had broken me, but he was wrong. I exposed his affair, took his company, and left him with nothing.

Years later, he crashed my wedding to another man, begging for a second chance. "Elena lied to me! She manipulated me! It was always you, Celina!"

I looked at the monster who had destroyed my life, my family, and my child.

Then I picked up a wine bottle and smashed it over his head.

Chapter 1

Celina POV:

The day I knew I had to leave Jeremiah wasn't one event. It was a slow, agonizing bleed, each drop of my love draining away until nothing but a hollow ache remained. He was a tech CEO, charismatic, brilliant even, but beneath that polished surface was a man who wielded incompetence like a weapon, aimed solely at me.

"Celina, I'm just about to beat this level," Jeremiah said, his eyes glued to the screen, his fingers flying across the controller. My throat was closing, my chest tightening with a terrifying speed. I could feel the familiar prickle of anaphylaxis spreading, a deadly fire beneath my skin.

"Jeremiah, please. My EpiPen. The emergency kit," I rasped, barely able to force the words out. My vision blurred. He sighed, an annoyed sound that cut deeper than any knife.

"Can't it wait five minutes? You always do this during my games."

I couldn't breathe. My hands clawed at my neck, but there was nothing there to unclog the air. Fear, cold and sharp, pierced through the haze of my failing body. He was more concerned about a video game than my life.

I managed to point, a desperate, shaking finger towards the emergency kit. He glanced over, a flicker of something that might have been concern, quickly replaced by irritation. He reluctantly paused the game, the victorious fanfare of his digital world silenced, but the real-world danger still ignored. He walked slowly, deliberately, to the kit. He fumbled with the clasp, his actions clumsy, as if the urgency was beyond his comprehension. It took an eternity. By the time the needle finally pierced my thigh, I was already fading, my world dimming to a pinpoint. I woke up in the ER, alone, the stark white walls a testament to his neglect.

That should have been my breaking point. But love, or what I thought was love, is a stubborn, stupid thing.

Then came the kidnapping. The terror was unlike anything I had ever known. Blindfolded, bound, thrown into the back of a van, my mind raced. I imagined Jeremiah, furious and determined, tearing the city apart to find me. When the call came, I heard his voice, cold and distant, on the other end.

"This is a joke, right? I'm busy. Don't call this number again," he snapped, his voice laced with annoyance.

My heart shattered into a million pieces. The kidnappers, initially aggressive, were almost amused. They hung up, then called back, trying to convince him. Each time, he dismissed them, his tone increasingly impatient. He thought it was a prank. He thought my life, my abduction, was a setup, an inconvenience designed to disrupt his day. I survived, not because of him, but despite him. I returned home battered and bruised, but he barely met my gaze, too engrossed in his work. He never asked what happened. He never asked if I was okay.

My love, already a fragile thing, started to wither.

The final, fatal blow came with the baby. Our baby. I was so careful, so hopeful. But a sudden, sharp pain, a gush of blood, and I knew. Panic seized me. I called him, my voice trembling, tears streaming down my face.

"Jeremiah, I'm bleeding. I think it's the baby. I need to go to the hospital. Now."

His voice was calm, almost bored. "Celina, I'm in the middle of a winning streak. This is critical. Can't you just call a cab?"

A cab. For our dying child. I started to plead, to beg. "They need your consent for the surgery, Jeremiah! Please, it's urgent."

"I can't lose my winning streak, Celina. You know how important this is to me." His voice hardened. "Just sign for yourself. You're a big girl."

Big girl. My hands shook so violently the pen slipped from my grasp. The nurse, a kind woman with tired eyes, gently picked it up and placed it back in my hand. Her sympathetic gaze was more comfort than I had received from my husband in three years. Each stroke of my name on that consent form was a nail in the coffin of my marriage. The physical pain of the miscarriage, the emptiness that followed, was nothing compared to the shock of his cold, calculated cruelty. My love for him didn't just die on the operating table. It was murdered, slowly, deliberately, by his indifference.

When I finally got home, the house felt like a tomb. An empty crib. An empty heart. I walked into his study, where he was, undoubtedly, still playing his games. My eyes landed on his array of expensive, meaningless trophies. My hand instinctively reached for the heaviest one, a solid gold plaque. With a scream that tore from my soul, I brought it down, again and again, smashing his awards, his framed certificates, his entire facade of success. The sound was deafening, a symphony of my shattered world.

He finally looked up, his face a mask of annoyance. "What the hell, Celina?"

"Do you even remember who I am?" I asked, my voice raw, broken.

He stared at me, his eyes blank, devoid of recognition. His phone buzzed. He picked it up, turned his back to me, the anger in his voice directed at some unseen business associate. He was already gone, absorbed in his world, my agony an invisible inconvenience. I stood there, amidst the wreckage, a ghost in my own home.

I thought back to the beginning. His charm had been intoxicating. He was ambitious, driven, and I, a naive girl from a wealthy family, believed in his vision. I poured my heart, my family's money, into his startup, convinced we were building a future together. He called me his muse, his lucky charm. I was so foolish.

The shattering truth came later, in whispers and stolen glances. Elena Wilder, his assistant, was always there. I started noticing the subtle shifts. His concern when she had a paper cut, his frantic rush when she twisted an ankle. Then, the full-blown panic when she suffered a minor burn. He treated her like she was made of glass, like she was the most precious thing in his world.

"She's his one true love, you know," I overheard a maid whisper to another. "She saved his life years ago, donated a kidney to him."

The words hit me like a physical blow. A kidney. My breath hitched. He had loved her all along. And me? I was just the convenient rich girl, the one whose family had bailed him out when his company was on the brink of collapse. My family' s massive investment, the one that saved his startup, was a blow to his pride he could never forgive. He resented me for it, punishing me with his neglect, projecting his insecurity onto me. His "love" was a twisted form of revenge.

One evening, I found myself dragged, literally, by his bodyguards. They threw me into his private study. Elena was there, a bandage on her arm, tears streaming down her face.

"She burned me, Jeremiah!" Elena sobbed, pointing a trembling finger at me. It was a small, superficial burn, the kind you get from a hot coffee cup. I hadn't even been near her.

Jeremiah's eyes, usually so cold, blazed with a fury I had never seen directed at me. "How dare you touch her, Celina?" He backhanded me, hard. My head snapped back, a sickening crack echoing in the silent room. My mouth filled with the coppery taste of blood.

"It wasn't me," I whispered, my cheek burning, but his gaze was already devoid of reason.

He grabbed my arm, his grip like iron, and dragged me towards his desk. He pressed a button, and a doctor, his face grim, stepped forward.

"Elena needs a skin graft," Jeremiah stated, his voice dangerously low. "From her." He pointed at me.

My blood ran cold. A skin graft for a minor burn? This wasn't about healing. This was about vengeance. My terror was absolute. I pleaded, I begged, I thrashed, but his bodyguards held me fast.

On that second operating table, the sterile scent of antiseptic filling my nostrils, the numbing agents doing little to quell the absolute violation, I saw his face. Jeremiah, standing at the foot of the bed, his eyes fixed on me, cold and triumphant. This wasn't neglect. This was torture. This was his true face. My love had died long ago. Now, a new, potent force was born in its place.

"You will remember this, Celina," he said, his voice a venomous whisper, just before the world went black. "Every single moment."

My love for Jeremiah Chase had bled out on the operating table, but what remained was a cold, hard resolve: I would not just leave him. I would dismantle him, piece by agonizing piece.