Jilted Bride: Marrying My Ex's Rival

Ding.

The screen of Isolde Gibson's phone lit up, cutting through the suffocating silence.

It wasn't an apology from her fiancé, who was currently an hour late to their wedding. It was a text from an unknown number.

Isolde opened it. It was a high-resolution photo of an ultrasound scan.

8 weeks pregnant.

The mother's name: Emilie Blackburn.

The father's name: Arland Rhodes-the billionaire heir Isolde had spent the last seven years loving.

The caption below the photo read: Did you see the news? Be smart and leave him alone. He's busy taking care of our baby today.

Isolde stared at the screen, and for a moment, the world simply stopped.

Seven years. The realization hit her like a physical blow, a jagged knife twisting deep into her chest. For seven years, she had molded herself into the perfect partner, swallowing her pride, enduring his coldness, and telling herself that his obsession with Emilie was just him honoring his dead sister's memory. She had thought today-their wedding day-would be the end of her waiting. Instead, it was the punchline to a cruel, sickening joke.

Her vision blurred, a sudden, agonizing burn pricking at the back of her eyes. Her fingers trembled so violently that the phone nearly slipped from her grasp. The sheer weight of the betrayal threatened to crush her lungs.

"Miss Gibson?"

The clerk behind the glass partition cleared her throat, her eyes darting to the empty space beside Isolde with thinly veiled pity. "Is Mr. Rhodes coming or not? We have a schedule."

Isolde squeezed her eyes shut, fighting back the humiliating tears that threatened to spill. When she opened them a second later, the agonizing heartbreak was gone, replaced by a chilling, absolute clarity. The lovesick girl who had waited for seven years died in that very second.

She swiped away the ultrasound photo, only for a breaking news banner from Metropolis Daily to immediately pop up.

She tapped it. The photo was taken at JFK Airport less than an hour ago.

Arland Rhodes was in the center of the frame. He looked devastatingly handsome, his jaw set tight as he tenderly lifted a frail-looking Emilie Blackburn into a black limousine. Emilie's eyes were closed, but there was a triumphant, possessive ghost of a smile on her lips.

The headline screamed in bold, black letters: Rhodes Heir Abandons Wedding for Returning 'First Love'-Secret Pregnancy Rumored?

The air in the room seemed to vanish. But this time, Isolde didn't feel a blow to her stomach. She felt nothing but a wave of absolute, freezing disgust. He wasn't stuck in traffic. He wasn't in a meeting. He was at the airport, playing the hero to the woman who had tormented Isolde's relationship for years, while leaving his bride at the altar to become a national joke.

"Miss Gibson?" The clerk's voice grew sharper. "We can't hold the slot."

Isolde stood up. She didn't look like a woman who had just been broken. She looked like a queen stepping down from a ruined throne. She picked up her handbag, her movements slow and deliberate.

"No," Isolde said. Her voice was steady, terrifyingly calm. "He isn't coming. Cancel the appointment."

She turned and walked toward the exit. She didn't look back at the clerk, or the whispering couples, or the empty chair that should have held her husband.

Outside, the New York sky was a bruised shade of grey. A fine drizzle was falling, slicking the sidewalks with oil and grime. Isolde stepped out, the cold rain hitting her heated skin like tiny needles. She stood there for a moment, letting the water ruin the silk dress she had spent months selecting.

Her phone rang again.

Isolde looked at the caller ID. Mother.

She closed her eyes for a second, bracing herself, then answered.

"Did you see it?" Beatrice Gibson's voice was a shrill shriek that pierced Isolde's ear drum. "It's on every channel, Isolde! Every single channel! The Rhodes boy carrying that... that invalid at the airport!"

Isolde watched a yellow taxi splash through a puddle, the dirty water missing her white shoes by an inch. "I saw it."

"You are a humiliation," Beatrice hissed. "Seven years. You gave him seven years, and he leaves you at City Hall for the Blackburn girl? Do you know what this does to our stock prices? To our reputation?"

Isolde said nothing. There was nothing to say.

"The Stone family deal is still on the table," Beatrice continued, her tone shifting from anger to calculation. "Esequiel Stone is looking for a wife. He doesn't care about scandal; he needs a caretaker and a figurehead. Come back to the Capital."

Isolde stared at the grey skyline. The Rhodes Penthouse was visible in the distance, a glass needle piercing the clouds. It was where she lived. It was where she had built a life on a foundation of sand.

"I agree," Isolde said, her voice dropping to a freezing register. "In fact, send me the digital contract right now." Isolde opened her email, found the pending marriage agreement from the Stone family's legal team, and signed her name with a few swift strokes on her screen. She stood up, took the velvet box containing Arland's wedding band from her purse, and dropped it into a nearby trash can with a hollow thud.

Beatrice paused. The silence on the other end was heavy with shock. Beatrice was used to Isolde fighting, crying, begging for time. "You... agree? To marry the cripple? He's in a wheelchair, Isolde. He's half a man compared to Arland."

"I already signed it," Isolde repeated, her voice void of emotion. "Prepare the papers."

She hung up the phone.

Stepping off the curb, she hailed a passing yellow taxi.

"Where to, Miss?" the driver asked. He glanced at her rain-soaked white silk dress through the rearview mirror, a flicker of unspoken sympathy in his eyes.

Isolde met his gaze, her expression dead calm.

"The Rhodes Penthouse," she said.

She had exactly fifteen days before the Stone family jet arrived to take her to the Capital. Fifteen days to systematically dismantle seven years of a shared life.

Arland would undoubtedly come home tonight. He would walk through the door armed with his flawless excuses, fully expecting her to swallow her pride and forgive him, just like she always did.

Isolde leaned her head against the cold glass of the window, watching the city blur into streaks of grey.

Let him come.

She wasn't going back to wait for an apology. She was going back to pack.