Chapter 230: Paula's Desperate Confession

Chapter 230: Paula's Desperate Confession

"What I've done?" Paula sat up straighter, all pretense of injury abandoned. "What about what you've done? What about the past fifteen years I've wasted waiting for you?"

Her voice cracked on the last word, and suddenly tears were streaming down her face again, but these were different. Raw. Real.

"I loved you." The words came out in a strangled whisper. "I've loved you since we were kids, Zachary. You were supposed to be mine. We were supposed to end up together. Everyone said so. Your grandfather, my parents—everyone."

Zachary's jaw tightened. "That's not how love works, Paula. You can't—"

"Then she came along." Paula's face contorted with hatred. "Perfect little Sophia with her big sad eyes and her tragic backstory. And suddenly I didn't exist anymore. You married her. You chose her."

"Because I loved her—"

"You barely knew her!" Paula's voice rose to a shriek. "Three months, Zachary. You dated her for three months and then married her. Meanwhile, I'd been by your side for years. I knew everything about you. I was there for every important moment. And you just... you threw me away like I meant nothing."

The raw pain in her voice made something twist in Zachary's gut. But it didn't excuse what she'd done.

"So you decided to destroy my marriage?" His voice was dangerously quiet. "You deliberately tried to tear my family apart?"

Paula wiped her face roughly, smearing what was left of her makeup. "I didn't have to try very hard, did I? Your precious marriage was already falling apart. I just... helped it along."

"The mother-baby store." Realization was dawning, piece by terrible piece. "You knew the kids would see us. You planned it."

She smiled, bitter and triumphant. "They looked so heartbroken. Those brats who weren't even yours, calling you 'daddy' like they had any right—"

"Watch it." The warning in his voice made her pause.

But she was too far gone to stop now. "The hotel photos, the anonymous messages to Sophia—all of it. I made sure she saw exactly what I wanted her to see." Her eyes glittered with malicious satisfaction. "You should have seen her face when she showed up at that hotel room. So pale. So defeated. Like watching her world end in real-time."

Zachary felt the blood drain from his face. "Sophia came to the hotel?"

"Oh, you didn't know?" Paula's laugh was cruel. "I sent her photos. Told her exactly where to find us. She saw you in that bed, half-naked, passed out. She saw the marks on my neck, the clothes on the floor. She saw everything."

The room spun. That explained so much—Sophia's sudden coldness, her absolute certainty about his infidelity, her refusal to listen to any explanation.

She'd seen it with her own eyes. Or at least, she thought she had.

"How?" His voice was hoarse. "How did you even—I don't remember that night. I woke up alone. You said you'd helped me to the room because I was drunk, but—"

"You were drugged, you idiot." Paula's expression shifted to something uglier. "Just a little something in your drink. Enough to knock you out. I undressed you, messed up the room, gave myself some nice visible hickeys..." She touched her neck, almost nostalgic. "The photos turned out perfectly."

Zachary's hands clenched into fists. "You're insane."

"I'm in love!" She was on her feet now, IV pole clattering. "And I'm tired of watching you play happy family with her and those kids who aren't even yours! When are you going to wake up, Zachary? When are you going to realize I'm the one who's always been there? I'm the one who actually loves you!"

"This isn't love, Paula." Disgust colored every word. "This is obsession. It's manipulation. It's—" He stopped, forcing himself to speak calmly. "We're done. Completely done. I don't want to see you, hear from you, or have you anywhere near my family ever again."

"Your family?" She spat the words. "They're not your family! Those kids belong to some other man—probably that Lucas she's so cozy with. And Sophia? She's been looking for any excuse to leave you. I just gave her one."

Zachary turned toward the door. "I'm calling my lawyer. What you've done—the drugging, the harassment, endangering the kids—you're going to face consequences."

"Wait." Something in her voice made him pause. "You want the truth? The whole truth?"

He looked back. Paula's face had gone pale, but there was a reckless desperation in her eyes.

"That night five years ago." Her voice shook. "At the hotel. When you woke up thinking you'd slept with someone..."

Zachary went very still.

"It wasn't me." The words came out in a rush. "The woman you actually slept with—it wasn't me. I just made you think it was."

The world tilted.

"What?"

"I drugged you that night too. But when I came back to the room, you were already... occupied." Bitterness twisted her features. "Some other woman got to you first. I don't know who she was. Never saw her face. But by morning she was gone, and you didn't remember anything, so I just..." She shrugged. "I let you believe it was me. All these years, you thought we'd had that night together. But we didn't. You slept with some random stranger."

Zachary couldn't breathe. Five years. Five years of guilt and confusion and thinking he'd somehow betrayed Sophia in his blackout state with Paula.

But it hadn't been Paula at all.

"Who was she?" His voice came out strangled. "The woman—did you see anything? Anything at all?"

Paula's smile was vindictive. "Not really. It was dark. But I know she left something behind—some kind of bracelet, I think. I threw it away. Didn't want any evidence of her existence."

She leaned forward, eyes glittering with tears and rage. "Does it matter? Does knowing it wasn't me change anything? You still cheated on your precious Sophia. You still—"

But Zachary was already gone, the hospital door slamming behind him.

His mind raced as he strode down the corridor. Five years ago. A hotel room. A woman whose face he'd never seen.

And now, somehow, he had to find out who she was.

Because suddenly, it felt like everything—his entire marriage, the divorce, Sophia's hatred, the kids' fear—all of it hinged on solving this five-year-old mystery.

His phone was already at his ear as he burst out into the storm.

"I need everything," he told his head of security. "Every piece of footage from the Grandview Hotel from five years ago. Guest lists, security logs, credit card transactions. Everything."

Behind him, Paula's anguished scream echoed through the hospital corridors.

But Zachary didn't look back.