I Made My Husband a CEO. Then He Hired His Ex

When Adam Hayes broke up with his first love, Seraphina, she slapped him in public.

You're a pathetic, broke loser! We were never meant to be!

I saw his handsome face, his earnest eyes, and decided to date him myself.

So what if he was poor? Money was the one thing I had plenty of.

We married. An Ivy League grad, he started a company with my backing. Seven years later, he took it public.

He'd always say, "My love, you're an angel sent from heaven to save me."

Today, as I held our daughter and fed her, a message came in from the HR manager at Adam's company.

Adam had just hired his ex-girlfriend, Seraphina, as his assistant.

The message hit me. I paused for a single, sharp second, then texted Adam.

"You hired Seraphina Miller. The woman who slapped you and called you trash in front of everyone. And now you're bringing her into your office?"

His reply was instant.

"It was a business decision. The previous assistant quit, and Seraphina aced every test. You know I don't mix work with personal feelings."

When I didn't answer, two more texts followed in quick succession.

"Don't stress over this. You need your rest after having Celeste."

"Send me a picture. I miss my girls."

For a moment, staring at his words, I almost believed him.

The realization hit me a second later. He was deflecting.

That familiar, icy pang returned to my chest.

"You want a picture?" I typed, my fingers cold. "Fire Seraphina. Now."

He went silent.

It wasn't until 4 PM that Adam finally replied.

"Sorry, I was in a meeting."

The tears came then, hot and immediate. A woman's intuition is never just intuition.

I opened a new chat with Adam's HR manager.

"Send me Seraphina's resume."

I own forty-nine percent of Hayes Capital. I have a right to see every employee's record.

The HR manager sent Seraphina's file half an hour later.

A quick scan painted a clear, pathetic picture. After breaking up with Adam, she got laid off. Then she'd bounced through several companies since, with each job ending in a layoff or a bankruptcy.

Once, she'd been a Wall Street star, connected and envied.

No wonder she'd left Adam in the dust back then. She'd been in a different galaxy.

But a gold digger like her begged for an assistant job from the man she'd discarded? No way this wasn't a play.

So that very day, I hired a private investigator to dig up everything. Her life, her debts, her secrets.

My instincts were right.

Seraphina hadn't just come back. She'd come back with an agenda.

The day before she started at Adam's company, Seraphina dumped her sales-rep boyfriend.

She even posted it?anonymously?on Ins:

"My ex's company just went public. Leaving him seven years ago was the biggest mistake of my life. He's married now, with a newborn. I'm dying of regret. How do I get him back?"

The post blew up. Hundreds of comments poured in, most telling her not to wreck a family.

But a few voices cut through the noise.

"If he ever really loved you, he'd take you back in a heartbeat. Men are simple. They always want the one they lost!"

"Why work a 9-to-5? Even as his mistress, you'd clear six figures a year."

"His wife just had a baby. She's exhausted, distracted. This is your moment!"

To each of these,?Seraphina replied: "Thanks for your support!"

After reading the post, I immediately printed it out.

When Adam came home that night, I calmly handed him all of Seraphina's information.

"This is what my private investigator found on Seraphina. You might want to take a look."

To my surprise, he didn't even look at the documents. His brow furrowed in immediate irritation.

"Why are you investigating her? How many times, Aurora? Seraphina is just an assistant. She means nothing."

"If she means nothing," I shot back, "fire her. I won't have a 'nothing' woman casting a shadow over my marriage. Remember who funded this company of yours."

At that, Adam snapped.

"There it is. The golden ticket. Do you have to hold it over my head every day? You think being my savior gives you the right to control my every move."

I didn't back down. "My line is infidelity, Adam. Fire her. Or I will."

Adam shook with rage. He ripped off his tie, glaring at me as if I were the enemy.

"Fine, you win. I'll fire her tomorrow."

Then he kicked the table, turned, and stormed upstairs without another look.

The moment he disappeared, the tears I'd held back finally fell. Then my body gave out, and I?collapsed into?the sofa.

Seraphina had only been at the company for a few days, yet Adam was already a stranger.

That night, he didn't come to our bedroom. He slept in the guest room.

It was a stark break from his old routine. Every night, his first stop was our room for a kiss-first for Celeste, then for me.

And he would gently say to me, "My love, you must be exhausted."

Then he'd hold Celeste in his arms.

"Our precious girl is just too adorable."

Now, because I'd dared to look into Seraphina, he wouldn't even look at our daughter.

He wouldn't even come home to our room.

My heart ached for Adam all night, and even in the middle of the night, my C-section incision throbbed faintly.

Celeste also cried non-stop all night for some unknown reason.

Rachel, the nanny, didn't sleep a wink that night because of Celeste and me.

But Adam never came to check on us.

Still, the outcome was positive. Early the next morning, I received a call from HR, telling me that Adam had fired Seraphina.

I let out a long sigh of relief. By mid-afternoon, I SnapChatted Adam, asking him to come home for dinner.

I told him I'd asked Rachel to make his favorite paella.

I desperately wanted to mend things between Adam and me, and I was genuinely convinced that Adam had just momentarily lost his way in our marriage. I even thought Seraphina was insignificant.

But to my surprise, Adam didn't reply to my message until eight o'clock that night.

My brow furrowed, and I called Adam, but it went straight to voicemail.

It wasn't until 11 PM that he finally messaged me.

"Sleeping at a hotel tonight. Not coming home."

Reading that message, my fingers clutched the phone tightly, and my C-section incision started throbbing again.

My fingers trembling, I called Mike, Adam's driver, to ask where Adam had gone.

In the past, I never questioned Adam's whereabouts because he'd always tell me himself. But now, a bitter smile played on my lips.

Especially when Mike hesitantly told me that Adam had left the company at 10 AM.

A sharp pain shot through my heart. 10 AM was the exact time Seraphina left the company.

My fingers trembled as I started checking Adam's credit card statements. Seeing that Adam had booked two presidential suites at a five-star hotel near the company at 11 AM, I completely collapsed to the floor.

Just then, Rachel, the nanny, brought me some warm milk. With red eyes, I asked her, "Rachel, should I go look for Adam?"

Rachel looked at me hesitantly.

"Mrs. Hayes, maybe you should back off a bit, give Mr. Hayes some space? Men have their pride, after all."

A bitter smile appeared on my lips.

"Back off? But what if 'backing off a bit' means Adam actually cheats, and then there's no turning back for us? Celeste is only three months old; she hasn't even learned to say 'Daddy' yet. Am I really going to get a divorce?"

"And if Seraphina were just an ordinary woman, I might be able to find a way to get rid of her. But it's clear Adam can't bear to let her go, and Seraphina definitely has her sights set on him."

And then, I finally broke.

For days, I'd armored myself in cold, aggressive logic to face the Seraphina problem.

But inside, my heart was a pincushion.Even if I could force myself to be gentle now, would it bring Adam back?

No. The unattainable always shines brightest.

In the crushing silence of that realization, Celeste spiked a fever in the dead of night.

The family doctor came at once. After a brief examination, he told me to take Celeste to the hospital right away. She likely had pneumonia.

Guilt, hot and sharp, ripped through me, and the tears I'd held back for days finally fell.

For two days, I'd been so consumed by Adam that I'd let Celeste fade into the background.

The night before, she'd cried without end. I hadn't noticed.

Pain and regret tore through me like a sharp blade. I called Adam, again and again. No answer.

Finally, a text arrived.

"Don't contact me. I need space."

Then his phone went dead!

At that exact moment, Celeste's crying stopped. Shallow, desperate gasps took its place, like a fish flopping on the sand.

"No, no, no, NO!"