Second Chance: Secret Billionaire Heir

The Day His Heart Shattered

Eight years had passed since Nathan Cole walked away from a prestigious position inside the Veylor Group, leaving behind a salary that once made competitors adjust their expectations whenever he entered a negotiation room. He resigned willingly, believing love deserved priority over ambition. Celine Hart, the woman who convinced him sacrifice was noble, became the center of every choice he made. She insisted her dreams held greater urgency, and he accepted the role of stay-at-home parent without protest.

Nathan embraced household work with quiet perseverance. Morning chores, school drop-offs, grocery runs, laundry loads, cooking, vacuuming, and evening trips to collect his family—every task became his routine. While other men climbed corporate ladders, he handled domestic responsibilities without complaint. People around him whispered condescending remarks about his life choices, calling him “too soft,” “unmotivated,” or “dependent on his wife.” Their judgment never altered his attitude. He genuinely believed supporting Celine’s career inside Morraine Group was worth every sacrifice. His devotion shaped every corner of his existence.

Celine grew colder as the years advanced. In the beginning, she smiled sweetly whenever Nathan helped with her work presentations or comforted her during stressful evenings. Slowly, that warmth dissolved. Whenever she returned home, she clutched her phone tightly and typed endlessly, claiming she had urgent discussions with Tristan Crowell. Tristan, a powerful director inside Morraine Group, became her constant reason to remain distant. The explanation sounded harmless at first—work responsibilities, planning, strategic discussions—but eventually everything she did involved Tristan’s presence.

She left the house without notifying Nathan, claiming she had meetings with Tristan that could not wait. Sometimes she disappeared late at night. Sometimes she returned early in the morning. Every time Nathan asked for clarification, she brushed the question aside with cold impatience.

Lyria, their seven-year-old daughter, copied Celine’s mannerisms. Nathan loved her deeply, cherishing every laugh and every small moment they spent together. He helped with her assignments, prepared her meals, and tucked her into bed with gentle patience. Despite all of that, Lyria compared him constantly to Tristan. She mentioned how Tristan gave better toys, bought cuter clothes, or brought her special treats after visiting Morraine headquarters. She often repeated that Tristan seemed “more impressive” than Nathan. It stung him deeply, yet he smiled through the pain, telling himself she was simply a child who admired someone influential.

Year after year, Nathan swallowed disappointment, convincing himself his family needed stability more than confrontation. He remained silent for eight long years because he believed love required endurance.

Everything changed the moment an unknown number sent a video to his phone.

Nathan sat in the living room, finishing dishes, when the notification appeared. After wiping his hands on a towel, he unlocked the screen. A message with no profile picture and no signature displayed a single file—a video recorded through some hidden camera.

His breath tightened.

A part of him refused to believe anything harmful lay inside that message. His instinct still clung to the belief that Celine would never betray him. Perhaps the file contained a digital scam, an edited recording generated by malicious software. He wanted to dismiss it as artificial fabrication.

Still, the sender included a location: a luxury hotel downtown. The suite number appeared clearly beneath the map pin.

Nathan’s pulse surged. A quiet voice inside him urged caution, pleading that everything could be misleading. But another voice—one that sounded like pure instinct—told him to check the truth directly. Doubt gnawed at his chest until it felt impossible to breathe without answers.

He grabbed his jacket, stepped outside, and called a cab. During the ride, his mind wavered between denial and dread. The city lights outside the windows blurred into indistinguishable streaks as he replayed eight years of marriage inside his mind, searching for signs he might have missed.

When he arrived at the hotel, the lobby smelled of polished marble and expensive perfume. His footsteps echoed softly across the corridor as he followed the numbered plaques toward the indicated suite. Each step felt heavier than the last. When he reached the door, distant laughter drifted softly from inside. His heart faltered.

Then he heard voices he recognized.

Celine’s tone carried an unsettling intimacy.

Tristan responded with amused confidence.

Nathan’s world tilted. His palms trembled while he pressed himself against the wall beside the door. Every whispered sentence pierced deeper than any physical wound could manage. He heard Celine asking when Tristan planned to finalize arrangements so she could proceed with divorce papers. She spoke eagerly about wanting to marry him afterward. Then she added words that shattered Nathan’s remaining sanity.

“Lyria deserves to grow up with her real father…”

Real father.

Nathan almost collapsed right there. The hallway’s silence wrapped around him as if the world froze for a moment.

Lyria was not his child.

His knees weakened. His mind struggled to process the revelation. A tidal wave of betrayal swept through his entire being, crushing the foundation he had built his life upon. Eight years of commitment, eight years of emotional investment, eight years of love poured into a family that apparently never valued him.

He turned away from the door and staggered toward the elevator. His breaths came in sharp bursts, chest tightening with unbearable pressure. When he reached the hotel’s front entrance, the world blurred. His vision dimmed. He felt his body swaying, then collapsing onto cold pavement as darkness swallowed him whole.

While unconscious, he drifted into a silent space where memories of childhood resurfaced. He saw his father, Alistair Veylor, smiling warmly while teaching him how to ride a bicycle. He saw the gentle encouragement Alistair always offered whenever Nathan expressed uncertainty about life. He remembered warnings he once ignored—warnings about trust, about choosing the right partner, about understanding people’s intentions.

He wanted to apologize. In that suspended moment, he felt ready to move beyond the mortal world, convinced his heart had endured more pain than it could withstand.

But instead of reaching his father, a sudden tug snapped his awareness backward. The shadows thinned. Light poured across his vision.

Nathan opened his eyes.

He found himself lying on the living room sofa—not in a hospital, not at the hotel courtyard, but inside his own home. Afternoon sunlight filtered through the curtains. The scent of detergent lingered faintly in the air, suggesting he had recently completed laundry. His surroundings appeared exactly as they had several years ago.

Two familiar faces hovered above him—Celine and Lyria.

Both looked irritated.

“What are you doing sleeping here?” Celine snapped with obvious annoyance. “You said you were going to tidy the bedroom.”

Lyria folded her arms and scowled. “Mom works all day while you sit around doing nothing. Tristan says good parents stay productive.”

Nathan stared at them, speechless. Confusion clouded his perception. He glanced around the room again. Everything looked unchanged, yet something felt fundamentally different. He sensed time had rewound itself, placing him somewhere before his marriage reached its catastrophic point. The atmosphere inside the house felt earlier, as though they were still in the period when Celine recently earned her position as assistant to one of Morraine Group’s top executives.

Celine stepped back, gripping her phone without hesitation, presumably messaging Tristan again. Lyria complained a second time about chores Nathan had supposedly ignored. Their harsh remarks echoed sharply, each comment slicing into him, but his reaction differed from before. A strange clarity rose inside him.

He had lived through their betrayal once already.

Celine’s cold behavior, Lyria’s dismissive attitude, Tristan’s interference—every event that led toward the devastation he witnessed inside that hotel room—remained fresh inside Nathan’s mind.

Yet the furniture arrangement, Celine’s clothing style, the current model of her phone, even Lyria’s hairstyle all showed signs of an earlier period. He remembered clearly that Morraine Group had not reached its current market dominance until a specific merger a few years after Celine’s promotion. The world outside these walls had not yet caught up to that future.

He had somehow returned to a turning point.

A second chance.

Nathan lifted himself slowly, ignoring Celine’s irritated sigh. He placed a hand over his chest, steadying the pounding rhythm beneath his ribs. Pain lingered, but it no longer controlled him. Instead, a quiet resolve grew steadily, fueled by memories of what had happened—and guided by the teachings his father once shared.

Alistair had always emphasized rebuilding after every fall. “Strength,” his father used to say, “is not measured by how much applause follows your success. It is measured by how firmly you stand after being drowned by disappointment.”

Nathan never fully understood those words until this moment.

Celine unleashed another insult, calling him useless. Lyria repeated Tristan’s name again, idolizing a man who exploited both mother and child for his ambitions. Despite their voices, Nathan remained still, watching them without the broken vulnerability he used to carry.

He would not collapse again.

Not this time.

Not after witnessing the truth behind their masks.

He felt the weight of a new reality settle into place. Somehow, fate had granted him another opportunity to correct past mistakes, reclaim his dignity, and rise above the people who dragged him into ruin. He did not yet know how time had shifted, nor why he regained consciousness in an earlier chapter of his life. But he recognized this gift for what it was: a path to redemption.

He stood quietly, letting Celine’s frustration echo through the room. He no longer absorbed her words like a sponge for humiliation. Lyria’s comparisons struck him differently as well; instead of piercing grief, they revealed how deeply Tristan manipulated his household.

Everything that once shattered him now shaped a new determination.

Nathan inhaled deeply.

The man who collapsed outside a hotel, broken by betrayal, no longer existed.

This version of Nathan carried the memory of a future he refused to repeat.

And somewhere behind the curtain of fate, the shadow of his true family—Alistair and Kade Veylor—waited for the moment he rediscovered the identity he never should have lost.

His journey was about to begin again.