Her reply came instantly.
Wine. My place. Tonight.
I smiled.
Kate Morrison had been my closest friend since college, a divorce attorney with red hair, sharp instincts, and the kind of loyalty that made weak men uneasy.
She had been the first person to tell me, “Olivia, stop asking whether he’s cheating and start asking what he’s hiding financially.”
She had been right.
I opened the bottom drawer of my desk and pulled out a framed photo from our wedding day. Mark and I stood beneath white roses outside a lakeside hotel. He looked handsome, hopeful, real.
I looked young enough to believe love could protect you from betrayal.
I turned the frame face down.
Not because the past meant nothing.
But because it no longer had the right to look at me.
That night, I sat at Kate’s kitchen island while she poured pinot noir into two oversized glasses and listened as I told her every detail.
“He actually said you didn’t need a divorce?” she asked.
“He said it would be messy.”
Kate’s jaw dropped. “He is a lawyer.”
“Apparently only when it works in his favor.”
She raised her glass. “To men who think women don’t read.”
I clinked mine against hers.
“To women who keep copies.”
We laughed, but then the laughter faded.
Kate reached across the counter and squeezed my hand. “You okay?”
I looked down at our hands.
“I don’t know,” I admitted. “I thought I’d feel shattered today.
But I think I shattered months ago. Today just feels like someone finally swept the glass into a pile.”
Her expression softened. “You loved him.”
“I did.”
“And he used that.”
I nodded.
The hardest part wasn’t that Mark had left.
It was realizing how long he had already been gone before his body followed.
Monday morning, Erin filed for divorce at 8:03 a.m.
By noon, formal notices were moving through all the proper channels.
Temporary financial restraints. Fraud reports. Preservation orders.
A demand for documents. Copies sent to Mark’s attorney, the bank, and one very important man named Peter Peterson—Amanda’s father, Mark’s boss, and the senior partner whose reputation depended on discretion.
For the next two weeks, I did nothing dramatic.
That was the point.
I went to work. I answered emails.
I watered the hydrangeas. I met Kate for dinner. I slept in the center of the bed.
The story doesn’t end here — it continues on the next page.
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