Ethan went pale—but his mother looked terrified and whispered, “Stop her before she finds out.” That was when I realized my triplets weren’t the only secret the Montgomery family had been hiding.

The sun dipped below the Chicago skyline, casting a brilliant golden glow across the glass and steel of the city.

Caroline left my office without another word. She walked out into the elevators, descending into a world where she no longer held any power, leaving behind the ghost of a war she never stood a chance of winning.

I didn't watch her leave.

I turned around, grabbed my coat, and took the private elevator down to the underground parking garage, where my driver was waiting to take me home.

When I walked through the front doors of the estate, I didn't smell cigar smoke or aged leather. I smelled freshly baked chocolate chip cookies and heard the chaotic, joyful shouting of three ten-year-old boys wrestling in the living room.

"Mom! Mom is home!" Caleb yelled, dropping his backpack on the floor and sprinting across the hardwood to wrap his arms around my waist.

Liam and Noah followed close behind, piling on top of us in a tangle of limbs and laughter until we all collapsed onto the plush rug in a heap of giggles.

"Did you bring the cookies?" Liam demanded, his gray eyes shining with mischief.

"In the kitchen, right where they belong," I laughed, hugging all three of them tightly, burying my face in their hair.

As I looked up, catching my reflection in the polished glass of the living room window, I finally saw the woman I had become. Not the terrified, penniless girl who fled a Montgomery mansion five years ago. Not the discarded ex-wife sitting by the kitchen doors at Table 27.