The leather seats of Molly’s Subaru were warm, but the ice inside my bones wouldn’t thaw. Ivy slept soundly against my chest, her tiny breaths soft and rhythmic, blissfully ignorant that her birth mother had just been evicted from her own empire by the man who had promised to love her until death do us part.

The leather seats of Molly’s Subaru were warm, but the ice inside my bones wouldn’t thaw.

Ivy slept soundly against my chest, her tiny breaths soft and rhythmic, blissfully ignorant that her birth mother had just been evicted from her own empire by the man who had promised to love her until death do us part.

Molly didn’t speak for the first ten minutes of the drive. She kept one hand on the steering wheel and reached over with the other, gripping my frozen fingers with a pressure that meant I’m here, and he’s dead.

"He’s in Miami," I said, my voice barely a raspy whisper above the hum of the heater. "With Diane."

"Miami," Molly repeated, her voice dripping with venom. "Your husband took his mother on a tropical vacation three days after you had a C-section, locked you out in the freezing rain, and you’re sitting there acting like you’re surprised."

"I’m not surprised," I murmured, staring out the window at the blurred lights of Boulder. "I’m just... clear."

For three years, I had compromised. When Brent wanted a luxury SUV, I bought it—though I kept the title in my name. When his mother, Diane, decided she wanted to host her country club bridge group in my grand dining room, I catered it. When his sister, Karen, replaced my vintage oil paintings with cheap family portraits of people I barely knew, I took a deep breath and moved them to the storage wing.

I thought I was being a good wife. I thought compromise was the glue of a modern marriage.

I hadn’t realized I was just fattening a leech.

Molly pulled into her driveway, killed the engine, and turned to look at me. Her eyes were red-rimmed, but her jaw was set like marble. "What’s the plan, Tessa? Because if you tell me you’re going to file for a standard divorce and let the courts handle this for eighteen months, I’m going to go to Miami myself and drown him in the ocean."

"Jennifer is drafting the agreement right now," I said softly, adjusting Ivy’s blanket. "The house is listed to Elliot’s buyer. All-cash offer. Ten percent above market value. Closing in forty-eight hours."

Molly blinked. "Forty-eight hours? Can you even legally sell a primary residence that fast?"

"It’s not our primary residence," I said, a cold, sharp smile finally breaking through my exhaustion. "The prenuptial agreement explicitly states that 1024 Redwood Crest Drive is classified as my sole investment property. Brent signed away all homestead rights before we walked down the aisle. He thought he was being romantic by signing whatever I put in front of him. He thought he’d eventually negotiate his way onto the title."

"And the secret?" Molly asked, her eyes narrowing. "The one you mentioned to Jennifer?"

I looked down at my daughter. "Brent didn’t just change the lock code to be cruel, Molly. He changed it because he needed me out of the house. He needed forty-eight hours in Miami to complete a transfer."

"A transfer of what?"

"Two million dollars," I said, my voice turning to steel. "From my private corporate liquidity reserve. He found my secondary master key in the study. He thinks he’s stealing my money to cover his failed real estate ventures in Florida. What he doesn't know... is that account wasn't mine. It was a holding account for a federal investigation into his mother's non-profit foundation."