Chapter 4

The doorman didn't even look at her as she dragged her single suitcase out the revolving doors. The New York sidewalk was loud and chaotic, the afternoon sun glaring off the windows of the luxury boutiques. Estella stood on the curb, feeling invisible. She had nothing but a suitcase of clothes and a deed to a ruin.

A bright red Mini Cooper screeched to a halt right in front of her, barely missing a taxi.

Chloe Mercer flew out of the driver's side. Her red hair was wild, her face flushed with rage. She didn't say a word. She just wrapped her arms around Estella, squeezing so tight Estella's ribs ached.

"I'll kill him," Chloe whispered fiercely into her shoulder. "I'll castrate him with a rusty spoon."

Estella let herself be held. The tension in her shoulders cracked, and a single sob escaped her lips before she could stop it. "How did you know?"

"Jana posted a selfie on Instagram with the caption 'New beginnings,'" Chloe said, pulling back, her green eyes blazing. "I broke a nail texting you. Get in the car."

Chloe didn't take her to a hotel. She took her to her cozy, cluttered apartment in Greenwich Village. It smelled like coffee and old books, a million miles away from the sterile perfection of the Nieves penthouse.

An hour later, Estella was curled up on the sofa, a mug of hot cocoa warming her hands. She had told Chloe everything. The affair, the confrontation, the phone call to her mother, the negotiation for the house.

Chloe paced the small living room, her sneakers squeaking on the hardwood floor. "I can't believe your mother. I can't believe Jana. And Conrad! 'You don't know Excel'? I'll show him Excel. I'll show him a spreadsheet of his impending doom!"

"Chloe," Estella said, a small smile touching her lips for the first time in twenty-four hours.

"What are you going to do, Est?" Chloe stopped pacing, her face crumpling with worry. "That house is a disaster. And you have no income. No job history. How are you going to live?"

She pulled a credit card from her wallet and threw it on the coffee table. "Here. My emergency fund. It's yours. We'll figure it out. You can stay here as long as you want."

Estella looked at the credit card, then at her best friend. She felt a rush of warmth, but she shook her head. "I don't need your money, Chloe."

Chloe stared at her. "Estella, I love you, but you're delusional. You've been a housewife for a decade. You have no 401k. You have nothing."

"I have something," Estella said. She stood up and walked over to her suitcase, which was leaning against the wall. She unzipped it, pushing aside the folded sweaters and toiletry bags. Nestled at the very bottom, wrapped in a silk scarf, was a thick, heavy leather portfolio.

She carried it back to the sofa and set it on the coffee table. She unbuckled the straps and flipped it open.

Chloe leaned in, her brow furrowed. "What is this?"

Estella pulled out the first sleeve. It was a certificate, embossed with a gold seal. "Le Cordon Bleu Paris," Chloe read aloud, her eyes going wide. "Grand Diplôme? Estella, what the hell?"

"I went to Paris three years ago," Estella said, her voice quiet. "Conrad was traveling for business. He was complaining about the food at his Michelin-star restaurant, saying the sauces were too heavy. I thought... I thought if I learned to cook like a professional, I could make him happy."

She pulled out the next one. "Cornell University Certified Nutritionist."

Chloe's mouth dropped open. "You're a nutritionist?"

"Conrad has severe IBS and anxiety-related eating issues," Estella said, a bitter edge to her voice. "I had to learn how to manage his gut microbiome while catering to his OCD."

She kept pulling them out. A high-end private nursing certification. A sommelier diploma. An art appraisal certificate. Each one was from a top-tier institution, each one a desperate attempt to fix a man who couldn't be fixed.

Chloe was speechless. She stared at the pile of credentials, then at Estella. "You did all this... for him?"

"I thought I was being a good wife," Estella said, her hand pausing on the last folder at the bottom. It was heavier, printed on thick, dark blue cardstock. She pulled it out and handed it to Chloe.

Chloe looked at it. Then she looked up at Estella, her eyes huge. "Columbia University. Master of Arts in Clinical Psychology."

"Conrad's control issues and OCD were getting worse," Estella said, her voice hollow. "The therapists he saw were useless. I thought if I understood the pathology, I could reach him. I thought I could save our marriage."

Chloe set the degree down on the table with trembling hands. "Estella... you're a genius. You're a certified, literal genius."

"I'm a fool," Estella corrected, but the ice in her chest was starting to thaw. She looked at the certificates, at the years of work she had put in, hidden away like a shameful secret. "He called me a domestic. He said I had no skills."

She gathered the papers, sliding them back into the portfolio with careful precision. "He thought I was spending my days at charity lunches and getting manicures. He never once asked what I was doing when he was away."

She buckled the straps, the leather creaking in the quiet room. When she looked up at Chloe, her eyes were dry and hard. "He thinks he stripped me of everything. But he didn't. He just gave me the tools to build something better."