Chapter 2

He produced one with a flourish. A gold Montblanc. Probably bought with my money.

As my fingers brushed the cap, Mom let out a sob.

Dad just stared, his disappointment a physical weight in the room.

I was about to click the pen when Mark cleared his throat.

"Actually, Sarah, there's one more thing."

He gestured. Emily White glided towards us, a smug smile on her perfectly made-up face. She was wearing a red dress, cut low.

She handed me another document. Thinner. More personal.

"Divorce papers, Sarah," Emily said, her voice like honey mixed with arsenic. "Thank you for taking care of Mark and *my* children for so long. It's time for our family to finally be together."

My head didn't buzz. No shock. No disbelief.

Just a cold, hard satisfaction.

I'd waited eighteen years for this exact moment.

"You see, Sarah," Mark said, his arm snaking around Emily's waist. "I'm a normal man. I wanted my own children. You couldn't give me that."

His excuse. The one he'd probably practiced in the mirror.

"But Mark," I said, my voice soft, "*you* were the one who insisted on the DINK lifestyle. You begged me to have the surgery. You said it would make us closer, free us from burdens."

That was the lie I'd let him believe I fell for. The lie I'd used to set my own stage.

Emily scoffed. "A woman who can't have children... what good is all that money if there's no one to leave it to? No legacy?"

The crowd, our supposed friends and business associates, murmured. Some shocked, some nodding in agreement with Emily's cruel logic.

Mom's voice cut through the noise, raw with pain, directed at Mark.

"You came from nothing, Mark Brown! Nothing! Dirt poor, your mother sick, no money for tuition. Sarah paid for everything! She lifted you out of the gutter!"

She was crying openly now, tears streaming down her face.

"We welcomed you. No dowry, a house, a car! She learned to cook your favorite meals. My husband gave your deadbeat brother a job, a six-figure salary!"

Mark just smirked. "Ancient history, Martha. What matters is now."