Chapter 2

The hospital room felt like a cage, even after Arthur Hayes Sr. left.

Ethan lingered, trying to argue, to manipulate.

"Sarah, we can work this out."

"There's nothing to work out, Ethan."

My voice was calm, a strange new calmness I didn't recognize.

"Lily's gone. The baby's gone. The agreement is gone."

"I'm gone."

He didn't understand. He couldn't.

His world revolved around what he wanted, what he could control.

He saw my calmness as a tactic, not an ending.

"You're just emotional right now," he said, trying a softer tone.

"Once you've rested, you'll see sense."

I just looked at him.

Finally, a nurse came and asked him to leave.

He went, still muttering about how I was overreacting.

Alone, the memories flickered.

Ethan, in the beginning.

Flowers that filled my small Vermont apartment.

Whispered promises of a future, a family, love.

He'd seemed so sincere, so different from the cold world of the Hayes wealth.

I had believed him, or wanted to.

I had tried so hard to make it work, even after the shine wore off.

Even after I understood the true, transactional nature of our marriage.

The first time I found out about his cheating, just six months in.

He' d laughed it off. "It means nothing, Sarah. You're my wife."

Then he' d reminded me, subtly, about Lily' s mounting medical bills.

The gilded cage.

He knew my weakness, my love for Lily.

He used it every time.

My pregnancy, I had foolishly hoped, might change him.

A child, his own child.

It only seemed to make him more reckless, more dismissive.

Days later, I was discharged.

Arthur Sr. had arranged everything, a quiet car, a discreet exit.

He' d even frozen some of Ethan' s trust funds, I heard.

And there was a small, vicious article in a society paper about an unnamed heir whose scandalous affair and callous behavior were causing a family rift.

Tiffany Starr' s social media went quiet.

Arthur was old money, and old money knew how to apply pressure.

Ethan started calling, texting, his messages alternating between threats and pleas.

"You can't do this, Sarah! Think of the family image!"

"I miss you. Come home. We can fix this."

"That influencer tramp meant nothing!"

I blocked his number.

He used burner phones.

I changed my number.

He sent messages through lawyers Arthur hadn't cut him off from.

He was enraged, not by my loss, but by his inconvenience.

By the public reprimand.

By losing his plaything, his punching bag.

I focused on one thing: taking Lily home.

Vermont. Our small town, the green mountains, the quiet cemetery where our parents rested.

That was all that mattered now.

I packed a single bag, Lily' s urn carefully wrapped in her favorite soft blanket.

The opulent New York penthouse felt alien, cold.

I left my wedding ring on the nightstand, beside a framed photo of Ethan and me from our wedding day.

We looked so hopeful.

I felt nothing looking at it now. Just a vast, echoing emptiness where my heart used to be.

The doorman, kind old Miguel who always had a smile for Lily when she visited, looked at me with sad eyes.

"Safe travels, Ms. Sarah."

He knew. Perhaps everyone knew, except Ethan.