Chapter 2

The sound of the front door closing echoed through the silent penthouse. Corbett had taken Ivana to the emergency room, just in case. It was a routine he knew well. My heart, which should have been racing with anger, felt strangely calm. It was the calm of a battlefield after the war is lost.

This home, our home, felt like a museum of a life that was never really mine. The paintings on the walls were Elenor' s favorites. The grand piano in the living room was the one she used to play. Even the scent of the lilies that the housekeeper placed in the vase every morning was her signature flower.

I walked back into the master bedroom. The duvet Corbett had laid out for Ivana was crumpled on the floor. Her lace-trimmed pillow, Elenor' s pillow, was still on the chaise lounge, a smug monument to her victory.

Corbett' s order from last night hung in the air. "Apologize." He hadn' t believed me. He never did.

He had also given me a punishment before he left. "Clean this room. And when I get back, I want to see that you' ve thrown out all those cheap-smelling oils of yours. The smell gives Ivana a headache."

My perfumes. My work. My passion. He called them cheap-smelling oils.

I walked over to my perfume organ, a beautiful tiered desk that held hundreds of tiny bottles of essential oils and absolutes. It was my sanctuary. A gift from my father, a perfumer himself, before he passed away.

My hands trembled as I began to pack them away, not to throw them out, but to save them. Each bottle held a memory, a piece of my soul. I couldn' t let him destroy this too.

I finished just as the sun began to rise. I was exhausted, but I couldn' t rest. I needed to find Corbett. I needed to see his face when he wasn' t under Ivana' s spell. A small, stupid part of me still hoped he would realize his mistake.

I called his phone. It went straight to voicemail. I called the hospital. The nurse said Mr. Ewing had been there but had left hours ago with his sister-in-law, who was perfectly fine.

A sick feeling churned in my stomach. I checked a celebrity gossip site on my phone, my fingers shaking.

There it was. A photo, time-stamped just an hour ago. Corbett and Ivana, not at the hospital, but at an exclusive all-night patisserie downtown. He was smiling, feeding her a croissant, his eyes full of the gentle affection he once reserved for me. The caption read: "Real estate mogul Corbett Ewing dotes on his fragile sister-in-law Ivana Manning after a late-night health scare. Is there more to this story?"

The maids were starting to move around the penthouse, their hushed whispers following me. I could feel their pity. Mrs. Ewing, the woman who had to clean her own room while her husband was out on a public date with his dead fiancée' s sister. The humiliation was a physical weight.

I placed the packed boxes of my perfume oils by the service elevator, telling the head butler they were donations. It was a lie, but it was the only way to get them out of the house safely. A friend would pick them up later.

I was clearing out the last of our shared things from a closet when Corbett finally came home. He found me holding a photo album from our honeymoon.

"What are you doing, Jen?" he asked, his voice soft, as if nothing had happened.

"Cleaning," I said, my voice flat. I tossed the album into a large garbage bag. "Getting rid of junk."

"Junk?" He looked hurt. "Those are our memories."

Ivana appeared behind him, clinging to his arm like a vine. "Corbett, my head still hurts. Can you make me some tea?"

She looked at me, her eyes glinting with triumph. She was wearing one of his expensive cashmere sweaters, and it hung off her small frame, making her look even more childlike and vulnerable.

"In a minute, Vana," Corbett said, his eyes still on me. He seemed genuinely confused by my coldness.

"But I need it now," she whined, her lower lip trembling. "The doctor said I need to stay calm."

He sighed, torn. It was a pathetic sight. He turned to go with her, then paused. "We' ll talk later, Jenna."

I said nothing. I just watched them walk away, his arm wrapped protectively around her. I dragged the garbage bag full of our "memories" to the incinerator chute and sent it down without a second thought.

Later that evening, he found me in the library. He brought me a small plate of macarons from the same patisserie he' d taken Ivana to.

"A peace offering," he said, a charming smile on his face.

I looked at the plate. "Did you apologize to her?"

His smile faltered. "Jenna, let' s not talk about that. It was a stressful night for everyone."

"Did she apologize to me?" I pressed, my voice still quiet. "For lying? For accusing me of trying to kill her?"

"She' s not well," he said, the familiar excuse sounding hollow even to his own ears. "You know her PTSD... she gets confused. She thinks she' s in danger."

"So you punished me for her delusion."

"I didn' t punish you," he said, his voice rising in frustration. "I just asked you to be considerate of her condition. I did ground her, you know. She' s not allowed to go shopping for a whole week."

A whole week. The punishment was so laughable, so insulting, that a dry, humorless laugh escaped my lips. Out in the hallway, I could see Ivana lounging on a sofa, scrolling through her phone, not a care in the world.

"I see," I said, my voice dripping with sarcasm. "How ever will she survive?"

I took one of the macarons from the plate. It was pistachio, my favorite. A flavor he remembered. For a moment, a flicker of the old Corbett seemed to be there. I put it in my mouth.

The taste was perfect. Sweet, nutty, delicate.

And then the itching started.

My throat began to close up. My skin erupted in hives. My breath came in ragged, panicked wheezes.

Pistachios. I wasn' t allergic to them.

But I was severely, life-threateningly allergic to almonds. And this macaron, this peace offering, was filled with almond paste.

Corbett' s eyes widened in horror as he saw my face swell, my skin turn red. "Jenna! Oh my God, Jenna!"

He fumbled for his phone to call 911. At the same moment, Ivana let out a piercing shriek from the hallway.

"Corbett! The internet! They' re saying horrible things about you and me! They' re calling me a homewrecker! I can' t breathe! I' m having another panic attack!"

She crumpled to the floor, sobbing hysterically.

Corbett' s head snapped back and forth between me, gasping for air on the library floor, and Ivana, putting on the performance of a lifetime in the hall.

He looked at me, his eyes full of panic and indecision. "Jenna, I..."

Then he turned and ran to Ivana.

"It' s okay, Vana, don' t look at it. I' m here," he soothed, pulling her into his arms. He chose her. He chose to comfort her fake panic attack while my throat was closing, while I was dying.

As my vision started to tunnel, the last thing I saw was Corbett carrying Ivana away, leaving me alone on the floor. My hand, swollen and red, reached for my purse, for the EpiPen I always carried. I was alone. I had to save myself.

And in that moment of pure, agonizing betrayal, I remembered a time when he would have moved mountains for me. A time when I' d had a mild allergic reaction at a restaurant, and he had carried me to the car himself, breaking every traffic law to get me to the hospital, never leaving my side. That man was gone. Or maybe he had never really existed at all.