Chapter 3

Diana Ware POV:

My laughter echoed in the suddenly silent room, a harsh, grating sound that made Isabell' s perfectly sculpted face tighten with annoyance. The lawyer holding the pen took an involuntary step back.

"What' s so funny?" Isabell asked, her voice sharp.

I finally managed to stifle the laugh, wiping a tear of pure, hysterical despair from the corner of my eye. I looked at her, at the lawyer, at the little boy who was no longer mine, and a strange, terrifying calm washed over me.

"Oh, nothing," I said, my voice eerily steady. "I was just thinking about what a good deal this is."

Without another word, I turned on my heel and walked back into the bedroom I had shared with a phantom. Their confused gazes followed me.

"What is she doing?" I heard Isabell hiss to the lawyer. "Is she packing? Make sure she doesn' t take anything of value."

I ignored her. I pulled a large, dusty storage box from under the bed. It wasn't my clothes I was after. It wasn't the few pieces of jewelry I owned or the sentimental trinkets from a life that was a lie.

I began to move with methodical precision. I opened my nightstand drawer and pulled out a thick stack of bank statements from the last five years, one for each of the three jobs I worked. I added the pile of pay stubs I kept for tax purposes.

Next, I went to the small desk in the corner. I gathered every credit card statement, every bill, every receipt I had meticulously saved. I found the statements for the supplementary credit card Jordan used-the one I paid off every month, filled with his "business" lunches and "networking" expenses.

When I turned around, Isabell was standing in the doorway, her arms crossed, her expression shifting from annoyance to suspicion.

"What is all that?" she demanded. "You' re not seriously thinking of trying to blackmail us, are you? Trying to squeeze out a few more dollars? It' s pathetic, Diana."

I didn' t answer her. I walked past her, back into the living room, and went straight to the small basket where I kept the mail. I rummaged through it until I found what I was looking for: the receipt for Leo' s new five-hundred-dollar robot. It was a crisp, damning piece of paper. Proof of a casual expenditure that represented a mountain of work for me.

I walked back to my box of papers and placed the receipt right on top. It was the final, perfect flourish.

I closed the lid of the box. It was heavy, filled with the paper trail of my servitude.

"That' s it," I announced, my voice clear and strong. "I' m ready to go. I' ll just be taking this with me."

The lawyer stepped forward, blocking my path. "I' m afraid not, Ms. Ware. Those are financial documents related to the project. They are the property of the Fernandez Corporation."

I looked him dead in the eye. "They are records of my labor. My earnings. My expenditures. They belong to me."

"Are you trying to renegotiate your compensation?" Isabell sneered, looking at me as if I were a particularly stupid child. "I told you, it won' t work."

"Who said anything about compensation?" I asked, a slow, cold smile spreading across my face. "You and Jordan, you taught me a very valuable lesson today."

She raised a perfectly plucked eyebrow. "Oh? And what' s that?"

"You said I have a scarcity mindset. That I' m obsessed with money," I said, my voice dropping low. "You' re right. I am."

I leaned in, my voice just a whisper, but it carried the weight of five years of rage. "Because love can be a lie. A family can be a stage play. A child can be taken from you. But money... money is just numbers. It' s honest. It doesn' t pretend to be something it' s not. It doesn' t promise you a future and then rip it away. From now on, I only believe in what I can count."

I hefted the heavy box. I walked to the front door, slipping on my worn-out sneakers. I didn't look back at the expensive furniture that would soon arrive. I didn't look back at the woman who had orchestrated my ruin.

And I didn' t look back at Leo. To look at him now would be to acknowledge a wound so deep it would kill me. I had to cauterize it. I had to cut it out of me completely.

The only things I took from that apartment were my ID, my now-useless bank cards, my laptop, and the box. The box was my past, my pain, and my only hope for a future.

As I pulled the door shut behind me, the last thing I heard was Isabell' s light, musical laughter, followed by Leo' s childish giggle. The sound was a brand on my soul.

And it was the fuel for the fire that was just beginning to burn.