The Billionaire's Regret: My Tortured Ex-Wife

They dragged her through the outer office. The secretaries and assistants stopped typing. They watched her pass with eyes full of judgment. They knew the rumors. Everyone knew. Karen Nash, the quiet designer, the murderer.

The rain in Manhattan didn't wash things clean. It just made the dirt slicker.

Karen Nash sat in the leather chair that cost more than her brother's life was apparently worth. The air conditioning in the top-floor office of King Enterprises was set to a temperature that froze the sweat on her back.

She stared at the mahogany desk. Specifically, at the document resting in the center.

"Sign it," Isaiah King said.

He was standing by the floor-to-ceiling window, his back to her. His silhouette cut through the gray backdrop of the storm like a blade. He didn't need to turn around to exert pressure. His voice did that on its own. It was a low baritone that vibrated in Karen's chest, a sound she used to associate with safety, now weaponized.

"Isaiah," Karen whispered. Her voice was thin, brittle. "Please. Just look at the evidence one more time. The toxicology report on the driver... the angle of the stairs..."

"Sign it," he repeated. He didn't raise his voice. He didn't have to. "Or the transfer to the dialysis center for Danny stops today. Right now."

Karen's hand spasmed.

She looked down at her fingers. They were pale, shaking against the dark wood of the desk. Danny. Her brother was the only family she had left. His kidneys were failing. The machine that cleaned his blood three times a week was the only thing keeping him on this side of the ground. Isaiah knew that. He knew exactly where to press to get the reaction he wanted.

She reached for the fountain pen. It was heavy, cold metal.

"I didn't push her," Karen said. She had to say it. Even if the words died in the empty air between them. "I didn't kill Clementine."

Isaiah turned.

The movement was sharp, violent in its precision. He walked toward the desk, placing his hands on the edge, leaning over her. He smelled of rain and expensive scotch and pure, unadulterated hatred. His eyes, usually a calm ocean blue, were rimmed with red. He hadn't slept. Grief did that to a man. Or maybe it was the rage.

"You are a jealous, vindictive woman," Isaiah said, spitting the words like poison. "She was pregnant, Karen. You pushed a pregnant woman down a flight of stairs because you couldn't stand that I loved her and not you."

Karen flinched. The accusation hit her like a physical blow.

"I tried to catch her," she choked out, tears blurring her vision. "I reached out to grab her hand..."

"I saw you," Isaiah cut her off. "I saw your hand extended. I saw her fall."

He believed his eyes. He believed the narrative that made sense. The jealous wife. The hidden marriage. The tragic mistress. It was a perfect story, except for the fact that it was a lie. A lie made easier to believe by the months they had spent living apart, two strangers under one legal contract, a distance that had allowed him to be completely oblivious.

"Danny," he said simply.

The name hung in the air. The leverage.

Karen closed her eyes. She could see Danny's face, pale and exhausted, hooked up to the tubes. If she fought this, if she dragged this divorce out, Danny would die. Isaiah King had the money and the power to bury them both in legal fees until Danny's body gave out.

She opened her eyes. She uncapped the pen.

The nib scratched against the paper. The sound was loud in the silent office. Karen Nash. She signed her name. With that signature, she wasn't just ending a marriage that no one knew existed; she was signing a confession. She was accepting the role of the villain.

She put the pen down.

Isaiah snatched the papers immediately. He didn't check the signature. He didn't look at her. He tossed the folder toward the lawyer who had been standing in the corner, blending into the shadows like a piece of furniture.

"The police are downstairs," the lawyer said. His voice was devoid of inflection. "They have a warrant for your arrest regarding the death of Clementine Villarreal."

Karen stood up so fast her chair screeched against the floor. Panic, cold and sharp, flooded her veins.

"You said... you said if I signed..."

"I said I wouldn't cut off Danny's funding," Isaiah said. He was adjusting his cufflinks, looking at a point above her head. "I didn't say I would protect you from the consequences of your actions."

"Isaiah, please."

"The divorce is just the administrative cleanup," he said. He finally looked at her. His gaze was dead. "You have a funeral to attend first."

"What?"

"You're going to her funeral," Isaiah said. "You're going to see what you did. You're going to watch them put her in the ground."

The door opened. Two men in dark suits stepped in. They weren't police yet. They were King's private security.

"Get her out of my sight," Isaiah said.

One of the guards grabbed her arm. His grip was bruising. Karen stumbled, her heels catching on the plush carpet. She looked back at Isaiah, searching for a shred of the man who had once held her when she had nightmares.

There was nothing. Just a wall of ice.

The elevator ride down was a blur of motion sickness. Karen leaned against the metal wall, trying to breathe. Her chest felt constricted, like a giant hand was squeezing her lungs.

When the doors opened to the lobby, the flashbulbs blinded her.

It was a wall of light. Cameras clicked in a frenzy, sounding like a swarm of mechanical locusts. Reporters shouted questions that overlapped into a roar of noise.

"Karen! Did you do it?"

"How do you feel about the baby?"

"Look this way, killer!"

Isaiah stepped out of the private elevator a moment later. He put on sunglasses, shielding himself from the lights. The reporters quieted down instantly, parting like the Red Sea for him. He was the grieving father, the betrayed lover. He was the victim here.

He didn't speak. He walked straight to the black Rolls Royce waiting at the curb.

The guards shoved Karen into the sedan behind it. It was an unmarked car. The interior smelled of stale leather.

The convoy moved.

Karen stared out the window as the city blurred into streaks of gray rain. She wrapped her arms around herself, shivering. She kept replaying that moment on the stairs. Clementine's smile, the way she had leaned back, the sudden loss of friction on the floor.

I tried to save her.

But memory is a fragile thing. Under the weight of Isaiah's certainty, under the weight of the world's hatred, Karen felt her own reality fracturing. Had she pushed her? Had she, in some subconscious moment of jealousy, wanted Clementine gone?

No. No.

She pressed her palms against her temples.

The car slowed. They were leaving the city, entering the winding roads of the private cemetery in Westchester. The trees were bare, skeletal fingers reaching up into the stormy sky.

The car stopped.

The door opened. The wind whipped rain into the backseat, soaking Karen's blouse in seconds.

Isaiah was standing there. He held a large black umbrella, but he didn't offer her shelter. He looked like a reaper.

"Get out," he ordered.

Karen stepped out into the mud. Her heels sank immediately. The cold rain plastered her hair to her face.

Isaiah pointed toward the gathering of people on the hill.

"On your knees," he said.

Karen looked at him, water dripping from her eyelashes. "Isaiah..."

"Walk to her grave on your knees," he said, his voice dropping to a terrifying whisper. "Or Danny loses his machine tonight."

The mud was freezing. It seeped through the fabric of her trousers instantly, biting into her skin.

Karen dropped to her knees.

The impact jarred her spine. A sharp rock hidden in the slush cut into her left kneecap, but she bit the inside of her cheek to keep from crying out. She wouldn't give him the satisfaction of hearing her pain. Not yet.

"Move," Isaiah commanded from above her.

She began to crawl.

It was a grotesque procession. The rain beat down on her back, heavy and relentless. Every movement was a struggle against the suction of the wet earth. She dragged herself forward, her hands sinking into the mire.

Ahead, the mourners stood in a semi-circle around a fresh grave. They were a sea of black umbrellas and pale, angry faces.

Victoria King, Isaiah's mother, stood at the front. She wore a veil, but Karen could feel the burning intensity of her glare. Beside her was Bird Villarreal, Clementine's younger sister. Bird was sobbing, her body shaking, held up by a man Karen didn't recognize.

Karen reached the edge of the crowd.

Isaiah walked past her, his shoes crunching on the gravel path, untouched by the mud. He grabbed Karen by the back of her soaking collar and hauled her forward, forcing her right up to the granite headstone.

Clementine Villarreal. Beloved Daughter, Sister, Mother.

"Apologize," Isaiah hissed in her ear. His hand was a vice on the nape of her neck. "Apologize to her. For the life you took. For the child you killed."

Karen looked up at the stone. Rainwater ran down the engraved letters like tears.

"I didn't..." Karen started, her voice trembling. "I didn't kill her."

Isaiah's fingers tightened. He forced her head down.

"Apologize!"

He slammed her forehead against the base of the monument.

Pain exploded behind her eyes. White light flashed in her vision. She tasted copper in her mouth. Warm blood trickled down her forehead, mixing with the cold rain, blinding her in one eye.

"Murderer!" Bird screamed from the crowd. Her voice was shrill, hysterical. "You killed my sister! You monster!"

Something hit Karen in the face. A white rose. The thorns scratched her cheek. Then another. Then a clod of dirt. The crowd was turning into a mob. Their grief was transforming into violence.

Karen was dizzy. The world was spinning.

Isaiah released her neck to step toward Bird, to comfort the grieving sister. He left Karen kneeling in the mud, bleeding, surrounded by hatred.

She looked up. Through the haze of pain and rain, her eyes locked onto an object sitting on a small table next to the grave.

It was an urn. A beautiful, white ceramic urn painted with delicate gold vines. It held Clementine's ashes, waiting to be interred.

Something inside Karen snapped.

It wasn't a loud snap. It was the quiet sound of a final thread giving way. She had lost her husband. She had lost her freedom. She had lost her dignity. She was bleeding in the mud while the man she loved comforted the sister of the woman who had destroyed her life.

If they wanted a monster, she would give them a monster.

Karen pushed herself up. Her legs were shaking, covered in filth. She wasn't trying to run away. She lunged forward.

"Karen, don't you dare!" Isaiah's voice rang out. He had turned around, seeing her trajectory.

It was too late.

Karen grabbed the urn with both hands. The ceramic was cold and wet. It was heavy. Heavier than a soul should be.

She turned to face them. To face Isaiah, Victoria, Bird, all of them. A smile twisted her bloody lips. It was a broken, jagged thing.

"This is what you wanted," she rasped.

She raised the urn high above her head.

"No!" Isaiah sprinted toward her.

Karen slammed the urn down onto the marble paving stones.

CRACK.

The sound was like a gunshot. The ceramic shattered into a thousand shards. A gray cloud puffed up into the air-bone dust and ash-before the rain instantly caught it, beating it down into a gray sludge that mixed with the mud at her feet.

Silence. Absolute, horrified silence.

Then, chaos.

Isaiah reached her a second too late. His momentum carried him into her. He didn't grab her; he kicked her. It was a reflex of pure, unbridled fury. His boot connected with her stomach.

Karen folded. She hit the wet ground hard, curling into a ball. The air left her lungs.

But she started to laugh.

She lay there in the mud and the ashes of her rival, laughing. It was a guttural, ugly sound that tore at her throat. It was the sound of someone who had nothing left to lose.

Sirens wailed in the distance, getting louder.

Isaiah stood over her, his chest heaving. His face was twisted into a mask of pure loathing. He looked down at the gray sludge washing over his expensive shoes.

"You are going to rot," he spat at her. "I will make sure you never see the sun again. I will make sure you die in a cage."

Police officers swarmed the hill. They grabbed Karen, hauling her up from the mud. They wrenched her arms behind her back.

The cold steel of handcuffs clicked shut around her wrists. It pinched her skin.

Karen didn't struggle. She let her head hang back, the rain washing the blood from her eyes. She looked at Isaiah one last time.

Her eyes were dead. The light was gone.

"Goodbye, Isaiah," she whispered.

They dragged her away, her feet leaving trails in the mud, right through the remains of Clementine Villarreal.

The back of the police cruiser smelled of vomit and pine air freshener. Karen watched through the wire mesh as the cemetery disappeared into the gray distance. She saw Isaiah on his knees in the rain, frantically trying to scoop up the wet gray sludge with his bare hands.

It was pathetic. It was tragic.

"I hope it hurts," she whispered to the glass. "I hope it hurts you every day."

The trial was a blur. A montage of gavels banging and lawyers droning. She pleaded guilty. It was part of the deal. Five years for First Degree Manslaughter. In exchange, the state wouldn't pursue life in prison without the possibility of parole, and Isaiah wouldn't pull the plug on Danny's dialysis.

She didn't look at the jury. She stared at the back of Isaiah's head in the front row. He never turned around. Not once.

Then came the intake.

The Correctional Facility was a world of gray concrete and fluorescent lights that buzzed like trapped flies.

"Strip," the guard barked. She was a large woman with eyes like stones.

Karen stood on the cold tile. The hose turned on. Freezing water blasted her, stinging her skin, washing away the mud and the blood and the last of her identity.

"Open your mouth. Lift your tongue. Squat and cough."

They took her clothes. They took her name. They gave her orange scrubs that scratched her skin and a number.

9275.

They cut her hair. The shears were dull. They hacked at her long chestnut locks, leaving jagged ends that prickled her neck. Karen watched her hair fall to the floor, feeling lighter and emptier with every snip.

The cell door slammed shut. Clang. The sound of a tomb sealing.

FIVE YEARS LATER

Karen woke up with a gasp.

Her hand flew to her stomach. It was flat. Empty.

The panic was a living thing in her chest, a bird beating its wings against her ribs. She sat up, her eyes darting around the room.

It wasn't a cell.

It was a basement. The walls were peeling, painted a sickly shade of yellow that was now stained with damp. The air smelled of mold and the fried onions from the neighbor's apartment upstairs.

She was out. She had been out for three months.

Karen swung her legs over the edge of the narrow mattress. Her left hand throbbed. A phantom pain, sharp and electric, shot up her arm.

She raised her hand. It was covered in a black leather glove. She slept with it on. She showered with it on. She never took it off.

"Mommy?"

The voice was small, sleepy.

Karen turned. On the other side of the room, on a mattress on the floor, a little boy was rubbing his eyes.

Hoke.

He was five years old, but his eyes were ancient. They were dark, intelligent, and terrifyingly familiar. He had Isaiah's jawline. He had Isaiah's intensity.

"Did you have the bad dream again?" Hoke asked. He sat up, his messy dark hair sticking up in tufts.

Karen forced a smile. It was a muscle memory she was relearning. "I'm okay, baby. Just a dream."

Hoke didn't look convinced. He slid off his mattress and walked over to the dresser. He was small for his age, malnourished from a diet of cheap pasta and government cheese, but he moved with a grace that didn't belong in this basement.

He opened a drawer and pulled out a small orange bottle.

"Here," he said, handing it to her.

Karen took the antidepressants. Shame washed over her. Her five-year-old son shouldn't know which pills his mother needed to stop shaking. He shouldn't be the one taking care of her.

"Thank you, Hoke." She swallowed the pill dry.

Hoke climbed onto the bed beside her. He reached out and placed his small hand over her black-gloved one. He didn't ask about the glove. He never did. He just held it, offering a silent comfort that broke her heart.

"I have to go out today," Karen said softly. "I have an interview."

Hoke nodded. "For the drawing job?"

"Yes. For the drawing job."

"You're the best drawer," Hoke said fiercely. "If they don't hire you, they're stupid."

Karen kissed the top of his head. "We need the money, Hoke. For Uncle Danny. And for rent."

Hoke pulled away slightly. His expression shifted. For a second, just a split second, the childish softness vanished, replaced by a cold, calculating look that chilled Karen to the bone.

"I'll help," he said. "When I get big, I'm going to make them pay. Everyone who made us live here."

Karen grabbed his shoulders. "Hoke, no. Don't talk like that."

Hoke blinked, and the look was gone. He smiled, an innocent, gap-toothed grin. "I just mean I'll get a job too, Mommy. Maybe walking dogs."

Karen pulled him into a hug, burying her face in his neck. She was terrified. Not of the world, but of the seed of hatred she could see growing in her son. A seed planted by a father he didn't know he had.