“Fine,” I whispered to the dial tone.

Elena stepped closer and gently squeezed my uninjured hand. Her eyes were full of a pity I despised. “Sweetheart, is there anyone else we can call?”

“Yes,” I said, my voice losing its tremor, hardening into steel. “My attorney.”

They all operated under the same fatal delusion. My parents, Adrian’s business partners, Adrian himself—they all thought I was a timid, obedient bookkeeper who managed the household utility bills while Adrian built his vaunted consulting firm.

What none of them understood, what Adrian’s arrogance had blinded him to, was that I was the architect of his empire. I had designed the financial controls beneath his company.

I had negotiated every credit line that kept the operation afloat. And I had retained a thirty-eight percent controlling stake through the original incorporation documents—documents Adrian had happily signed six years ago without ever reading the fine print.