But I was not allowed to fall into it, because I was not alone, and the presence of my son changed the entire equation of my survival.

Brandon’s betrayal had taken away my reason to fight for myself.

But it could not touch my reason to fight for my child, because that reason did not depend on Brandon, or on the marriage, or on anything he had the power to destroy.

It existed entirely outside his reach.

And so, in trying to kill me, my husband had inadvertently left intact the one motive strong enough to keep me alive — because a man who murders a mother has still failed to murder her motherhood, and her motherhood, it turns out, is stronger than the cliff, stronger than the cold, and considerably stronger than him.

Chapter 3 — For Fifty Million Dollars