Until then, she had believed every argument would be decided by who could shout the loudest.

I no longer intended to compete on those terms.

PART 7

The secret I had kept from Gavin was not a hidden fortune or an unknown inheritance.

It was a separate checking account opened in my own name eight months earlier, after I discovered he had begun borrowing from our emergency fund without mentioning it.

I had deposited small amounts from freelance bookkeeping projects.

Some months it was seventy dollars.