“You wouldn’t—”

I hung up. Texts from Diane started flooding in, desperate and vile, calling me a greedy barren succubus. I didn’t block her. I read every word. With each insult, the ache in my chest hardened into armor.

I didn’t sleep. I turned the dining table into a war room — bank statements, mortgage deeds, car titles, and a careful timeline of Michael’s visits to the South Tower.

By the time the Chicago skyline bled into a bruised dawn, I wasn’t a weeping wife anymore.

At 8:50 I was in the glass conference room of my attorney, Jessica, in a charcoal pantsuit, hair pulled into a severe chignon. She read through my files, her eyebrows climbing with every page.

“This is a slaughter, Sarah,” she said, tapping the financial breakdown. “He doesn’t have a leg to stand on.”