Chapter 2 - The Second Page
My breath hitched in my throat as my eyes scanned the opening line of that second page. It was a secret, carefully buried for five years, revealing that Evelyn had quietly inherited a multi-million-dollar coastal estate from her estranged grandfather a month before we met—a fortune she had kept entirely hidden because she wanted to be loved for who she was, not what she owned. Below that shocking revelation, she wrote that she had already contacted her family’s elite legal counsel to file for sole custody and immediate asset separation. The room seemed to tilt on its axis. My mother strolled into the kitchen, wiping crumbs from her lips, looking around with a smug, self-satisfied smirk. "Well, Daniel, that went splendidly. Nelson practically promised you the vice presidency. See? Mother always knows best." I spun around, the rage inside me boiling over so intensely that my vision blurred at the edges. "She's gone, Mother," I whispered, my voice shaking with a terrifying, hollow tremor. Linda paused, waving a dismissive hand in the air. "Oh, stop being dramatic. Evelyn threw a little kitchen tantrum? She'll be back by morning. Women like that have nowhere else to go; she’s entirely dependent on you." I slammed my fist against the marble countertop so hard the wedding ring jumped. "She didn't just walk out, Mother! She took Lucas, and she’s left me! And she’s not who you think she is—she never was!" Linda blinked, her haughty expression faltering for a fraction of a second before she recovered her icy composure. "Nonsense. Clean up this mess, sleep it off, and call her tomorrow. A good husband knows how to discipline a rebellious wife." She turned and clicked her heels toward the hallway, entirely oblivious to the fact that my entire world had just detonated. I looked back down at the note, reading the final lines over and over until the words blurred into meaningless ink. You wanted a wife who looked like hired help, Daniel. Now you can live in the empty house you built. Panic seized my chest, cold and suffocating. I grabbed my car keys, sprinting out the front door into the chilly night air, desperate to chase after a ghost who had already slipped through my fingers.
