Stanle

e title, the jewels, the social standing. She didn' t want the quarterly board meetings, the charity event planning, or the endle

Now she

andfather had set up for me, untouchable by my mother or the Stanley corporate machi

ar that wouldn' t attract a second glance. Then I drov

from home. The room smelled of stale cigarettes and pine-scented cleaner. It was ding

jarring, but it was a lullaby of escape. Just as I was about to drift off, I heard voices from the room next door, thin through the w

d it away. I wasn' t running toward love; I was running away

uses, of libraries filled with the scent of

pent the day buying secondhand furniture and basic necessities. As I unpacked a box of

guing. Their voices were

home! I made dinner

rk, babe, I couldn' t hel

versation I' d ever had with Jace. Their anger was born of expectation, of a shared life hitting a rough patch. My relations

t the noise. I didn't need thei

es at the local university, starting the MBA program I' d deferred for Jace. The w

s loaded with textbooks. As I rounded the corner to my street, I saw a sleek, bla

g entirely out of place in my

the car and strode towards me, his expensive

, furious. "What the hell d

elt immense. I clutched them tighter, a pathe

class," I sai

nd. "You think this is a game? You ran away.

tinue towards my apartment building. "I gave you what you always

"Don' t be an idiot. You know that contract was

t they only fueled my disgust. A mistake. He h

I had seen the announcement online, a carefully curated photo of him and a glowing Cassidy, her hand re

It doesn' t matter. We can fix this. We' ll get an annulment. Cassidy w

loved, or the powerful man he had become, but as a weak, entitled child who thought he could rearrang

response. I could feel his eyes on my back,

after me. "You can' t survive without me!

t it slam shut behind me, the sound a final, definitive period on the last chapter of my old life. The confrontation left me s

s res