Chapter 2

I didn’t go home after leaving the hotel.

Ethan called four times. On the fifth, I silenced my phone and texted my sister.

Can I stay with you tonight?

Rachel answered almost immediately.

Same address. Come over.

I got into my car but didn’t start it. Music from the ballroom still reached the parking lot.

Three months earlier, I’d sat alone in this same car after Lucy’s spring concert. She’d marked her first solo on our family calendar two weeks earlier.

Ethan had promised to be there.

Eighteen minutes before the concert, he texted that an emergency at one of the company’s hotels had stranded him out of town.

I believed him. For eight years, whenever Ethan mentioned work, I made excuses for him.

Lucy scanned the audience once before she performed.

Afterward, she only asked, “Did Dad see the video I sent him?”

I told her he would watch it when he had time.

Ethan didn’t come home until eleven. He didn’t look tired from traveling, but his phone kept lighting up.

While he was in the shower, a message appeared.

Sloane: Thank you for staying tonight. I don’t know how I would’ve faced Mark without you.

I didn’t search his phone. That message was enough.

When Ethan came out, I asked what had happened at the hotel. First, he blamed a staffing problem. Then he claimed an emergency meeting had run late.

He stopped lying only after I read Sloane’s message aloud.

“Sloane received her divorce papers today,” he said, irritated rather than sorry. “She fell apart. I couldn’t leave her alone.”

“So you lied to me?”

“I didn’t want you jumping to conclusions.”

“Lucy waited for you all night.”

“She had you. Sloane had no one.”

He said it as if that settled everything.

Lucy had me, so he could miss her concert. I was capable, so he didn’t have to keep his promises. Sloane needed him, so I was supposed to understand.

I contacted Naomi the next day. That was when she’d prepared the divorce papers.

Ethan cried when he saw them.

He admitted lying, promised to stop handling Sloane’s problems alone, and said he would apologize to Lucy. He even suggested marriage counseling.

I stopped the divorce.

We attended two sessions. Ethan canceled the third because something came up at the foundation. He never rescheduled, and neither did I.

Now I understood that he hadn’t seen my decision to stay as his last chance.

He had seen a pattern.

I would get angry. I would draw a line. Then I would stay for Lucy, my job, or the family.

My phone lit up again. This time it was Naomi.

“Are you somewhere safe?” she asked.

“Yes. I’m going to Rachel’s.”

“Good. Ethan’s signature doesn’t end the marriage by itself. We still have to file, and he’ll have time to respond.”

“I understand.”

“I need to ask once more. If we move forward tomorrow, this can’t be another attempt to make him take you seriously.”

I looked toward the hotel entrance. Guests were already leaving and checking their phones. Tonight’s story was spreading.

“I wasn’t trying to scare him the first time.”

Naomi paused. “I’ll call you at eight.”

I started the car.

Ethan stopped calling and began texting.

You embarrassed everyone.

Come home. We can fix this before Lucy finds out.

Lucy was staying with Helen tonight. Ethan knew she wouldn’t see us before morning, yet he was already using our daughter to pull me home.

I didn’t reply.

Forty minutes later, Rachel let me into her apartment. She took one look at me and prepared the guest room without asking questions.

“Tell me when you’re ready.”

I’d barely set down my phone when the lobby intercom rang.

Rachel checked the screen, then turned to me.

“It’s Ethan,” she said. “And he’s not alone.”