Chapter 3 The Plan to Abandon Me

That weekend, Derrick's mother, Lora, invited us over for dinner. She said the financing deal was almost final, and the family should celebrate the good news early.

When I arrived, Natasha was already seated to Derrick's right.

Lora put a piece of fish on her plate and praised, "Natasha really is capable since she is a young woman willing to go with Derrick to meet investors and drink whenever she has to. That's impressive."

Then, she turned to me. "You are great too, Lydia. You know how to run a household. A woman should hold down the fort at home."

Natasha smiled and spoke up for me. "Lydia has contributed a lot to the company, too. With the household so well taken care of, Derrick can focus on work without worrying about a thing."

Derrick served me a bowl of soup and said, "My mother speaks bluntly. Don't take it personally."

…

Halfway through dinner, he picked up the guarantee agreement from the chair beside him and said, "We need to finalize this tomorrow."

I didn't accept it.

Lora immediately asked, "You still haven't signed it?"

"No."

"Why not?"

"Because the company isn't mine."

In that split second, everyone stopped eating.

Her expression darkened as she demanded, "What are you getting at? Are you really going to split everything down the middle between husband and wife?"

"Do we split things when it's time to make money?"

She fell silent.

"Natasha owns 35% of the company. Why isn't that considered marital property?"

Lora immediately retorted, "She earned those shares with her own abilities!"

I turned to Derrick, but he didn't say a word in my defense.

Natasha hurried to smooth things over. "If Lydia is concerned about it, I could pledge some of my shares as additional security."

However, he swiftly shot the idea down. "Your equity is already tied up in the financing arrangements. You can't touch it."

That riled Lora even more. "Look at Natasha! She's even willing to put up her shares. You only have one little apartment. What's wrong with using that as collateral?"

I opened the supplementary guarantee document.

The collateral address had already been filled in. It was my premarital apartment, which was less than 70 square meters.

I had paid the down payment out of my own savings in my third year of joining the workforce. Derrick had once suggested selling it when the company was struggling to stay afloat.

Later, he changed his mind and told me, "It's good to keep it. If we ever fight, at least you'll have somewhere to go."

Now, he had listed that very apartment in the guarantee agreement.

"Who filled this in?"

I pushed the page toward him.

Derrick replied, "It's just a backup arrangement."

"Did I agree to this?"

"Once the financing comes through, we can release it in a few months."

"Then, why not use Natasha's property?"

The dinner table went quiet again.

Natasha set down her glass and said, "My apartment was given to me by my parents."

Lora snapped, "Her parents gave that property to their daughter. How can you even think of taking it from her?"

I pulled out my own collateral page and asked, "Then, why is mine fair game?"

Lora slammed her palm on the table and barked, "Lydia, why are you being so unreasonable?"

Derrick's expression darkened, too. "Nobody is taking your apartment. I promise the company will be fine."

"How much is your promise worth?"

"You—"

Before he could say anything, I put the entire agreement into my bag and said, "If you want me to sign, fine."

When Derrick heard this, his voice immediately softened. "You should have said that earlier."

"Give me the complete financing documents."

His hand stopped halfway as he held his glass.

"What do you need those for?"

"I'll be taking responsibility for 5 million dollars worth of debt. I want to review the risk disclosures, the related entities, and the asset arrangements."

"Those are confidential company documents."

"Then, I have even less reason to sign the papers."

Natasha let out a chuckle and chimed in, "You don't understand any of these things, Lydia. You might not make sense of those pages even if we give a hundred copies of them."

"Whether I understand them is my business. Whether I sign is my decision, too."

Nobody finished dinner that night.

…

The next morning, the legal department emailed me the complete financing documents. There were more than 400 pages, but I didn't start at page one.

During the liquidation in my previous life, I had only caught a glimpse of one term—risk isolation.

I typed those two words into the search bar, and an attachment came up immediately.

"Risk Isolation and Core Asset Transfer Plan."

It included profitable stores, key distribution channels, important clients, and the brand team. If the financing situation deteriorated, all the valuable assets would be moved in advance to a new company.

Lo and behold, the new company was the same one named in the email I'd found—Farrel Food Inc.

Natasha was listed first among the actual controlling shareholders.

I kept reading.

The old company would be kept with bank loans, supplier debts, employee compensation obligations, and financing guarantees. The legal representative was my name.

This wasn't some rough draft. After all, the document included partial implementation records, and several major clients had already been contacted.

I opened the file properties.

This document was created on September 17, 9:46 p.m.

I didn't need to think about what happened on that day since September 17 was our wedding anniversary.

I opened our old chat history.

At 9:49 p.m., I had messaged Derrick, "The food has gone cold again. I've asked them to heat it up."

At 9:52 p.m., he replied, "I'm in a meeting. Stop rushing me."

He didn't come home until 1 a.m. When he got home, he brought a bouquet of leftover roses from a convenience store; the wrapping paper was already crumpled.

He said the company had called an emergency meeting and he was too tired to talk. I went into the kitchen and reheated some noodles for him.

Half the roses wilted by the next day. I even trimmed the damaged edges and changed the water.

Now, I finally understood.

At 9:46 p.m., he was in a meeting discussing how to move all the company's valuable assets out if things went wrong. Yet, I had foolishly asked him at 9:49 p.m. whether he wanted his dinner reheated.