Divorce Me

THEA’s POV

“Tell him,” I said.

I walked toward the dressing room.

The walk-in closet was the size of a small house, filled with rows of suits in muted grays and navy blues, colors Elias liked. I used to dress like a shadow so I wouldn’t offend him.

I found a pair of scissors on the mahogany island.

Maya hovered in the doorway, trembling with rage.

With a sudden, violent movement, I grabbed the front of the slate-gray silk robe I was wearing, the one Elias had bought me because it made me look “meek” and sliced a jagged line right through the middle.

Maya gasped, her hand flying to her mouth.

I didn’t stop.

I went to the mirror and looked at my hair. It was long, styled in soft waves that fell over my eyes, making me look shy and submissive.

With three quick, brutal snips, the hair fell to the floor in clumps.

Jagged.

Uneven.

Alive.

Now, my eyes were sharp, exposed, and full of a dark, vengeful light.

I finally looked like someone who was alive.

“Get out of my room, Maya,” I said, my voice dropping to a dangerous, low hum.

She didn’t wait.

She scrambled out the door, her heels clicking frantically down the long hallway.

I didn’t have a friendship to lean on, my parents had made sure of that, isolating me so I only had them. I didn’t have a confidant.

All I had now was the memory of a needle.

And the cold eyes of my husband.

I walked out of the bedroom, my bare feet silent on the cold stone. The Vane Mansion was a large masterpiece of old money and secrets.

I headed straight for the West Wing.

The air grew colder.

The scent of expensive tobacco grew stronger.

The study doors were twelve feet of solid oak.

I didn’t knock.

I pushed them open with a thud that echoed through the silent hallway.

Elias was there.

My husband.

The man who had treated me like a ghost for a thousand days.

He was hunched over a tablet and laptop, wearing a black dress shirt with the sleeves rolled up. He didn’t look up.

“I told the staff I wasn’t to be disturbed, Thea,” he said, his voice a low, bored rumble. “Go back to your room. I have a merger to attend to at ten.”

In the past, I would have apologized.

I would have asked if he wanted tea.

Instead, I walked right up to his desk and slammed a single white envelope onto his tablet and keyboard.

“Sign it,” I said.

Elias finally looked up.

His eyes were a piercing, freezing blue, cold and merciless. They flicked over my hacked off hair, the jagged silk of my robe, and finally the envelope.

“What is this?” he asked, dangerously quiet. “Another request for a vacation? A bigger allowance?”

“Divorce papers,” I said, leaning over the desk so he had no choice but to see the fire in my eyes. “I want the house in the Hamptons, the city penthouse, and five percent of Vane Holdings as a ‘silence f*e’ for the things I’ve seen in this marriage. I’m done being your ghost, Elias. Sign it, and you’ll never have to look at me again.”

For the first time in my life, I saw Elias Vane lose his composure.

He didn’t look relieved.

He didn’t look amused.

He looked… dangerous.

“Divorce?” He repeated the word like it was a curse.

He stood up, a head taller than me intimidating as his jaw ticked. He walked around the desk slowly, fluid and predatory.

“You think you can just walk in here and end this?” He scoffed.

“I think I just did.”

His hand moved so fast I couldn’t dodge.

He grabbed the divorce papers and, without breaking eye contact, shredded them. The thick papers being torn into a thousand pieces. He let the scraps flutter down to the ground.

Then he stepped into me.

He slammed his hand against the heavy oak door behind me, pinning me in the narrow space between the wood and his body. His other hand gripped my chin, forcing my head up.

I braced for a blow.

But his fingers only tightened.

His eyes weren’t cold anymore.

They were burning with a dark, obsessive hunger I had never seen in three years of marriage.

“You’ve spent years begging me to look at you, Thea,” he growled, his thumb brushing over my lower lip with pressure that was almost painful. “You spent years crying in the next room because I wouldn’t touch you.”

His grip on my waist tightened, almost bruising.

“Now that I’ve finally decided to give you exactly what you wanted,” he whispered, leaning down until his breath ghosted over my lips, his teeth grazing the shell of my ear, “you think I’m going to let you leave?”

“You aren’t going anywhere,” he said. “Over my dead body.”

In my last life, I would have been shaking.

If Elias had ever pinned me like this before I died, I would have thought my heart was going to explode with joy. I would have mistaken his grip for affection and his gaze for love.

I spent three years being a "good wife", I memorized his favorite vintage of wine, I kept the house silent when he had a headache, and I never, ever raised my voice.

Back then, if he had looked at me this way, I would have melted.

But as Elias pressed his body against mine, his hand heavy on my waist, I felt nothing but a cold, hard knot in my stomach. I remembered the way he looked at his watch while I was dying. That memory was enough that no amount of his "new" obsession could break.

"Let go, Elias," I said. My voice didn't tremble.

In the past, I couldn't even look him in the eye for more than three seconds without blushing. Now, I stared at him until he was the one who looked surprised.

"What did you do to your hair?" he asked, his voice a low growl. He reached up, his fingers brushing the jagged edges I’d cut with the scissors. "And this robe... you look like you’ve been in a fight."

"I have," I snapped. "With myself. And I won."

I tried to shove him back, but he was like a wall of solid muscle. This was the man who spent fourteen hours a day at Vane Holdings, a shark who devoured companies for breakfast. He wasn't used to people saying 'no' to him, especially not the 'trophy wife' he usually ignored.

In my last life, I had been the perfect "Vane Spouse." I wore soft colors, I spoke in whispers, and I let the maids who were all on my mother’s payroll, report my every move. The head housekeeper, Mrs. Gable, used to tell me every morning how "disappointed" Elias was in my lack of social standing. She did it to keep me insecure. To keep me running back to my parents for advice.

Suddenly, a loud, frantic banging echoed against the heavy oak doors of the study.

"Thea! Open this door right now!" My father’s voice boomed from the hallway. "Maya told us what you did! Have you lost your mind? That money belongs to the family!".

TBC