Chapter 6: Moving Out

GRACE'S POV

The apartment felt different now that I knew I was leaving. Like walking through a museum of someone else's life, a carefully curated exhibit of the woman I'd pretended to be for three years. I stood in the master bedroom doorway with empty boxes stacked beside me and tried to figure out where to start. The closet seemed logical—clothes were mine, clearly mine, even if Carter had opinions about what I wore. But my feet wouldn't move. I just kept staring at the bed we'd shared, the nightstand where I'd kept a stack of design magazines I never had time to read, the window seat where I used to sit and sketch before I'd convinced myself that being Carter's wife was enough of a career.

Naomi had wanted to come help but I'd told her I needed to do this alone. Now I was regretting that decision because the silence was oppressive, made room for thoughts I'd been successfully avoiding since I signed those papers two days ago. I'd been so sure in David's office, so cold and certain. But here, surrounded by the debris of my marriage, I felt something cracking open inside my chest.

I grabbed the first box and headed for the closet before I could change my mind. My clothes took up maybe a third of the space—Carter had always needed more room for his suits, his shirts organized by color and occasion like he was running a boutique instead of just getting dressed in the morning. I pulled dresses off hangers without looking at them too closely, not wanting to remember where I'd worn them or who I'd been trying to impress. There was the red one from our first anniversary dinner, the black one from Marcus's holiday party, the green one Carter had bought me for his mother's birthday because he said it made me look elegant. I shoved them all into the box, designer labels and dry cleaning tags and memories I didn't want anymore.

The shoes were easier. I'd always hated most of them—too high, too impractical, too obviously expensive in that way that screamed "look at what my husband can afford." I packed them anyway because ten million dollars was a lot of money but it wouldn't last forever and designer heels held their resale value. Practical Grace, already thinking about the future. Already calculating how to survive.

I found the receipt in the pocket of one of Carter's tuxedo jackets. I wasn't snooping, not really. I'd just been moving his clothes to one side to get to mine and the jacket was heavy, had something weighing down the pocket. The paper was old, faded, dated three years and two months ago. A receipt from some place called The Hastings Club for a private event. Dinner for twelve, open bar, cigar service. Total came to forty-eight thousand dollars before tip. I stared at the number, trying to process what kind of dinner cost that much, and then I saw the handwritten note at the bottom: "Initiation complete. Welcome to the club, CV."

CV. Carter Vaughn. This was from right before we got engaged, maybe two weeks before he'd proposed at that restaurant where he'd somehow arranged for them to put my grandmother's ring in the champagne flute. I'd been so charmed, so convinced he'd put thought into it. Now I wondered if the ring was even real or if that had been another performance, another prop in whatever game he'd been playing.

I should've left it there. Should've put the receipt back and finished packing. But something about that handwritten note made my skin crawl. Initiation complete. Like he'd joined a fraternity instead of—what? What was this club? And why had the receipt been important enough to keep for three years, hidden in a tuxedo he barely wore?

My phone was in my hand before I'd consciously decided to call Naomi. She picked up on the second ring. "Please tell me you're not backing out of signing those papers."

"I already signed them. The money hits my account tomorrow." I sat down on the bed, stared at the receipt. "I found something. A receipt from three years ago, right before Carter proposed. Some place called The Hastings Club. Do you know it?"

"The Hastings?" Naomi's voice went sharp. "Grace, that's not a club you just join. That's old money, private membership, probably a five-year waiting list minimum. What was Carter doing there?"

"Having a forty-eight-thousand-dollar dinner, apparently. And there's a note about initiation. Naomi, what if this is connected to the bet? What if this is where it happened?"

"Hold on." I heard typing, Naomi pulling up something on her computer. "Okay, looking at their website now. Very discreet, very exclusive. They do private events, corporate retreats, that kind of thing. But Grace, if this is where the bet was made, if there's any kind of documentation—"

"I know. The NDA." I crumpled the receipt in my fist, then smoothed it out again because I couldn't afford to damage potential evidence. "But the NDA says I can't make public statements about Carter. It doesn't say I can't investigate. It doesn't say I can't collect information."

"Technically true. But if he finds out you're digging into this, if he thinks you're planning to violate the agreement, he could argue breach of contract and withhold the money." Naomi paused. "Is this worth risking ten million dollars?"

I thought about Carter's face in that hallway, the way he'd looked relieved when I signed. The way he'd already dismissed me, already moved on to whatever came next. "What if I wait? What if I take the money first, let it clear, and then I start asking questions?"

"The NDA doesn't have a time limit. If you violate it at any point, you forfeit the money and owe penalties." But Naomi's voice had that tone she got when she was thinking, strategizing. "Unless we can prove the contract was signed under duress or false pretenses. If you can demonstrate that Carter hid material information about the nature of your marriage, that changes things."

"The bet."

"The bet." She said it with satisfaction. "If we can prove he married you as part of a wager, if we can show that the entire marriage was fraudulent from the start, then the NDA probably won't hold up. You'd be exposing a crime, not just airing dirty laundry."

"So I need to find proof. Real proof, not just Stella's vague memories and a receipt from a dinner party." I stood up, started pacing. "How do I do that?"

"Carefully. Very carefully. And Grace, you can't tell anyone what you're doing. Not your mom, not friends, no one. If Carter gets wind that you're investigating, he'll shut it down before you get anywhere." Naomi's voice softened. "Are you sure you want to do this? You could take the money and walk away. Start over somewhere new. You don't owe the world the truth about Carter Vaughn."

But I did. I owed it to myself. I owed it to Stella and all the other women he'd used. I owed it to whoever might marry him next, whoever might believe his lies and waste years of their life thinking they mattered to him. "I'm sure."

"Okay. Then here's what we're going to do. You take that receipt to a private investigator I know. Someone discreet who specializes in this kind of thing. You tell them what you're looking for and you let them handle it. No breaking into Carter's office, no confronting his friends, nothing that could blow back on you." She paused. "And Grace? Once the money clears tomorrow, transfer it immediately into an account he doesn't know about. Offshore if possible. Because if this goes sideways, he's going to come after it."

I wrote down the investigator's name and number, then tucked the receipt carefully into my wallet. Back to packing. I worked mechanically for the next few hours, filling boxes with clothes and books and the few personal items I'd accumulated. Most of the apartment belonged to Carter—his furniture, his art, his vision of what a successful man's home should look like. I'd just been a decorative element, another carefully chosen piece that fit his aesthetic.

The photos were hardest. There were dozens of them scattered through the apartment. Our wedding, vacations, charity galas. I looked happy in all of them. Genuinely happy, glowing with what I'd thought was love. How had I been so stupid? How had I not seen that Carter's smile never reached his eyes in these pictures, that his hand on my waist always looked possessive instead of affectionate? I'd been so busy performing happiness that I'd never stopped to check if it was real.

I found our wedding album in the bottom drawer of the media console, the expensive leather-bound one his mother had insisted we needed. I flipped through it slowly, studying each carefully composed shot. There was Carter looking handsome in his tuxedo, me in my dress that had cost more than a car, both of us promising forever to each other in front of two hundred witnesses. I looked for signs that he was lying, that this was all part of some elaborate bet. But his face gave nothing away. He looked like any other groom—happy, proud, maybe a little nervous.

Then I saw it. A candid shot the photographer had caught during the reception. Carter talking to Marcus near the bar, both of them laughing, Marcus's hand raised like he was making a toast. Carter's expression in that split second was different from every other photo. Triumphant. Like he'd just won something. And Marcus was looking at him with this knowing smirk, this boys-club camaraderie that made my stomach turn.

I ripped the photo out of the album and added it to my evidence collection. The receipt, the photo, the timeline I'd built of Carter's infidelities. It wasn't much. Probably wasn't enough. But it was a start.

My phone buzzed with a text from the bank. The wire transfer had cleared. Ten million dollars, minus Naomi's fees and taxes, sitting in my personal account. More money than I'd ever seen in my life. Blood money, I thought. Conscience money. The price of my silence and my dignity.

I transferred it immediately, exactly like Naomi had instructed, to an account at a Swiss bank she'd helped me set up. Untraceable, unreachable, safe from whatever Carter might try if this went bad. Then I went back to packing.

The sun was setting by the time I filled the last box. I'd managed to reduce three years of marriage to twelve cardboard boxes and three suitcases. Everything else—the furniture, the kitchen supplies, the wedding gifts from people whose names I couldn't remember—I was leaving behind. It had never been mine anyway. I'd just been borrowing Carter's life for a while, playing dress-up in his world.

I walked through the apartment one last time, saying goodbye to the woman who'd lived here. The one who'd believed in love and partnership and building something real. She was gone now, replaced by someone harder, someone who understood that marriage could be a transaction, that trust was a luxury, that sometimes the person you loved most was the person who hurt you worst.

In the kitchen, I found one of Carter's old college t-shirts balled up in the back of the pantry, probably shoved there by the housekeeper after it came back from the laundry. I held it for a second, remembered how I used to wear his shirts on lazy Sunday mornings, how big they felt on me, how safe. Then I threw it in the trash and walked out.

Naomi was waiting outside with her car, engine running. She hopped out to help me load boxes, took one look at my face and pulled me into a hug. "You okay?"

"No. But I will be." I pulled back, wiped my eyes even though I wasn't crying. Refused to cry over Carter Vaughn anymore. "Did you get me that appointment?"

"Tomorrow, ten AM. The investigator's office in Chelsea." She slammed the trunk closed. "Grace, once you start this, there's no going back. You're sure?"

I looked up at the building where I'd lived for three years, at the lights in the penthouse that Carter would come home to tonight. He probably wouldn't even notice I was gone at first. Would probably just be relieved that the drama was over, that he could go back to his life without the inconvenience of a wife who'd discovered his secrets.

"I'm sure." I got in the car, buckled my seatbelt. "Let's go ruin his life the way he ruined mine."

Naomi grinned, sharp and satisfied. "That's my girl."

We drove away from Tribeca, away from Carter's world of penthouses and private clubs and men who thought money made them invincible. I had the receipt in my wallet, the photo in my purse, and ten million dollars in an account Carter didn't know existed.

He'd told me I'd regret fighting him. Had threatened me with lawyers and consequences and the power imbalance he thought would keep me silent.

But Carter had made one critical mistake. He'd underestimated me. Had spent three years treating me like an accessory, like someone whose only value was decorative. He'd never bothered to learn what I was capable of when I stopped trying to please him.

Now he was going to find out.