Chapter 1

Mara’s POV

At the same time, a message from Soren appeared on my phone.

[Your father will be transferred first thing tomorrow.]

A second message followed.

[We can still fix this, Mara. Stop fighting me, stop going after Celeste, and I can forget everything that happened.]

I stared at the screen until the words blurred.

Across from me, the funeral director slid a form toward me.

“What name would you like on the urn?”

My fingers tightened around the pen.

Gideon Voss.

He glanced at the death certificate.

“Should we notify your husband? He’s listed as the next of kin.”

“No.” I slipped my wedding ring off my finger. “He won’t be my husband for much longer.”

My phone rang.

It was Soren’s assistant.

“Mrs. Calloway, I’m calling about your father. Mr. Calloway arranged a transfer to St. Vincent’s. The ambulance will be there at nine tomorrow morning.”

I looked down at the death certificate again.

2:17 A.M.

It was a whole night too late.

“Cancel it.”

There was a brief silence.

“Mrs. Calloway, St. Vincent’s has one of the best private surgical teams in the state. Mr. Calloway went through considerable trouble to secure the bed.”

His assistant lowered his voice.

“Mr. Calloway believes this situation can still be resolved.”

I almost laughed.

“How?”

“Celeste is willing to let the matter go if you publicly apologize for what happened at the hospital.”

My hand curled around the edge of the table.

Yesterday, I stood in front of Celeste and begged her to help me. I’d swallowed my pride, I’d promised to divorce Soren and disappear from their lives.

She’d simply buried her face against Soren’s chest and whispered that seeing me made her afraid.

Soren hadn’t even looked at me before ordering his men to remove me from the hospital.

Now he wanted an apology.

“Tell Soren I’ll have the divorce papers sent to him.”

His assistant sighed.

“Mrs. Calloway, Mr. Calloway doesn’t think you mean that.”

I closed my eyes.

Of course he didn’t.

For years, every fight between us had ended the same way. I’d explode, he’d wait for me to calm down, and eventually I’d return.

This time, there was nothing left in me to fight for.

“I mean it.”

I ended the call.

The funeral director handed me the cremation authorization.

I signed.

Then I walked to the nearest pawnshop and sold my wedding ring.

Soren had given it to me on our third anniversary.

That night, he’d left me waiting alone at a restaurant for three hours because Celeste had gotten drunk.

When he finally arrived, he’d tossed the ring across the table.

“Stop making everything a war, Mara.”

I had kept it anyway.

It sold for $120,000.

My father’s funeral expenses, morgue fees, and outstanding hospital bills came to $117,000.

Three thousand dollars.

That was all I had left.

When I returned to the hospital for my father’s belongings, a nurse handed me a small cloth bag.

His glasses, his keys, and his old silver watch.

“Your father kept asking about you,” she said quietly. “Before surgery, he kept asking whether Mr. Calloway had arrived.”

She hesitated.

“Later, he heard you begging the hospital staff in the hallway.”

My throat tightened.

The nurse pulled a folded piece of paper from the bag.

“He couldn’t write himself anymore. He asked me to put this down for him.”

I unfolded it.

[Mara, don’t lose yourself again for Dad’s sake.]

My phone buzzed.

It was a message from Celeste.

A photograph filled the screen.

She was standing beneath a canopy of lights, Soren behind her, one arm around her shoulders.

Another message appeared.

[Mara, Soren said he’ll transfer your father tomorrow. Please don’t be angry anymore.]

Then another.

[He hates seeing you like this. You don’t look like yourself anymore.]

After reading the messages, I blocked both of them.

That afternoon, I asked a lawyer to draft a divorce agreement.

“How should the assets be divided?”

“I don’t want the house, the shares, or the cars.”

“Then what do you want?”

I looked at the old key my father had left behind.

It belonged to the Voss property on the southern edge of the city.

My father had lived there for more than twenty years.

Soren had once promised he’d turn it into a home for us after we married.

Last month, Celeste had seen the property and decided she wanted it for an art gallery.

“I want the Voss property.” I paused. “And everything my father kept in the Calloway family vault.”

The lawyer nodded. “Anything else?”

I looked at him.

“The divorce.”