The Wife's Reckoning
He said it as though the title were a blank check, as though twenty years of marriage had entitled him to my signature, my clinical earnings, my son's future, and the equity of the roof over our heads.
I walked over to the kitchen sink, gripping the edge of the granite counter so hard my knuckles turned white. The affair wasn't separate from the financial fraud. They were the exact same symptom. This hadn't been a grand, tragic romance that spun out of control; it was a calculated embezzlement, and the romance was just the aesthetic he used to make himself feel better about it. It was a heist with a love story stapled to the front cover.
Behind me, Marcus's voice softened, returning to that