Chapter 2

The next day, Andrew came home just after noon, a walking cliché of guilt. He held a ridiculously large bouquet of roses and a small, velvet box from a high-end jeweler.

"Honey, I am so, so sorry about last night," he began, his voice dripping with practiced sincerity. "A sudden donor crisis blew up. I was on the phone all night. I feel terrible."

He leaned in to kiss me, but the scent hit me first. It wasn't the musky, expensive fragrance he wore. It was a sweet, cheap floral perfume. Madisyn' s perfume. It clung to the lapels of his suit like a stain.

The smell, combined with his hypocrisy, made my stomach churn violently. I turned and ran to the bathroom, barely making it to the toilet before I threw up.

I heard his footsteps behind me. When I looked up, wiping my mouth, his eyes were lit with a strange, eager hope.

"Jen? Are you… are you pregnant?"

The question was so absurd, so grotesquely optimistic, that I almost laughed. He thought a baby, a male heir for the Scott political dynasty his mother was so obsessed with, would solve everything.

"No, Andrew," I said, my voice flat. "I' m not pregnant."

I stood up and faced him. "Where were you last night?"

He didn' t even flinch. He was a professional liar. "I told you, a donor crisis. Call my chief of staff, he' ll tell you. We were all on a conference call until 3 a.m."

As if on cue, his phone, which he' d left on the dresser, buzzed. Then it buzzed again, and again, the screen lighting up with a string of texts. I could see the name even from the bathroom door: Madisyn.

He glanced at the phone, then back at me, a flicker of panic in his eyes. "Urgent city matter," he said quickly, grabbing the device. He saw the look of what he must have mistaken for weary resignation on my face.

"Look, I' ll make it up to you," he said, his voice softening into the one he used on donors and voters. "I' ll book that trip to Napa Valley we' ve been talking about. A whole week, just the two of us. How does that sound?"

He thought he had won. He thought a trip and some jewelry could erase his betrayal.

I just nodded, too numb to argue.

He smiled, relieved. "Great. I just have to handle this… city thing. I' ll be back in a bit."

He gave me a quick, sterile kiss on the cheek and hurried out of the room, already typing a reply on his phone.

The moment the front door clicked shut, the dam broke. Tears I didn' t even know I was holding back streamed down my face. Not tears of sadness, but of a profound, heartbreaking clarity.

I walked over to my laptop, sat down at the desk where I used to help him draft speeches, and opened a blank document.

My fingers, trained by years as a paralegal, flew across the keyboard.

I typed: PETITION FOR DISSOLUTION OF MARRIAGE.