Chapter 3 Looks Like Someone's In For A Rough Time

"You can finally see Evan for what he is, Rylee!" Jessica couldn't hide how pleased she was.

The light faded from Rylee's eyes.

She had finally seen Evan's true colors, but her daughter had paid for it with her life. Nothing could make that price bearable.

Rylee felt strong enough the following day to sort through the bills she'd covered for the Marshalls throughout her marriage.

She had been put in charge of running the house, yet her mother-in-law had kept every bit of the family's money for herself. Not a dollar of it ever went toward the household's expenses.

Keeping up appearances mattered to Kathleen, who regularly threw expensive parties for her wealthy friends. Evan's younger sister, Bailee Marshall, was an influencer whose obsessions were cosmetic procedures and reckless spending.

Thirty million dollars from Rylee's own savings before the marriage hadn't been enough to support their lifestyle. She'd only managed to keep paying the bills by taking design commissions online without telling anyone.

Getting those contributions back wouldn't be easy. Rylee understood that the law might treat what she'd spent as shared marital funds.

Being married to Evan did, however, give her a claim to half of what he owned.

Between company profits and dividends from his shares, he'd made around a billion dollars during their years together. Claiming her share would at least mean she wasn't walking away with nothing.

She sent Jessica a message. "Make it clear to the lawyer that I won't settle for anything below five hundred million dollars from Evan. I also need you to look into Claire. Check when she came back and find out exactly how far along her pregnancy is."

Evan clearly wasn't ready to agree to a divorce. Should he choose to contest it, his family's influence and connections could make winning in court a struggle.

Evidence that he'd cheated on her would put her in a much stronger position.

Rylee then realized that, had her daughter survived, the Marshalls would've fought with everything they had to keep her.

Aria had never been good enough for them because she wasn't a boy, but they'd still considered her to carry their blood. Letting her leave the family would've been out of the question.

Knowing they could hold Aria over her, Rylee would rather drop the divorce than put her daughter through a custody fight.

But her daughter was gone now, and they had nothing left to threaten her with. There was no longer anything tying her to that family.

Rylee found herself crying all over again.

She couldn't stop wondering whether Aria had slipped away because watching her mother suffer had become too much for her. Perhaps her quiet departure had been the last way she could show her love.

Once she'd cried herself dry, Rylee cleaned her face and gathered her own things along with her daughter's belongings, packing them together.

She and Aria had spent more than three years in that house, but a single bag was enough to hold everything that belonged to them.

She picked up the bag and made her way downstairs.

When Kathleen saw Rylee leaving without Aria tagging along, she sneered, "Don't tell me that girl's back in the hospital. She's never well for more than a minute. At this rate, I can't see her living very long."

"You're talking about your own granddaughter. How can you wish something like that on her?" Rylee fixed Kathleen with a cold stare.

Kathleen remained sprawled on the couch while a servant massaged her shoulders. "What does this family gain from having a girl? You spend years bringing her up, and then she marries into someone else's family. Give me a grandson if you're any use."

Nothing mattered more to Kathleen than getting a grandson. She insisted the Marshall fortune could only pass to a boy.

Rylee had endured plenty of insults for spending nearly four years as Evan's wife and giving the family nothing but a daughter they considered worthless.

However, Evan's family didn't know he'd only shared her bed once, when he'd been drunk on their wedding night. In all the time since, he hadn't touched her.

Bailee admired her newly done nose in the mirror and chuckled. "You can stop wishing now, Mom. Evan says the baby's a boy. Claire's going to give you a grandson."

Kathleen sat straight up, suddenly beaming. "Are you serious?"

Bailee confirmed it with a nod. "She's four months along already."

Kathleen brought her hands together in delight. "That's the best news I've heard. Have someone get a bedroom ready. Claire needs to move in right away so we can look after her properly."

Rylee held the bag so tightly that her fingers began to hurt.

Four months earlier, Evan had gone to Beloria on business, the very country Claire had been studying in.

Rylee had told herself he simply had little interest in physical intimacy. Now Claire was back, carrying a baby conceived around the time of that trip. Apparently, he'd spent their entire marriage saving himself for Claire.

Rylee had hoped that more than three years of devotion would eventually make him fall for her, only to discover how foolish she had been.

She struggled to swallow past the tightness in her throat, then left the house and refused to turn around.

Her first stop was Marshall Group, where she intended to hand in her resignation.

For three years, she had looked after his every need as his personal assistant and taken his place when clients expected him to drink. She'd suffered stomach bleeding several times as a result, and going without a meal now brought on intense pain.

Evan had no idea what it had done to her. His concern had always been maintaining his polished, successful image in front of other people.

Rylee held her sore stomach and reminded herself quietly that she wouldn't have to keep doing this anymore.

She was almost at the CEO's office when his assistant Sarah Morgan came striding toward her. Sarah looked her over with open arrogance and sneered, "All that effort to claw your way into becoming Mrs. Marshall, and where did it get you? Mr. Marshall's real wife has come back. Looks like someone's in for a rough time."