Chapter 3

3.

Our argument ended with Sienna slamming the door and storming out.

I wasn't even trying to fight with her.

I only had seven days left in this place.

I spent the next few days packing our things.

I planned to return everything we had borrowed from the neighbors and then leave without looking back.

I didn't expect Quinton to show up at my door.

He was wearing a brand-new, expensive-looking black wool sweater.

I thought about the money that had gone missing from our savings jar a few days ago. The pieces clicked together.

I didn't say a word.

Since I was leaving, it didn't matter where Sienna spent her money anymore.

But Quinton wasn't satisfied with my silence. He tugged at his new collar, a smug look on his face.

"Doesn't this look great? Sienna went all the way to the city just to buy this for me."

"She wanted to get me a designer jacket too, but I told her it was too flashy."

He looked at the old, patched-up coat I was wearing and fake-gasped, covering his mouth.

"Oh, Caleb, I didn't mean it like that. I wasn't calling you and Andy 'cheap'."

I looked down at my clothes and remained silent.

This coat was something my mother had bought me when I got married.

She told me that marriage meant making sacrifices and saving for the future.

I had listened to her. In ten years, I hadn't spent a dime of Sienna's money on myself.

Even Andy's clothes were just my old ones, cut down and resewn.

It wasn't that I didn't want to buy him things. It was that Sienna gave almost all her salary to Quinton.

She claimed he was her mentor's son and a lonely soul who needed support.

So, over the years, whether I had a broken leg or our son was unconscious with a fever, she stayed by Quinton's side.

My eyes stung, but I refused to cry.

I tried to step around him to return some supplies to the neighbor, but Quinton blocked my path.

He leaned in close, whispering in a voice full of malice.

"I'm going to the city soon. Sienna has two spots, and she didn't save one for you, did she?"

"So what if you're her husband? So what if you gave her a kid? In the end, you're just trash she's throwing away."