The doubt that had taken root in my heart at Celeste was a cold, bitter thing. I tried to ignore it, to chalk it up to Serena's toxicity and Richard's misguided attempt at keeping the peace. I threw myself back into my work, into being the perfect, supportive wife. Richard's big meeting with the logistics firm—the one I'd saved—was rescheduled for the following week. He was on edge, and my purpose, as Jane, was to be his calm.
The night before the meeting, he was a storm of nervous energy, pacing the length of our apartment. I made him chamomile tea, organized his presentation notes, and offered quiet, reassuring words. Around eleven, he decided he needed to go to the office, to run through the presentation one last time on the main boardroom projector.
"You don't have to come, darling," he said, kissing my cheek. "Get some sleep."
But I couldn't. A knot of anxiety, sharp and unfamiliar, twisted in my stomach. I knew he'd left a crucial supporting document—a market analysis I'd painstakingly compiled—on his home desk. He would need it.
So, an hour later, I let myself into the silent, cavernous lobby of Sterling Innovations. The security guard, Barry, waved me through with a familiar smile. "Burning the midnight oil for the big boss, Jane?"
"Always," I smiled back, the lie tasting like ash.
The elevator ascended in silence, opening onto the top floor. Richard's corner office was dark, but a sliver of light escaped from under the main boardroom door down the hall. I walked softly, my sensible flats making no sound on the polished marble. I was just going to slide the folder under the door, a silent act of support from his devoted wife.
As I neared the door, I heard voices. Richard's, and another one, a woman's, laced with triumphant laughter. Serena.
My hand froze, inches from the door.
"I still can't believe how easy this has been," Serena's voice purred. "Six years, and the little mouse never suspected a thing."
"She's predictable," Richard's voice replied, and the casual cruelty in it made my blood run cold. "She wants to believe in the fairytale. The struggling entrepreneur who loves her for her, not her name. It's pathetic, really."
My breath hitched. The folder in my hand suddenly felt impossibly heavy. I pressed my ear against the cold wood of the door, my heart hammering a frantic, painful rhythm against my ribs.
"And the way she 'helps'," Serena continued, her tone dripping with mockery. "Fixing your spreadsheets, organizing your schedule… she thinks she's your partner. She has no idea she's just been building her own cage, piece by piece."
"Every success she's secretly handed me just makes the company more valuable," Richard said, a smug satisfaction in his voice. "When we sell to the Thorne acquisition group next month, the payout will be astronomical. And she'll be left with nothing but divorce papers. It's perfect."
Thorne acquisition group? My family? The thought was a dizzying blow. They weren't just planning to leave me; they were using me to defraud my own family.
"What if she tries to fight back?" Serena asked, a sliver of concern in her voice.
Richard laughed. It was a sound I had once loved, a sound I now realized was utterly hollow. "With what? She has no pre-nup. She's legally Jane Sterling, a woman with no assets to her name. She's a nobody. She walked away from the Thorne empire to be with me. Who's going to believe her when she suddenly claims she was the secret genius behind it all? They'll think she's a scorned, delusional wife. We'll be halfway to a private island before she can even find a lawyer who'll take her case."
The finality of his words struck me harder than any physical blow. He had thought of everything. He had used my love, my sacrifice, my very identity against me. The six years we had spent together, the life I had poured my soul into, wasn't a partnership. It was a long con. A hostile takeover of my heart.
"To us," Serena said, the clink of glasses echoing through the door. "And to the end of the boring little mouse."
I didn't move. I couldn't. I stood there, a statue in the darkened hallway, the folder of my hard work still clutched in my hand. The world I had known, the man I had loved, the future I had sacrificed everything for—it all dissolved into a cruel, elaborate lie. The silence that followed their toast was the loudest sound I had ever heard. It was the sound of my world ending. And in the ruins, a new, terrifying clarity began to emerge. The mouse was dead. And they had no idea what they had just woken up in her place.