The blood came first.
Sloane Hayes felt the warm trickle before she saw it — a slow drip from her right nostril that splattered onto the contract she'd been proofreading for the past four hours. Seventy-three pages. Four cups of coffee. One nosebleed.
She blotted it with her sleeve, smearing red across the cuff of her white blouse. Derek will be annoyed about that, she thought. Then she laughed — a dry, broken sound that didn't belong in the silent townhouse.
Derek was always annoyed.
She finished the last paragraph. Corrected a comma splice. Saved the document. Printed three copies. Stood up, wobbled from hunger she hadn't noticed, and walked from her home office into the living room.
That's where she found him.
Derek Vance sat on the leather sofa she'd picked out — "too expensive," he'd said then, but now he sprawled across it like a king — holding a manila folder. His sandy hair was freshly styled. His jaw was set in that way she used to find handsome, back when she mistook coldness for strength.
"You're bleeding," he said.
"I know."
"Your blouse is ruined."
"I know that too."
She waited for him to ask if she was okay. He didn't.
Instead, he held out the folder. "Sign these."
Sloane opened it. The words PETITION FOR DISSOLUTION OF MARRIAGE swam before her eyes. She blinked. The words didn't change.
"You're joking," she whispered.
Derek's expression didn't flicker. "I don't joke about business."
"Business?" Her voice cracked. "Our marriage is business?"
"Everything is business, Sloane. You know that." He gestured to the contract she was still holding, the one she'd bled on. "You just spent four hours on a deal that will make us — me — three million dollars. You're good at business. So you understand: this marriage isn't working for me anymore."
For me.
Not for us. For him.
Sloane's fingers trembled as she flipped through the divorce papers. He'd already filled everything out. Her name. Her signature date. Even the box marked "waiver of spousal support" was checked.
"You don't want me to have anything," she said. Not a question.
"You didn't earn anything."
Five years. Five years of building his company from the shadows. Five years of writing contracts, soothing clients, fixing his mistakes while he took the credit. Five years of being the invisible engine of Derek Vance's success.
And now: You didn't earn anything.
"Who is she?" Sloane asked.
Derek's jaw tightened. "That's not relevant."
"It's Megan Cross, isn't it? Your manager's daughter. The one who laughs too loud at your jokes in company meetings."
Derek stood up. He was six feet of polished cruelty in a tailored suit. "Sign the papers, Sloane. Don't make this ugly."
"Ugly?" She laughed again — that same hollow sound. "You're divorcing me after I just finished a contract that will make you a millionaire. Ugly left the building a long time ago."
She picked up a pen from the side table. It was a cheap ballpoint, not even her favorite. Somehow that made it worse. She was signing away her marriage with a pen that cost twelve cents.
"Last chance," Derek said. "Sign, and I'll let you keep your car."
Her car. The used Honda she'd bought before they even met. He was offering to let her keep her own property like it was a gift.
Sloane signed.
She didn't cry. She didn't scream. She just put her signature on every marked line, closed the folder, and handed it back to him.
"Happy?" she asked.
Derek examined her signature like he was checking a contract. Satisfied, he tucked the folder under his arm. "I'll have my lawyer file it Monday. You have until then to move your things out."
"Monday is three days from now."
"I'm aware."
He walked toward the door. Paused. Looked back at her with something that might have been pity — or maybe just impatience.
"You should clean your face," he said. "You look pathetic."
The door closed behind him.
Sloane stood in the middle of the living room, blood still drying on her upper lip, the cheap pen still in her hand. She didn't move for a full minute. Then two. Then five.
When she finally walked to the bathroom, she caught her reflection in the mirror.
Pathetic.
Maybe he was right.
She washed her face. Changed her blouse. And then, because she had nowhere else to go and nothing else to do, she walked into the bedroom to pack.
That's when she found the earring.