Meet Cassidy: The Woman Who Will Replace You

The text came through at 4:47 p.m. on a Tuesday, and I should have known immediately that something was wrong. But hindsight is a luxury you only get after you’ve already walked into the trap.

Join us tonight. We have booked a table at the restaurant. Wear something nice. See you at 7.

My mother-in-law, Josephine, had sent it—three exclamation points punctuating the invitation like warning flags I was too naive to recognize. Josephine never used exclamation points. She was the type of woman who measured her words the way pharmacists measure medicine: precise, deliberate, and always with an awareness of potential side effects.

But I dismissed that nagging feeling in my gut, that small voice that whispered something’s not right. Maybe I was tired. Maybe I wanted to believe that for once, my in-laws had invited me somewhere without an ulterior motive. Maybe I was just tired of being suspicious of people who were supposed to be family.

I should have trusted my instincts.

Let me back up and tell you how I got here—to this moment, to this family, to this particular circle of hell disguised as a reservation at Marcello’s.

My name is Samantha Blackwood. Well, Samantha Harrison for the past six years, though I’m starting to remember why I loved my maiden name. I’m thirty-four years old, a freelance graphic designer who works from the home office I built in what was supposed to be a craft room. I drive a Tesla I bought with my own money. I live in a craftsman-style house in Pasadena that I purchased before I ever met Elliot Harrison, back when I still believed that owning property in your own name was just smart financial planning, not a shield you’d eventually need against your own husband.

I met Elliot six years ago at a charity gala I’d been hired to design promotional materials for. He was handsome in that effortless way some men are—tall, broad-shouldered, with a smile that looked genuine until you realized he used it the same way regardless of whether he was greeting his grandmother or closing a business deal.

He worked for his family’s company, Harrison Enterprises, a mid-sized firm that did something vague with industrial equipment and international contracts. His father, Leonard, was CEO. His mother, Josephine, was on every charity board in Southern California. His sister, Isabelle, worked in HR at the family company and spent most of her time on her phone.

They were money. Old money pretending to be new money, or maybe new money pretending to be old—I could never quite figure out which, and the distinction seemed to matter enormously to them while meaning nothing to me.

Elliot pursued me with the kind of focused attention that feels romantic at first. Flowers delivered to my studio. Reservations at restaurants I couldn’t have afforded on my own. Weekend trips to wine country where he knew all the vineyard owners by name.

“You’re different,” he told me on our third date, reaching across the table to take my hand. “You’re real. You’re not impressed by all the… stuff.”

I should have asked him what he meant by “real.” I should have wondered why being unimpressed by wealth was notable to him. But I was twenty-eight and flattered and maybe a little bit lonely, and his attention felt like sunlight after a long winter.

We got married fourteen months later in a ceremony his mother planned down to the color of the napkins. I’d wanted something small and intimate. Josephine had wanted three hundred guests and a sit-down dinner that cost more than my first car. Elliot had sided with his mother, explaining that “family expectations” meant certain traditions had to be honored.

I gave in. That was my first mistake, though I wouldn’t understand that for several more years.

The second mistake was more subtle: I kept my house in my name only.

I’d bought it three months before meeting Elliot, using inheritance money from my grandmother who’d passed away the year before. She’d been a schoolteacher her entire life, lived frugally, and left me sixty thousand dollars that she’d saved penny by penny over decades. I’d used it for the down payment on a modest two-bedroom craftsman in a neighborhood that was just starting to gentrify.

When Elliot and I got engaged, my lawyer—a woman named Patricia Chen who’d handled my grandmother’s estate—pulled me aside.

“Keep the house in your name only,” she’d said. “Separate property. California is a community property state, but what you owned before marriage stays yours unless you put his name on it.”

“That seems… unromantic,” I’d said.

“Romance is wonderful,” Patricia had replied. “But so is financial security. Keep it separate. You can always add him later if you want. You can’t easily remove him if things go wrong.”

I’d followed her advice, though I’d never told Elliot about that conversation. I’d just explained that the house was mine before we met, and the paperwork was already done, and wasn’t it nice that we had a place to live without having to buy something together right away?

He’d seemed fine with it. More than fine—he’d moved into my house without hesitation, bringing his expensive suits and his collection of golf clubs he never used and his assumption that my home was now our home, even if only one name was on the deed.

The first few years of marriage were… fine. That’s the word people use when they mean “not terrible but not great either.” We were fine.

Elliot worked long hours at Harrison Enterprises. I built my freelance design business from the craft room I’d converted into an office, slowly accumulating clients and building a reputation for brand work that actually connected with people rather than just looking impressive in boardrooms.

The problems were small at first. Subtle.

The way Josephine would drop by unannounced and rearrange things in my kitchen “to be more efficient.” The way Leonard would ask Elliot about “the house” like it belonged to both of us, and Elliot would never correct him. The way Isabelle would make comments about my clothes, my car, my career—always wrapped in concern, always delivered with a smile that never reached her eyes.

“Are you sure freelancing is stable enough?” she’d ask. “You might want to think about getting a real job—I mean, a more traditional job—especially if you’re thinking about kids.”

We weren’t thinking about kids. I was building a business. But nobody asked me what I wanted—they told me what I should want, and Elliot never defended me. He would just smile and change the subject, or worse, laugh along like their criticism was all in good fun.

“They’re just trying to help,” he’d say later when I’d bring it up. “They care about you.”

But it didn’t feel like caring. It felt like assessment. Like I was being measured against some standard I’d never agreed to and consistently found wanting.

The real shift happened about six months ago.

Elliot started working late more frequently. Taking calls in the other room. Guarding his phone like it contained nuclear secrets. When I’d ask about his day, his answers became vague, distracted.

“Just busy at work,” he’d say. “You know how it is.”

I did know. I knew what “busy at work” looked like when it was real, and I knew what it looked like when it was an excuse. But I didn’t push. Maybe I didn’t want to know. Maybe I was too busy with my own work, my own clients, my own carefully constructed life that was starting to feel like it was built on sand.

Three days ago, everything crystallized into something I could no longer ignore.

I’d been working on a rebranding project for a tech startup when my phone buzzed with a text from Elliot.

Need to talk. Important. Can you be home at 6?

My stomach dropped. “Need to talk” is never good. “Important” makes it worse. I spent the afternoon imagining scenarios—job loss, health crisis, family emergency. I didn’t imagine what was actually coming because the truth was somehow both more predictable and more shocking than anything I’d conjured.

Elliot came home at 6:15, fifteen minutes late for his own requested conversation, which should have told me everything.

“We need to talk about us,” he said, sitting down at the kitchen table without taking off his jacket. Without kissing me hello. Without any of the small rituals that usually marked his homecoming.

“Okay,” I said carefully, joining him at the table.

“I don’t think this is working anymore,” he said, not meeting my eyes. “We’ve grown apart. We want different things. I think we’d both be happier if we… made a change.”

The words were so generic, so carefully neutral, that they almost didn’t mean anything. But the meaning was clear enough.

“You want a divorce,” I said.

“I think it would be best for both of us.”

“Is there someone else?”

He hesitated just long enough to confirm before he said, “This isn’t about anyone else. This is about us not being compatible anymore.”

“So there is someone else.”

“Sam—”

“Don’t.” I held up my hand. “Don’t lie to me and then use the nickname you gave me when we were happy. Is there someone else?”

Another hesitation. Then: “Yes. But that’s not why—”

“How long?”

“Does it matter?”

“How. Long.”

“Eight months.”

Eight months. Eight months of late nights and guarded phones and distracted conversations. Eight months of me making excuses for his distance while he was building a relationship with someone else.

“Who is she?”

“Her name is Cassidy. She’s… it doesn’t matter who she is. What matters is that I think we’d both be better off if we ended this cleanly and moved forward separately.”

“Cleanly,” I repeated. “You’ve been cheating on me for eight months and you want to end this ‘cleanly.'”

“I didn’t mean for it to happen—”

“They never do,” I said, surprised by how calm my voice sounded when my chest felt like it was caving in. “When were you going to tell me? Or were you just going to keep lying until you figured out a convenient time?”

“Sam—Samantha—I’m sorry. I know this is hard. But I think if we’re both honest, we’ve known for a while that something was off.”

He wasn’t wrong about that. Something had been off. But I’d thought it was stress, or the natural evolution of marriage, or a phase we’d work through. I hadn’t realized he’d already decided we were over and was auditioning replacements.

“I need you to leave,” I said.

“This is my house too—”

“No, actually, it’s not. The deed is in my name. This is my house. And I need you to leave so I can think.”

He looked like he wanted to argue, but something in my expression must have stopped him. He grabbed his keys and his wallet and left, the door closing behind him with a soft click that felt like the end of something that had been dying slowly for months.

I sat at that table for a long time, staring at nothing, trying to process what had just happened. Then my phone rang.

It was Josephine.

I almost didn’t answer. But some combination of habit and shock made me pick up.

“Samantha, dear,” she said, her voice warm and sweet in that way that usually preceded something terrible. “I wanted to invite you to dinner tomorrow night. Just family. We have a table at Marcello’s at seven. Will you join us?”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” I said. “Elliot and I just—”

“I know, dear. That’s why we’d like to talk. As a family. Please come. It would mean so much.”

I should have said no. But I was disoriented and hurt and maybe some part of me still believed that “family” meant support, that his mother would be on my side, that there was some explanation that would make this make sense.

“Okay,” I heard myself say. “I’ll be there.”

Which brings me back to Tuesday night, to Marcello’s, to the moment everything became crystal clear.

I wore a navy dress—professional, appropriate, the kind of outfit you wear when you want to feel armored. I drove to the restaurant in my Tesla, taking longer than necessary because I wasn’t ready to face whatever was waiting for me.

The hostess greeted me with a strange look—something between pity and discomfort—and led me through the dining room. Past couples sharing wine and conversation, past families celebrating birthdays, past all the normal people having normal dinners.

Then I saw the table.

They were all there. The entire Harrison family gathered like this was some kind of summit. Josephine sat at the center like a queen, Leonard to her right, Isabelle to her left. And Elliot—my husband, though apparently not for much longer—sitting next to a woman I’d never seen before.

She was younger than me. Maybe twenty-six or twenty-seven, with the kind of effortless beauty that doesn’t require much effort because genetics did most of the work. Blonde hair in perfect waves. A red dress that probably cost more than my mortgage payment. And her hand resting casually on Elliot’s forearm like she had every right to touch him in front of his wife.

Elliot looked up as I approached, and for just a second, I saw genuine fear flash across his face before it settled into something worse—resignation mixed with defiance. Like he’d known this would be bad but had decided to go through with it anyway.

“Samantha,” Josephine said, her voice dripping with false sweetness. “So glad you could make it. Please, sit down.”

There was an empty chair directly across from the blonde woman. Of course there was. This was choreographed, staged, designed for maximum impact.

I sat down slowly, placing my purse on the floor, buying time to process what I was seeing.

“I don’t think we’ve met,” I said, looking at the woman in red. My voice came out steadier than I felt.

Josephine’s smile widened, and I watched as her mask slipped just enough to reveal something cruel underneath.

“Oh, how rude of me,” she said, clearly delighted to make this introduction. “Samantha, meet Cassidy Richardson. The woman who will replace you.”

The words hit me like a physical blow. Not “Elliot’s friend” or “someone we’d like you to meet” or any other euphemism that would have at least pretended at civility. Just… the woman who will replace you. Like I was a broken appliance being upgraded.

I looked around the table, waiting for someone—anyone—to laugh, to tell me this was some kind of sick joke, to apologize for how insane this was. But nobody was laughing. Leonard was studying his menu like it contained secrets. Isabelle was on her phone. Elliot wouldn’t meet my eyes.

“I’m sorry,” I managed to say, though my throat felt tight. “What?”

Cassidy leaned forward, and her perfume—something expensive with notes of jasmine and vanilla—wafted across the table. She smiled, and it was the smile of someone who’s already won and knows it.

“This must be awkward for you,” she said, her voice carrying false sympathy that made my skin crawl. “I kept telling Elliot we should have done this privately, just the two of us, but Josephine insisted on making it a family event. She thought it would be better to handle everything openly, you know? No secrets.”

“No secrets,” I repeated slowly, feeling like I’d walked into an alternate dimension where words meant something completely different than they should. “You’re sitting at a table with my husband telling me you’re my replacement, and you think the problem here was secrecy?”

“Well, when you put it like that, it sounds—”

Isabelle cut her off by reaching into her designer bag and pulling out a manila envelope. She slid it across the table toward me with the casual disdain of someone disposing of trash, then flicked her wrist so the papers inside spilled out onto my empty plate.

Divorce papers. Petition for Dissolution of Marriage printed in bold letters at the top. My name. Elliot’s name. A filing date from two weeks ago—two weeks before Elliot had even told me he wanted a divorce.

“Do us all a favor and sign it,” Isabelle said, her voice sharp and dismissive. “We’re all sick of looking at you.”

The cruelty was so casual, so matter-of-fact, that for a moment I couldn’t process it. This wasn’t just about Elliot leaving me. This was orchestrated. Planned. A family project.

“You can’t be serious,” I whispered, staring down at the papers.

“Serious as a heart attack,” Cassidy said cheerfully, gesturing to Elliot with her wine glass. “Andy and I have been together for eight months now. It’s time to make things official.”

“Andy?” Nobody called him Andy. Nobody except—

“His mother calls him that,” Cassidy said, smiling at Josephine like they were co-conspirators. Which, apparently, they were.

“Eight months?” I turned to Elliot, who was suddenly very interested in the breadbasket. “You’ve been cheating on me for eight months, and your entire family knew?”

“Don’t be so dramatic,” Josephine interjected, waving her hand dismissively. “Elliot simply found someone more suitable. Someone who fits better with our family values and our business interests.”

“Your family values,” I said, my voice rising despite my efforts to stay calm. “I’ve spent five years bending over backward for this family. I hosted your holiday parties. I organized Leonard’s retirement celebration. I took care of your mother when she had her hip replacement, Josephine. I was there every single day for three weeks, managing her medications, helping her with physical therapy—”

“And we appreciated that, dear,” Josephine interrupted, her voice dripping with condescension. “But appreciation doesn’t equal compatibility. Cassidy here graduated from Cornell. Her father owns Harrison Steel’s biggest competitor. That makes her infinitely more valuable to our family’s business interests.”

The truth landed with brutal clarity, cutting through my confusion like a blade through fog. This wasn’t about love or compatibility or any of the things marriage was supposed to be about. This was a business merger. I was being traded out like a used asset that no longer served its purpose.

Cassidy leaned back in her chair, examining her perfectly manicured nails with the satisfaction of someone who’d already claimed victory. “Guess I’ll be taking over everything,” she said casually. “Your house, your car, even that cute little office you set up in the spare bedroom. I’ve always wanted a home office.”

The table erupted in laughter—Leonard’s deep chuckle, Isabelle’s sharp giggle, even Elliot cracked a smile. And Josephine—Josephine looked positively delighted, like she’d just orchestrated the social coup of the century.

Leonard raised his glass of scotch, his face flushed with the particular smugness of men who think they’ve gotten away with something. “To new beginnings and better choices.”

Everyone except me clinked glasses. I sat frozen, watching this surreal nightmare unfold around me like I was watching a play where I’d somehow ended up on stage without learning my lines.

Cassidy leaned into Elliot now, whispering something in his ear that made him chuckle. The sound of his laughter felt like glass shards working their way under my skin. This was my husband—the man I’d made vows with, built a life with—laughing while his family humiliated me at a table in a restaurant we used to come to for anniversaries.

“I’ve already picked out which bedroom I want,” Cassidy continued, turning her attention back to me with theatrical enthusiasm. “I’m thinking we’ll convert your craft room—sorry, your office—into a walk-in closet. I have quite a collection of clothing, and that space would be absolutely perfect.”

My craft room. The space where I’d built my freelance business because Josephine had insisted I quit my full-time job to be “more available for family obligations.” The room where I’d spent countless hours growing my client base, where I’d cried when I landed my first major contract, where I’d built something that was mine in a life that had been slowly colonized by the Harrison family’s expectations.

The room where I’d hidden when things got bad, where I’d found myself again when I felt like I was disappearing into someone else’s idea of who I should be.

And she wanted to turn it into a closet for her clothes.

Something inside me shifted. The shock was wearing off, stripped away by a cold, clear anger that sharpened my senses instead of clouding them. I looked around the table again—really looked this time, without the filter of hope or denial or whatever had made me think these people were family.

Josephine was practically glowing with satisfaction, radiating the particular pleasure of someone who believes they’ve executed a perfect plan. Leonard had that smug expression he always wore when he thought he’d won something. Isabelle was back on her phone, already bored with my humiliation now that the initial entertainment value had worn off.

Elliot was staring at his plate like a coward who couldn’t even do his own dirty work.

And Cassidy—Cassidy was studying me like a scientist examining a bug under a microscope, waiting with genuine curiosity to see how I’d react to this carefully orchestrated destruction.

I picked up the divorce papers carefully, straightening them into a neat stack with hands that barely trembled. Then I set them aside and folded my hands on the table in front of me.

“This is quite the ambush,” I said calmly, my voice level and clear. “Very well planned. I’m almost impressed by the coordination.”

Josephine beamed like I’d complimented her catering choices. “I knew you’d see reason eventually. You’re a smart girl, Samantha. There’s no point in dragging this out and making things ugly.”

“Oh, I agree completely,” I said. “Dragging things out would be exhausting for everyone involved. But before I sign anything, I do have one tiny question.”

“What is it?” Elliot asked, finally looking at me with something like relief in his eyes. He thought I was giving in. They all did. They’d staged this whole performance expecting me to crumble, to cry, to sign their papers and slink away quietly.

I smiled, keeping my voice pleasant and conversational, like we were discussing vacation plans instead of the dissolution of my marriage.

“Have you explained to Cassidy how property ownership works in our marriage?”

Elliot’s face went pale. The color drained from his cheeks so quickly I thought he might actually be sick right there at the table.

“Samantha, don’t,” he said, his voice tight with warning.

“Don’t what?” I asked innocently. “Don’t clarify some basic facts? That seems unfair to Cassidy, don’t you think? Especially since she’s already made so many plans for her future in my house.”

Cassidy looked between us, her confident smile faltering just slightly. “What are you talking about?”

“The house you’re so excited about,” I said, turning to face her fully. “The one where you’ve already picked out your bedroom and planned your walk-in closet.”

“What about it?” Her voice had lost some of its earlier certainty.

I let the silence stretch for just a moment, watching as confusion began to replace confidence on her perfectly made-up face.

“By the way,” I said sweetly, each word precisely delivered, “the house is in my name, not his.”

The room froze.

It was like someone had hit pause on a movie. Leonard’s glass stopped halfway to his mouth, suspended in mid-air. Isabelle’s fingers went still on her phone screen, frozen mid-scroll. Josephine’s smile evaporated like morning dew under brutal sunlight. Elliot looked like he might actually vomit.

And Cassidy—Cassidy’s mouth opened slightly, her hand stopping mid-gesture, her entire carefully constructed performance grinding to a halt as she processed what I’d just said.

“Excuse me?” she said, her voice no longer quite so confident or cheerful.

“The house,” I repeated slowly, as if explaining something to a child. “It’s mine. I bought it with inheritance money from my grandmother three months before Elliot and I got married. I specifically kept it in my name only, as separate property, on the advice of my lawyer.”

“That can’t be right,” Josephine said sharply, her voice cutting through the silence like scissors through silk. “Elliot told us that—”

“Elliot told you what he wanted you to believe,” I interrupted, my voice still calm but carrying an edge now. “Or what he wanted to believe himself. But I have the deed, the mortgage statements, and five years of sole property tax payments—all in my name. Samantha Joyce Blackwood, not Harrison. I never changed my name on the property documents.”

The implications were sinking in now. I watched the reality dawn on each of their faces in turn, and it was almost worth the humiliation of this dinner to see the moment they realized their perfect plan had a rather significant flaw.

Cassidy’s expression shifted from smug to uncertain to something approaching panic. Isabelle actually set down her phone and looked at me directly for the first time all evening. Leonard looked like he’d swallowed something unpleasant and couldn’t quite figure out how to get it back up.

“But surely you have some assets together,” Leonard said, leaning forward with the calculating expression of a man trying to salvage a bad business deal. “The renovations, the improvements to the property—”

“Which I paid for,” I said. “With money from my freelance business. The business I built in that craft room Cassidy is planning to turn into a closet. The business that generates quite a comfortable six-figure income, actually. All separate property, all documented, all mine.”

Elliot had gone from pale to greenish, like he was fighting actual nausea. “Samantha, we need to talk about this privately—”

“Oh, I don’t think so,” I cut him off. “Your family wanted to handle this ‘openly,’ remember? No secrets. So let’s continue being open.”

I turned to Cassidy, whose perfect composure had cracked like cheap porcelain. “Did Elliot also tell you about the car you’re so excited to drive? The Tesla?”

She didn’t answer, but her expression was answer enough.

“Also mine,” I said cheerfully. “Purchased with my money, registered in my name, insured under my policy. Turns out when you’re a successful freelance designer with a solid client base and no expensive habits, you can actually afford nice things.”

“This is ridiculous,” Josephine sputtered, her carefully maintained poise finally cracking. “Surely you have some shared assets. Some joint accounts, retirement funds, investments—”

“Oh, we do have a joint checking account,” I agreed. “With about three thousand dollars in it currently, which I’m happy to split fifty-fifty. We also have some furniture we bought together—mostly from IKEA. You’re welcome to the coffee table and the bookshelf. Oh, and Elliot has his car, of course.”

I paused for effect, watching their faces.

“That 2015 Honda Civic with the dent in the passenger door.”

The Honda Civic. In a family that measured worth by luxury brands and status symbols, where Leonard drove a Mercedes and Josephine had a BMW, that twelve-year-old Honda with a dent might as well have been a skateboard.

Isabelle actually grimaced, her face twisting with an expression somewhere between disgust and disbelief.

“There has to be more,” Leonard insisted, his voice taking on an edge of desperation. “Retirement accounts, investment portfolios, savings—”

“My retirement account is separate,” I said. “Started before the marriage and maintained separately throughout, as is my right under California law. My investment accounts are in my name only. As for savings, well, those have been accumulating quite nicely in accounts that Elliot doesn’t have access to. Turns out being financially responsible and living below your means has certain advantages.”

Elliot was staring at me like he’d never seen me before, his mouth slightly open, his eyes wide with something between shock and betrayal—as if I’d somehow wronged him by not sharing every detail of my financial life with a man who was, as it turned out, planning to leave me for someone more “suitable.”

“How did I not know any of this?” he asked, his voice barely above a whisper.

I laughed, and it felt good—liberating, even. “Because you never bothered to ask, Elliot. You assumed that because I worked from home, because I was available for your family’s endless demands, because I didn’t drive a flashier car or wear more expensive clothes, that I was somehow less successful than you. You assumed dependence where there was none.”

“We supported you,” Josephine said coldly, her voice dropping the pretense of sweetness entirely.

“No, you didn’t,” I shot back, my patience finally snapping completely. “I supported myself every single day. While you treated me like hired help, I was building a business that now brings in significantly more than Elliot’s salary at your family company. While you looked down on me for not having a Cornell degree, I was investing and saving and creating security for myself. The difference is that I didn’t feel the need to brag about it at every family dinner or use it as a weapon to make other people feel small.”

Cassidy was scrolling furiously through her phone now, probably texting someone—maybe her father, maybe a friend, maybe a lawyer. Her perfect mask had completely shattered, revealing something closer to panic underneath.

Elliot looked shell-shocked, like someone had hit him over the head with reality and he was still trying to figure out what happened.

Isabelle had gone very quiet, which was unusual for her. She was probably doing calculations in her head, trying to figure out how this changed the family’s position.

Leonard was staring at me with an expression I’d never seen before—something like grudging respect mixed with frustration at having miscalculated so badly.

And Josephine looked like she wanted to flip the table.

“Furthermore,” I continued, gathering momentum now that I’d started, “about those Harrison family business interests you mentioned. The ones that make Cassidy so infinitely more valuable than me.”

Josephine’s eyes narrowed dangerously.

“I should probably mention that I’ve been consulting for Harrison Enterprises for the past two years. You know that rebranding initiative that increased your market share by thirty percent? That was my design work. The new website that brought in all those international clients? Mine. The marketing campaign that Leonard praised so effusively at the shareholders meeting last quarter? Also mine.”

Josephine’s mouth opened and closed like a fish pulled from water, no sound coming out.

“You’re the contractor?” Leonard said, his face going through a fascinating progression of emotions. “But we hired you through—”

“Through my business,” I finished for him. “Blackwood Design Studio. I operate under my maiden name professionally, which is common practice in my industry. Your HR department has been cutting me checks twice a month for twenty-four months. Fairly substantial checks, actually, since you were paying market rates for premium work.”

I pulled out my phone and opened my banking app, turning the screen so they could see the recent transactions. “See that deposit from last Friday? That’s Harrison Enterprises paying me for the Q4 marketing materials I delivered ahead of schedule. Again.”

Leonard had gone from smug to calculating, probably tallying up how much they’d paid me over two years, how much they’d praised work without knowing who created it, how much they’d valued my contributions when they thought they were buying them from a stranger instead of receiving them from family they’d dismissed.

The irony was absolutely delicious.

“This doesn’t change anything,” Elliot said, but his voice lacked any conviction. “We can still get divorced. You can’t stop that.”

“You’re absolutely right,” I agreed pleasantly. “We can definitely get divorced. In fact, I think it’s a wonderful idea. I should thank you all for making this decision so much easier for me.”

I picked up the papers again and started reading through them carefully, taking my time.

“Let’s see here,” I murmured, making a show of scanning the documents. “Joint property settlement… oh, this is interesting. This entire section assumes we have joint property to divide. We’ll need to revise that completely. And this section about alimony—Elliot, did you actually ask for alimony from me?”

His face went even paler, if that was possible. Isabelle made a small choking sound that might have been a laugh if it had contained any humor.

“I didn’t think you had any money,” he muttered, looking at his plate.

“Well, that was foolish,” I said. “But lucky for you, I’m not interested in paying alimony to someone who cheated on me for eight months with someone his mother picked out like she was ordering from a catalog. However, I will expect compensation for the improvements I made to the house that you’ve been living in rent-free, the utilities I’ve been paying solely, and the groceries I’ve been buying for both of us.”

“This is absurd,” Josephine said, her voice shaking with barely controlled fury. “You can’t possibly expect—”

“I expect exactly what I’m entitled to under the law,” I said firmly, my voice cutting through her protest like a knife through butter. “Nothing more, nothing less. But I won’t be signing anything tonight. These papers are incomplete and based on fraudulent assumptions about our financial situation. My lawyer will be in touch with yours, Elliot, to discuss a more accurate and equitable division of our actual marital assets—which, as we’ve established, amount to about three thousand dollars and some IKEA furniture.”

I stood up, gathering my purse and the divorce papers with hands that were remarkably steady. The adrenaline was coursing through my system now, sharp and clarifying.

“I’ll be taking these to my attorney,” I said. “You can expect revised documents within a week, along with a bill for my half of the improvements I made to my separate property during our marriage.”

Cassidy finally found her voice again. “Wait—so where am I supposed to live?”

I looked at her—this woman who’d been so excited to take over my life, who’d sat across from me planning which room of my house she’d claim, who’d been complicit in one of the cruelest performances I’d ever experienced—and felt something like pity mixed with satisfaction.

“That’s between you and Andy, sweetheart,” I said, using the nickname I’d heard her use earlier. “But I’d suggest looking for an apartment. Maybe something near that Honda Civic you’ll presumably be riding around in. Unless your Cornell degree and your father’s connections can get you something better. Though from the looks of things, I’m guessing they got you Elliot, and we can all see how that’s working out.”