Chapter 2

Renee's smile froze on her face.

She shoved Oliver's arm off her, her voice going shrill.

"Oliver! Didn't you say you were divorced?"

Oliver panicked completely.

He turned and pulled Renee into his arms, rushing to explain:

"Renee, don't be upset, listen to me, she and I haven't felt anything for each other in ages!"

"I just didn't want to mess up your brother's evaluation of me for the VP spot right when I'm about to get promoted, that's the only reason I kept it quiet!"

I let out a cold laugh.

This morning, before he walked out the door, he'd called me sweetheart with every other breath.

Said that when he got back from his business trip, he'd bring me my favorite perfume.

So it turned out his business trip led straight into another woman's bed.

After hearing Oliver's explanation, Renee's expression eased a good deal.

She looked me up and down, a note of pity settling into her eyes, the kind you look down on someone with.

"Oh. So you're the ex-wife who got dumped and still won't let go."

"No wonder, look at you, everything you've got on your body wouldn't add up to two hundred bucks, that broke, shabby look. What part of you deserves who Oliver is now?"

Renee slid an arm through Oliver's and stepped aside from the doorway, her eyes taunting.

"Since you're here, come in and sit awhile. Let you see for yourself what kind of life Oliver actually wants."

Oliver was throwing me frantic looks, begging me not to go in.

But I wanted to see exactly what I'd raised in five years of scrimping and saving.

The place was luxurious to the point of hurting the eyes.

Italian imported leather sofas, a crystal chandelier worth hundreds of thousands.

A hand-woven rug underfoot, and even the paintings on the walls didn't come cheap.

Renee pointed at the sofa set and said:

"Oliver already said it, from now on every piece of furniture in our home gets chosen by my taste."

Then she rapped her knuckles on the coffee table in front of her.

"This table, two hundred grand. How many years of delivery runs would that take you?"

I looked at that coffee table, and something jabbed at my chest like an awl.

Last month, I'd wanted to replace the table at home. I'd had my eye on one for three thousand.

Oliver said I was wasteful, said his money didn't come easy, said we had to plan ahead for when we'd have a kid.

I believed him.

In the end I went to the secondhand market and dug one up for three hundred.

Renee wasn't done showing off.

She walked over to the kitchen and opened the double-door refrigerator.

It was crammed with imported fruit and ingredients.

"I mentioned once, offhand, that I wanted cherries, and he found a private supply line to order me the Curtis Wilkerson ones, had a courier bring them over overnight."

"He said, whatever other people have, his wife has to have too, and it has to be the best."

Renee picked up a cherry and held it out to me.

"I hear that back in the day you'd haggle with vendors over a few cents just to buy groceries?"

"No wonder Oliver didn't want you."

I turned and looked at Oliver.

And felt that all those five years of swallowing everything had been a joke.

He was staring guiltily at the floor, not daring to meet my eyes.

Because I didn't want to put pressure on him, back then I'd hidden that I was the only daughter of the richest man in the city.

I'd refused to take over the family business, fought with my family until it nearly tore us apart.

Even living on thirty dollars a day, I'd stayed with him in that inner-city neighborhood, freezing in winter and sweltering in summer.

Eaten instant ramen with him, walked with him from having nothing to where he was today.

I'd thought that was love, two people sharing the bitter and the sweet.

Turns out, in his eyes, I was poor, I was cheap.

Reeking, head to toe, of a broke shabbiness that couldn't be shown in public.

He'd taken the connections I'd quietly laid down for him, climbed up on the back of everything I'd poured out, and used it to grovel at another woman's feet.

Seeing me stay silent, Renee assumed I felt small.

She pulled out a jade necklace, deep green all through.

"See this? Oliver's mother gave it to me."

"Said it's a family heirloom of the Hardings, passed down only to the Harding daughter-in-law."

I looked at that necklace, and the blood shot straight to my head.

It was the coming-of-age gift my grandmother gave me on her deathbed, the most important piece of my dowry.

Last month, Oliver's mother kept saying the family's fortune had been bad these past few years.

She insisted on borrowing it, said she wanted to take it to a temple to have it blessed before the Buddha, to protect Oliver's career.

I never imagined the one she took it to bless.

Was this shameless mistress!

"This necklace is worth two, three million at least. Oliver said only someone with my kind of presence deserves a piece of jade like this."

Renee stroked the necklace, laughing until she was trembling like a flower on a stem.

"Tell me, you married him for five years, what did you get out of it? Besides that smell of delivery food all over you."

My fingernails dug into my flesh, and there wasn't a trace of warmth in my voice.

"Oliver. What's the story with this necklace?"

Oliver's whole body jerked, and he hurried to snatch the necklace back.

"Renee, this necklace is too valuable, put it away for now, don't damage it."

Renee dodged him and pouted sweetly.

"What are you scared of? If it breaks, you just buy me a better one, right?"

Oliver gave a dry laugh and went along with it.

"Right, right, a better one."

He turned to me, lowered his voice, and said it at a volume only the two of us could hear:

"Jess, my mom grabbed the wrong necklace, can't you just stop making a scene?"

"I'm begging you, leave me a little face."

When he'd used my dowry to keep his mistress happy, had he ever once thought of me?

I was about to open my mouth when the sound of the keypad lock releasing came from outside the door.

"Son, Renee, I made you both bird's nest soup!"