Chapter 1

Wyatt Delgado made a rule: every expense from the household account that went over the three-thousand-a-month cap had to be logged on a Household Fund Expense Request Form.

Filled out wrong, it got kicked back.

Filled out right, the money came through with an electronic IOU attached.

He said we were spending shared assets, and putting it in black and white kept feelings out of it.

Two years later, I had forty-three thousand in IOUs to my name.

Twelve thousand of that was from my acute appendicitis, when I passed out from the pain and had no time to file the paperwork, so I used his card for the tests and the surgery first.

The note on that IOU read: unauthorized use, interest raised 20%.

Then one day, using Wyatt's computer in the study to look something up, I clicked into a folder by accident.

Inside was a screenshot of an order.

A premium annual membership card at a private hospital. Annual fee, one hundred eighty-two thousand.

One-on-one healthy meal plans, priority booking with specialists, a fully customized rehabilitation program.

Cardholder: Madeline Fox.

That name I knew all too well.

She'd been Wyatt's secretary for five years.

I stared at the screen for a long time, then closed the folder and downloaded a new form.

Only this time, what I filled out wasn't a Household Fund Expense Request Form.

It was a divorce petition.

……

The printer was pushing out the last page just as Wyatt opened the door and walked in.

He glanced at the title on the paper and reached over to stop the machine.

"A divorce petition?"

I pulled the pages out and slid only the order screenshot across to him.

"A premium medical membership card, annual fee one hundred eighty-two thousand, cardholder Madeline Fox. When did you set this up for her?"

The smile froze on Wyatt's face.

"Madeline's health is poor, and she has no one at home. She's stuck with me for five years. I fronted a health-management fee for her. Is that a problem?"

I looked up at him.

"And my appendix surgery?"

The smile on his face thinned.

"Why are you bringing that up again?"

"Because that twelve thousand is still accruing interest at twenty-four percent a year."

"It's not the same thing."

Wyatt took the petition out of my hand and turned two pages, unhurried.

"You didn't apply. You just swiped my card. Of course that counts as unauthorized spending. Madeline's money had a purpose and an assessment behind it. I knew about it in advance, and I approved it."

"So the difference isn't where the money went."

I looked at him.

"It's who it went to."

His fingertips stopped.

A moment later, he tossed the petition back onto the desk.

"Irma Harding, you've been carrying too much lately."

"Setting a cap on the household account was something we agreed on before we got married. You said it yourself back then, black and white is the fairest."

Of course I remembered.

Right after we married, he said his father had been dragged under by relatives borrowing money, so he had no sense of security.

I felt for him, and I handed the account over to him to manage.

He said three months would do it.

Then three months turned into two years.

I had to log a purpose to buy sanitary products, upload a receipt to buy my mother her medicine, and even my appendicitis surgery became a debt I owed him.

I took the petition back.

"I've changed my mind."

Wyatt clamped a hand around my wrist.

"Don't use divorce to test me."

He wasn't gripping hard, but it was just enough that I couldn't pull free.

"All you want is for me to wipe out that forty-three thousand in IOUs and raise your cap. That's up for discussion. Just don't go about it like this."

He'd decided I was only throwing a tantrum, certain I couldn't bear to leave.

Watching how sure of himself he was, I meant to argue back, but what came out instead was:

"Tomorrow is my mother's sixtieth birthday. Are you still coming?"

Wyatt let go of my wrist and straightened his cuff.

"I promised her. Of course I'm coming."

The string pulled tight inside me loosened, just a little.

It was the first time he'd offered on his own to attend my mother's birthday.

Maybe he still remembered.

Maybe there really was another reason behind that membership card.

Wyatt picked up his phone and turned to leave.

"Take down the petition. Don't let your mother see it. She's old, she can't handle the stress."

He'd just reached the door when his phone rang.

Madeline's voice leaked out of the receiver.

"Mr. Delgado, the hospital wants me to add an emergency contact. Who should I put down?"

Wyatt didn't hesitate.

"Put me."

"And the relationship field?"

He paused, then pushed the door open.

"Family."

The door closed in front of me.

By the printer, a corner of the petition lifted in the draft.

I reached out to press it flat, but under my palm there was nothing but creases.