Chapter 1

Ethan Walker stood in their living room, the Austin skyline behind him.

He didn't look at me, Sarah Miller, his wife.

His voice was flat, like he was closing a business deal.

"I'm in love with Tiffany Hayes."

Tiffany, from marketing, barely out of college.

I felt a cold wave start in my stomach, but my face stayed still.

"She's younger, vibrant. We connect."

He finally looked at me, a quick, nervous glance.

"I want a divorce, Sarah. A clean slate."

He paced, warming to his speech.

"To make it fast, no mess, you get Innovatech. All of it. The house, the accounts, everything."

Innovatech Solutions, the company we built from our garage. My strategies, his face.

He thought he was being generous, magnanimous.

He thought he could build another Innovatech with charm alone.

He had no idea what Innovatech truly was, or who I was.

A small, secret flutter in my belly, a life he would never know.

"Okay," I said.

My voice was even, calm. It surprised him.

He expected tears, arguments, a scene.

He always underestimated me.

"Okay?" he repeated, a flicker of confusion in his eyes.

He thought this offer, his entire stake, was a king's ransom, a painful sacrifice.

He believed I'd see it as his desperate need for freedom, for this new love.

He didn't see it as him shedding a burden, eager to run.

I remembered seven years of dating, five years of marriage.

Nights spent coding, drawing up business plans on napkins.

His arm around me, whispering, "We'll conquer the world, Sarah."

That Ethan was gone, replaced by this stranger who valued youth over history, flash over substance.

He believed I'd be crushed, lost without him, the "face" of the company.

He never truly saw the mind behind it.

My mind.

"You're making this easy," he said, relief washing over his face.

"I want to be fair, Sarah. This way, there are no lawyers dragging things out, no public mess."

He tried to sound noble, as if this protected me.

It protected him, his image, his new romance.

"You always said you wanted Innovatech to be something great," he continued, "Now it's all yours. You can shape it however you want."

As if I hadn't been shaping it all along.

I looked at him, this man I had loved, had built a life with.

"And Tiffany?" I asked, my voice quiet. "Is she worth all of this?"

The question hung in the air.

It wasn't an accusation, just a simple inquiry.

He shifted, uncomfortable.

"She understands me," he said, a weak defense.

Understand his ambition? His ego? His need for constant admiration?

Perhaps she did, in her own way.

The baby, my secret, gave me a strange kind of strength.

This wasn't just an ending, it was a different beginning.

He had no idea.