My name is Olivia Reeves, and for four years, I believed that marriage was about compromise,

While Matthew was crumbling under the weight of his own undoing, Diane Reeves was fighting a desperate, losing battle to maintain her illusion of superiority.

Refusing to accept that her bank accounts were frozen and her properties under court lien, Diane decided to take matters into her own hands. On a crisp Thursday morning, she drove her Mercedes straight to Marcus Sterling’s downtown law office, demanding an immediate audience with my legal team.

According to Marcus—who recounted the incident to me over the phone with undisguised amusement—Diane had marched into the reception area wearing a fur-trimmed coat, demanding that the receptionist bow down to her social standing.

"She threatened to sue me, sue the firm, and call the state bar association," Marcus laughed over the speakerphone. "She genuinely believed she could intimidate us into dropping the case by flashing an expired country club membership card."

"What did you do?" I asked, sitting at my desk with a cup of coffee.

"I had her escorted out by building security after handing her a formal subpoena for a debtor's examination," Marcus replied smoothly. "Judge Holloway granted our motion. Next Tuesday morning, Diane has to sit in a deposition room under oath and explain every single financial transaction she made over the last five years."

The deposition was scheduled for ten o'clock on a sunny Tuesday in a neutral conference room on the tenth floor of our legal firm's building.

When Diane walked into the room accompanied by a timid, overworked defense attorney she had frantically hired at the eleventh hour, she looked like a queen forced to walk among commoners. Her chin was held high, her designer handbag clutched tightly in her lap, and her eyes burned with absolute contempt as she spotted me sitting across the table next to Marcus.

"You," Diane hissed, pointing a manicured finger at me as she sat down. "You ungrateful little leech. You tore this family apart over a petty squabble. You're going to pay for every single penny of legal fees I've had to spend defending myself against your malicious lies."

"Quiet, Mrs. Reeves," her attorney whispered anxiously, pulling on her sleeve. "Remember what we discussed. Keep your composure."

"Don't you dare shush me!" Diane snapped at her own lawyer, before turning her venomous glare back to me. "She manipulated my son! She brainwashed him into turning against his own mother!"

Marcus Sterling cleared his throat, tapping a pen against the thick folder of financial exhibits spread across the table. His voice cut through her tirade like a surgical blade.

"Mrs. Diane Reeves," Marcus said formally, looking straight into her eyes. "You are under oath. Let's begin with the thirty-eight thousand dollars transferred from your son's joint marital account into your personal checking on October twelfth of last year. Care to explain what emergency house repairs required that exact sum?"