Chapter 4 - The Aftermath and the Ultimatum
By nine o’clock, the guests had gone home.
My parents had insisted on taking Hailey with them for the night, wrapping her safely in her pink blanket and shielding her innocent eyes and ears from the wreckage. Liam’s parents had left first, refusing to even look at their son as they stormed out to their Mercedes, muttering about legal counsel and family disgrace.
The dining room was a battlefield of untouched pumpkin pie and cold coffee cups.
Liam was sitting slumped in a chair at the end of the table, his head buried in his hands. The cedarwood cologne still clung to his clothes, a bitter reminder of the lie he had been living.
"Clara," he muttered through his fingers, his voice hoarse. "Please. We can talk about this. We have a baby. We can go to counseling. I was stupid, I was stressed, it meant nothing—"
"Who is she?" I asked quietly, cutting through his pathetic rambling like a scalpel.
Liam froze. He slowly lowered his hands, looking up at me with red, bloodshot eyes. "What?"
"The woman on the phone, Liam. Who is she? Is it someone from the firm? A client? Or is it Sarah from marketing?" I named the woman I had occasionally seen him mention in passing months ago.
His sudden, microscopic flinch confirmed my guess instantly. Sarah. The ambitious twenty-four-year-old account manager who had recently joined his floor.
"Clara... it was a mistake. A moment of weakness. She doesn't mean anything to me, I swear to God—"
"Save your breath," I said, walking over to the sideboard and picking up a manila folder I had prepared earlier that afternoon. I tossed it onto the table in front of him. It slid across the polished wood and stopped right against his chest.
Liam looked down at the folder with trembling fingers. He opened the cover. Inside were printed copies of phone records, credit card statements showing expensive dinners at downtown bistros on nights he claimed to be working late, and a preliminary draft of a divorce agreement.
"What... what is this?" he whispered, staring at the pages in sheer horror.
"This is the beginning of the end of our marriage," I said steadily, pulling out a chair and sitting down opposite him. I crossed my legs, resting my hands in my lap. "I’ve already spoken to a family law attorney. I didn't want to waste time, Liam. When a man tells you he hates you and plans to discard you like trash, you believe him the first time."
"You... you talked to a lawyer? When?!" He looked at me as if I had grown a second head.
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"While you were busy buying cheap tulips at the grocery store to cover up your guilt," I replied coldly. "I’m not going to scream, Liam. I’m not going to claw your eyes out or throw your clothes out on the lawn. I have a daughter to protect, and my dignity is worth far more than a protracted, messy war of attrition. But make no mistake: you are going to give me what I want, or I will make sure your firm, your colleagues, and your precious reputation learn all about the kind of man you really are."
Liam swallowed hard, the last remnants of his arrogance completely evaporated. He realized then that the sweet, quiet woman he thought he could walk all over had transformed into an adversary he could never defeat.
