Margaret doesn’t flinch. Her voice is cool, measured—the voice of someone who has sat across from a hundred Julians. “Specific behaviors cited include psychological manipulation, gaslighting, financial control, and patterns of coercive conductthat systematically undermined my client’s autonomy over the course of the marriage. These are detailed in the petition.”
Julian turns sharply toward her, his chair scraping against the floor. “Oh, please.” His voice drips with scorn. “Are you just parroting whatever she told you? Did she even tell you the truth? Did she mention she lived like a queen? Everything was provided for.Everything.”
I flinch.
Margaret does not. Her voice remains level, but firmer now. “Mr. Ashworth, I would remind you that we are here to negotiate the terms of a dissolution, not to litigate the merits of your defense in this room. I would ask you to lower your voice and address the matter at hand.”
But Julian only turns fully toward me, his focus narrowing. “What’s the real reason you’re doing this?” he demands, his voice cutting. “Huh? Tell me. What is it?”
I hold his stare. My eyes don’t waver. My chin stays up. I spent years looking away, making myself small, avoiding his gaze.
I’m not that woman anymore.
He leans in further, elbows planted on the table. “Is it because of that man? Kieran. That’s his name, isn’t it? The one standing beside you at the café. He was far too close to you. Are you seeing him?”
He had an affair with another woman for months, and now he is questioningmebecause a man stood beside me in a public place.
Julian keeps going, faster now, his composure shredding. “Were you cheating on me with him? Just tell me. Because if you were—God—here I was, feeling guilty for months when I didn’t even have to! Is that what this is? Is that thetruth?”
His lawyer finally grips his arm, hard. “Julian. That’s enough.”
But Julian yanks his arm away. “This is insane. She’s accusing me of emotional abuse when she’s the one who—”
Margaret looks at him then. “Mr. Ashworth, I would note that your current outburst is doing more to substantiate our claims than to refute them.”
Julian goes still.
For a moment.
Then he sinks back into his chair, breathing hard, his eyes locked on mine with a furious, wounded heat.
Margaret folds her hands on the table. “As previously proposed, we are offering a settlement that includes spousal support for a transitional period of eighteen months, our client retaining her personal savings and all future income, and an uncontested dissolution. If both parties sign, this matter can be resolved privately, without proceeding to a contested hearing.”
Margaret has asked me in her office if I wanted to fight for my father’s assets too. Take back the properties and accounts that should have come to me, that would have come to me, if my father hadn’t signed everything over to Julian instead. She told me I had a claim.
I told her no.
If I fight, this never ends. I’d be stuck in the same cycle, waking up every other day to battle him again and again until he finally gave in. I don’t want to do that.
I only want to fight to be free of him. That’s all I want. I would trade every last thing I never had for that single word: free.
Besides, I don’t want anything from my father. It feels tainted. Blood money. A settlement for the abuse I endured. My suffering with a price tag, and someone had finally decided to pay it.
I don’t want his money.
I want to walk down a street and not feel my shoulders tighten every time a car slows behind me. I want to wake up inthe morning and choose my own day—what I eat, where I go, how I spend the hours that belong only to me.
I want tolive.
That is all.
That is everything.
His father speaks for the first time, his voice low and tight. “I can’t believe George’s daughter is dragging us to a place like this. He must be turning in his grave.”
George’s daughter. NotNora. My father’s name still carries more weight than my own.
The man who terrorized me continues to erase me.
