He used to say that whenever he was tired, all he had to do was lie down on this couch and every memory of our life together would come flooding back.
He wouldn't even let his own mother sit on it.
But now, he and Nora had been tangled up on it together.
And he wanted me to deal with the dirty sheets.
Because I was good at it.
When he saw me standing there frozen, he urged：
“Nora's a neat freak. She can't stand the smell.”
The lingering scent hit me before it could fully dissipate, and my stomach turned.
“James, what exactly do you think I am?”
He paused mid-step and answered without a shred of shame：
“My wife, obviously!”
I hurled the sheets at his face.
Then I sent the prenup and the video of him admitting to the affair straight to my lawyer.
“James, I want a divorce!”
He frowned and sighed, then started changing the sheets himself.
“This divorce talk is getting old.”
A man who couldn't figure out a fitted sheet at home had the sofa bed re-made in minutes.
More practiced than I'd ever been.
“Oh, right. I signed you up for a premium nanny training course so you can take care of Nora through the birth!”
“Don't let me down.”
So that was why he wouldn't agree to a divorce. He wanted a free servant.
I was speechless, but he was already heading for the conference room.
Peter caught up with him, his voice low and worried：
“Mr. Gilbert, treating your wife this way, what if she makes a scene?”
“A scene?”
“She'd rather take hundreds of injections than give me a child. What right does she have to make a scene?”
“Besides, a woman who refuses to have kids? Without me, who'd want her?”
His voice was pitched just right, loud enough for every employee nearby to hear.
The looks they gave me ranged from contempt to amusement to pity……
Nora sidled up to me, oozing fake concern：
“Madge, James still remembers everything you went through for him. Why not quit while you're ahead?”
Oh, he remembered what I'd endured, all right.
He was punishing me for it.
I ignored Nora and walked to the print room.
She trailed behind me and caught sight of the words DIVORCE AGREEMENT. Shock and delight flickered across her face.
Two seconds of reading, and her voice dropped to a hiss：
“Madge Rowe! What makes you think you can force James to leave with nothing?”
“His affair. That's what.”
A sharp crack echoed through the room.
Nora slapped herself across the face, twice, and in the process knocked over a bottle of red ink.
Then she dropped to the floor, sitting in the spreading pool of crimson：
“You won't even give James a child! You're the one who should leave with nothing! If I weren't so generous, you'd never have been Mrs. Gilbert in the first place!”
Generous. Again.
She and James really were a perfect match.
The next second, she scrambled out of the print room on her hands and knees, face twisted in terror, and screamed：
“Madge, I already agreed to terminate the pregnancy! Why are you still hitting me?”
Her screams brought James running.
He took one look at Nora's wrecked state, then rounded on me, roaring：
“Madge Rowe! I trusted you, and you lay hands on Nora and my son?”
Nora clutched her stomach, tears streaming down her face：
“James, it's my fault for being so naive. I thought Madge was just afraid of the pain and didn't want to have a baby herself, so I offered to carry one for her as a way of repaying her kindness. I never imagined she'd use it as an excuse to make you leave with nothing……”
“I told her that marriage means something, that she shouldn't let me come between you two, and she slapped me and said the bastard in my belly deserved to die……”
I'd expected Nora to pull something. My phone had been recording the whole time.
I was about to show James the video when he saw the words "leaving with nothing" on the divorce agreement and backhanded me across the face.
My phone hit the floor and the screen went black.
“If I didn't want to give you a painless path to motherhood, I'd have kept Nora and the baby hidden from you forever!”
