On the day of her mother's funeral, Beth Cox's husband didn't show.
Beth stood in the funeral home lobby, clutching the urn, and sent him ninety-nine sixty-second voice messages before he finally rushed in, still wearing the court robes he hadn't had time to change out of.
The moment she saw Melvin, the floodgates opened. She couldn't help it. The words poured out of her in a torrent of hurt and accusation, one grievance tumbling over the next.
Melvin rubbed his temples with a pained expression, but he stood there and let her go on for half an hour before he finally spoke:
"Don't be upset. I was swamped today. I'll go with you to the cemetery right now, okay?"
"What good is coming now? When they were cremating my mother, when I needed you most, where were you?"
Beth's face flushed deep red. Her fists clenched at her sides, and she looked ready to launch into another round, fully prepared to keep going until she'd said every last word.
But Melvin frowned, something he rarely did, and raised a hand to cut her off:
"Your mother has passed. The cremation is done. What's the point of all this? Will it bring her back? I have an important wedding to attend tonight. I'm running late. I need to go."
Beth stared at him, eyes wide.
She couldn't comprehend it. Today was the day they laid her mother to rest, and he was leaving for a wedding.
She chased him to his car, her voice cracking with fury: "Melvin Henson, if you go watch someone else get married today, tomorrow you'll be watching us get divorced!"
Divorce. She'd lost count of how many times that word had left her mouth.
Everyone in Harbor City knew that Beth Cox, heiress to the Cox Group, was stunningly beautiful and impeccably pedigreed, but she was also a notorious chatterbox. Give her any topic, any person, and she could talk circles around them for hours, refusing to stop until she'd made her point.
Her family adored her. The people around her indulged her. So whatever she said went, and no one dared push back.
Melvin might have been a famous attorney, legendary for his silver tongue, but even he was powerless against her. The moment she dropped the word "divorce," he'd surrender on the spot and coax her back with soft words.
Beth waited for Melvin to step out of the car and soothe her. Instead, she turned and found herself face to face with a striking, ice-cold beauty.
The woman wore a perfectly tailored suit and gold-rimmed glasses, a stack of files pressed against her chest. Her expression carried the detached severity of someone perpetually on the clock.
"Mrs. Henson, don't you think you're being a little unreasonable today?"
"Attorney Henson took on a major case today. Three lives and tens of millions of dollars in financial disputes. Your messages were pinging nonstop in the middle of his court session. He rushed here the moment he finished, and you're still going after him like this. Tell me, which matters more: the victims who are still alive, or your mother who's already gone?"
That single remark nearly choked the words right out of Beth's throat.
Beth recognized her. Jeanette Pruitt, a recent intern at Melvin's firm. Melvin himself had said the girl lacked talent and wasn't worth investing in. When had she started keeping her at his side?
Melvin stepped out of the car and gently took the files from Jeanette's hands, smiling at her with a look full of warmth and admiration.
Beth's chest seized. Her eyes locked onto Jeanette, and she trembled with rage:
"You're nothing but an intern working under my husband. Since when do you get to lecture me?"
Jeanette offered a thin smile, adjusted her gold-rimmed glasses, and let her gaze drift toward Melvin:
"Mrs. Henson, first of all, I'm not an intern anymore. Attorney Henson has made me his partner and personal assistant. I'm not like you, chattering away all day until he can't stand it. I actually help him. In his work and in his life."
"Second, Attorney Henson spends every day in court, talking and listening for hours on end. When he's off the clock, all he wants is a little peace and quiet. I wonder if Mrs. Henson is simply too rich and too idle, which is why she's always so relentless and overbearing."
Beth saw the undisguised contempt in Jeanette's eyes and raised her hand, ready to slap that look right off her face.
A strong hand caught her wrist. Melvin's brow was furrowed, his eyes dark and heavy as they bore into her:
"Enough! Beth, you're not just running your mouth like a shrew anymore. You're starting to act like one too."
"Jeanette is the most important person by my side right now. I won't let you lay a finger on her."
The words drove through Beth's chest like a blade. Pain spread outward from the wound, so sudden and so total that her legs nearly buckled. She shook like a leaf caught in a gale.
His grip was crushing, as though he meant to grind her bones to dust.
He called her a shrew, yet he called Jeanette by her first name, soft and familiar.
So that was it. His absence today, the sudden shift in his demeanor, all of it traced back to this woman, who had somehow, at some point she couldn't name, become "the most important person by his side."
Once, Melvin had said those same words about Beth.
Years ago, the first time they met, Melvin was a fresh law school graduate. His very first client was unhappy with the outcome and stormed into the firm, berating him until he stood there red-faced and speechless.
Beth happened to be passing by. She couldn't just watch, so she stepped in and argued with the client, her quick tongue firing so fast and so sharp that the man eventually sputtered into silence and gave up.
After the client left, Melvin wiped the sweat from his forehead and looked at her with pure gratitude:
"Thank you. If you hadn't been here, who knows how long that would've dragged on. You were incredible. I've always admired women who can talk like that."
Beth's face turned crimson. Every wealthy young man her family had set her up with over the years had fled within ten minutes, unable to handle how much she talked.
She'd failed ninety-nine blind dates. She'd all but given up, resigned to growing old alone.
And here was someone who didn't just tolerate her. He admired her for the very thing everyone else ran from. It felt like fate.
Soon, all of Harbor City knew that the Cox heiress was making no secret of dating a nobody junior attorney, parking her Ferrari outside his office every day, tagging along to eat street food from sidewalk carts.
The Cox family objected at first. But Beth talked at her parents day and night, going on and on about how wonderful Melvin was, how driven, how special, swearing she would marry him or no one.
Eventually, her parents gave in. They didn't just accept Melvin; they threw the family's resources and connections behind him. Combined with his own talent and relentless drive, he shot to prominence in just a few years, opening his own firm and winning the Bar Association's Elite Attorney Award.
After the wedding, Beth still talked as much as ever, and Melvin would sit there with a patient smile, listening.
But gradually, flickers of impatience crept in. Whenever they did, Beth got upset, because she believed communication was the most important thing between husband and wife.
So every time, she'd remind him by threatening divorce.
Melvin had long since learned the routine. All he had to do was pull her into his arms and say, "Alright, alright, I'm listening, okay?" and the tears would dissolve into a smile.
After all, she loved him that much. She would never actually go through with it.
But now, the woman who always had too much to say stood as if something had closed around her throat. Tears welled in her eyes. She stared at him for a long time before forcing out two dry, hollow words: "I want a divorce."
Melvin let out a cold laugh, turned around, opened the car door, and placed a protective hand over Jeanette's head as she ducked inside. "Get in, Jeanette. We need to get to the wedding. You still have to change into your gown."
Then, without so much as a backward glance, he said to Beth: "Fine. We'll talk about it when I get home tonight."
The black Maybach pulled away and vanished down the road. Beth stood where he'd left her, trembling.
She felt like she should say something. But she found she had nothing left to say.
Every urge to speak, every word she'd ever stored up, dissolved into nothing.
She lowered her head and texted her best friend overseas: "I'm going to divorce Melvin. After it's done, I'll come to you. Your jewelry design company still has an opening, right?"
Beth had studied jewelry design. She was extraordinarily gifted, but she'd turned down her friend's invitations again and again for Melvin's sake, passing up chance after chance at international recognition.
Her friend replied almost instantly: "Beth, come on. You say this every time, and every time you end up right back by his side. You two are married. Just sit down and talk it out!"
Beth smiled bitterly. There was nothing left to talk about.
She typed one more message: "I mean it this time. One month from now, I'll be done with him for good."
