Mark blinked, his pen hovering over his notepad. He looked at me with wide, concerned eyes. “Maureen? You... are you sure? It’s only been a week since the... since the accident.”
“It wasn't an accident,” I said, my voice flat. “Just do it, Mark. Please.”
He sighed, leaning back in his chair. He rubbed his temples. “Okay. I’ll keep it a secret for a while. I won’t file them immediately. But Maureen... think about this.”
He gestured to me, to my pale skin, my thin frame.
“Where would you go?” he asked gently. “You lost everything now. You quit your job. You sold your apartment. You only have him, remember?”
I stared at the floor. He was right. Brandon had slowly stripped me of everything. My independence. My career. My friends. He had made himself my entire world, so that when he decided to destroy it, I would have nowhere to fall.
“He used to love you so much,” Mark continued, his voice soft, trying to be the voice of reason. “What happened? I’ve never seen a man more devoted. Remember when you were sick last year? He didn't leave your side for three days.”
I closed my eyes.
I remembered.
Four years. That’s how long I lived in his lie.
I remembered the perfection. The way he looked at me across a crowded room. The way he would drop everything for a whim. Once, I mentioned I craved a specific chocolate from Belgium. He didn't just order it. He flew there. He abandoned a million-dollar negotiation to hand-deliver a box of truffles, just to see me smile.
He was the husband who carried me when I was tired. The man who swore I was his religion. “I’d burn the world for you, Maureen.”
But he didn't burn the world. He burned me.
It was all a performance. A mask to hide the monster.
The soup he fed me probably had the same poison in it. The care was just control. The love was just a cage.
The image of him laughing about our dead baby flashed in my mind, overriding every sweet memory, turning them into ash.
I opened my eyes. The tears I thought I had run out of were threatening to spill, but I wouldn't let them. Not for him. Not anymore.
I stood up, smoothing down my coat.
“Just process it, Mark. I want it in a week,” I said, my voice shaking but resolute. “Because I’m going to move to another country.”