He threw me out on the street after inheriting 75 million, believing I was a burden. But when the lawyer read the final clause, his triumphant smile turned into a face of panic.

We had been married for ten years. Ten years in which I, Vanessa, had given everything I had. I wasn’t just a wife—I was his support, his shadow, and for the last three years, I was his father’s full-time nurse.

My father-in-law, Mr. Arthur, was a real estate tycoon, an iron man who built a $75 million empire from scratch. But cancer doesn’t respect bank accounts. When he fell ill, his son—my husband, Curtis—was too busy with his “important meetings,” his golf outings, and his friends who talked louder than they listened. He said watching his father wither away was “too depressing,” and that he needed to “protect his mindset.”

So I took charge.

I cleaned up Arthur’s vomit, listened to his war stories when the morphine made him hallucinate, read him the newspaper every morning, and held his hand when the fear of death gripped him in the early hours. Curtis would appear from time to time, impeccably dressed, to pat his father’s shoulder and ask, “Did he say anything about the will today?”

I didn’t want to see Curtis’s coldness. I loved him. Or so I thought. I told myself his distance was a defense mechanism. How naive I was.

The day Arthur died, the world stopped for me. I had lost a father I’d learned to love. But for Curtis, it seemed as if the world had just begun. At the funeral, he wept—oh yes, he wept with Oscar-worthy elegance, dabbing his tears with a silk handkerchief while glancing sideways at his father’s business associates, calculating the value of the suits they were wearing.

Two days after the burial, the mask fell off.

I arrived home after taking care of the cemetery arrangements, exhausted, my eyes swollen. I found my suitcases in the entryway. They weren’t packed carefully—my clothes were crammed in, sleeves dangling, shoes scattered on the floor.

“Curtis?” I called, confused.

He came downstairs. He wasn’t in mourning. He wore a crisp shirt, expensive watch, and held a glass of champagne. He looked radiant—and terrifying.

—Vanessa, sweetheart—he said, his voice dripping with sweet poison—I think it’s time for you to go your own way.

“What are you talking about?” I asked, dropping my keys.

“I’m talking about my father’s death. The old man’s finally at rest.” He took a sip from his glass. “And that means I’m the sole heir. Seventy-five million dollars, Vanessa. Do you have any idea what that means?”