“My house.”
Nobody challenged her.
Certainly not Nolan.
Why would they?
Edwin had been the owner.
Vivian had been his wife.
Everyone assumed the property had passed to her.
That assumption became the foundation of everything that happened next.
And it was wrong.
I discovered the truth nearly three years later.
Vivian had decided Edwin’s old study needed to be “properly cleared.”
Naturally, she delegated that task to me.
By then I had stopped working.
Before marrying Nolan, I had been a paralegal at a mid-sized firm in Marlowe City.
I liked the job.
I was good at it.
But Nolan’s career began demanding more travel, more dinners, more weekends with clients.
Vivian repeatedly suggested that a Hartwell wife did not need to “chase a salary.”
Eventually Nolan agreed.
“We can afford it.”
“That isn’t the point.”
“You complain that we never see each other.”
