Chapter 18 - The Key to the Safe
|
I stood over my husband as he wept on the floorboards, feeling no triumph, no malice, and no joy.
Just a deep, profound sadness for the ten years we had lost to an illusion.
I reached into my trench coat pocket and pulled out a small brass key and a white index card with six digits written on it.
I walked over to the mahogany coffee table and laid them down side by side.
"What is that?" Graham whispered, his voice muffled against the floor before he slowly raised his head.
"The key unlocks the wall panel in your study," I said quietly. "The numbers on the card are the new combination to the safe."
Graham looked at the card, his breath coming in jagged, painful hitches. "What did you engrave on the back of the watch, Elena? Martin said you engraved something."
I looked toward the grand front doors, where the headlights of my driver's car flickered through the rain-streaked glass.
"Go upstairs and read it yourself, Graham," I said softly.
"Are you coming with me?" he begged, reaching out a trembling hand toward my ankle. "Just come upstairs with me... let me open it in front of you..."
"No," I said, stepping back out of his reach. "I’ve already spent seven months with that watch. It's yours now."
I picked up my leather travel bag.
"Elena, please!" Graham scrambled to his feet, reaching for my arm, but I turned and looked at him with a quiet, absolute authority that stopped him dead in his tracks.
May you like
"Do not follow me to the car, Graham," I said, my voice steady as stone. "You spent ten years enjoying a life that existed only because I loved you. Now you get to see what your life looks like when I only love myself."
I turned my back on him, walked down the long marble hallway, and opened the heavy brass doors of the estate.
