“If you want the children, take them. They’re only holding me back from starting over.”
Adrian Castillo said it barely five minutes after we signed the divorce papers, with the same indifference someone might use when talking about getting rid of old furniture instead of speaking about Noah and Lily, our children.
I sat across from the attorney’s polished walnut desk in a sleek office building downtown, watching the man I had spent ten years married to answer his phone with a smile I hadn’t seen directed at me in a very long time.
“Baby, it’s done,” he said, standing before the lawyer had even finished organizing the paperwork. “Yeah, I can still make the appointment. Today we finally get to meet the future heir.”
The heir.
Not “my son.” Not “our baby.” Just heir, as though the Castillo family were royalty instead of a toxic group of people pretending money made them important.
His sister, Vanessa, smirked from the chair beside him.
“Well, at least something good finally came out of all this mess,” she muttered.
I said nothing. I had already spent too many nights crying quietly. I cried when I found messages from Chloe. I cried when Adrian insisted she was “only a friend.” I cried when his mother told me a wise wife knows when not to ask questions.
But that morning, I didn’t feel devastated.
I felt free.
Adrian signed the final document without even glancing at it. Buried inside it was his agreement giving me primary custody and permission to travel abroad with the children. He was so eager to celebrate his mistress’s pregnancy that he didn’t bother checking what he was signing.
“So are we finished?” he asked impatiently, glancing at his watch. “My family’s waiting for me at the clinic.”
Attorney Bennett cleared his throat.
“Mr. Castillo, you should really review some of the financial conditions—”
“Later,” Adrian interrupted. “I’m not wasting energy fighting over condos or bank accounts. She can keep whatever she wants. I already have a new life waiting for me.”
Vanessa laughed under her breath.
“And a woman who can finally give him a real son.”
Something cracked in that moment, but it wasn’t my heart. It was the last trace of respect I still had left for any of them.
I reached into my purse and set a pair of keys on the table.
Adrian grinned.
“At least you’re being mature about the apartment.”
Then I pulled out two American passports.
His smile vanished instantly.
“What’s that?”
“Noah and Lily’s passports.”
Vanessa sat up straighter.
“Passports? For where?”
For the first time all morning, I looked Adrian directly in the eye.
“Barcelona. We leave today.”
He laughed sharply.
