My Mother Demanded I Divorce My Husband And Give Him Our House Because He Got My Sister Pregnant. Little Do They Know, I’m A Cfo And Have Already Secured The Assets. How Do I Tell Them They’re Now Trespassing On My Property?
Reinforcements
And then, as if summoned by my desperation, a yellow cab pulled up to my curb. A woman got out wrestling a giant leopard print suitcase and a soggy umbrella. Zoe. My college roommate, my maid of honor, the one who told me on my wedding day, “I give this 5 years, but I’ve got your back.”
She lived in Boston. I hadn’t called her yet because I was too ashamed, but here she was, marching up my front walk like a general arriving at the front lines.
I opened the door and before I could say a word, she dropped the suitcase, took one look at my tear-stained face, and said,
“I saw Barbara’s miracle baby post on Instagram. I’m here to help you bury the body.”
“Metaphorically or literally?”
“I brought a shovel.”
I burst into tears, but this time they were tears of relief. Zoe didn’t give me a gentle hug; she gave me a fierce one, like she was trying to hold my shattered pieces together through sheer force of will. She marched me into the living room, kicked off her shoes, and opened a bottle of wine I’d been saving for a special occasion.
“This is a special occasion,”
she declared, pouring two huge glasses.
“This is the day you finally woke up.”
We sat on the floor and I told her everything: the dinner, the trip, the text messages, the email from my father. When I showed her the email, Zoe didn’t get sad; she got incandescently angry. She paced my living room, gesturing wildly with her wine glass.
“Emotional distress for Barbara?”
she yelled.
“She slept with your husband! The only distress she should be feeling is the shame of being a horrible human being.”
“And your parents?”
“Veronica, I’ve been telling you they were toxic for 20 years, but this… this is a biblical level betrayal. They said they’d testify against me,”
I said quietly.
“They said I was abusive.”
“Let them,”
Zoe said, dropping to her knees in front of me and grabbing my shoulders.
“Listen to me, Veronica. Look at me. You are not the victim here. You are the bank. And they are terrified.”
“Terrified?”
I sniffled.
“They seem pretty confident.”
“It’s a bluff,”
Zoe said.
“Think about it. Greg has no job. Barbara has no job. Your parents are retired and living on a fixed income, plus whatever handouts you give them. If you turn off the money tap, they starve. They are attacking you because they need you to break before you realize you’re holding all the cards.”
She was right. I had been so focused on the emotional wound that I hadn’t looked at the strategic landscape.
“He wants the house,”
I said.
“He thinks it’s marital property.”
“Is it?”
Zoe asked. She knew I was meticulous about finances.
“Veronica, please tell me you didn’t put that loser’s name on the deed.”
I managed a weak smile.
“I bought the house before we were married. It’s titled in the name of an LLC, Miller Holdings. I did it for liability protection because of my job.”
Zoe’s eyes widened.
“The prenup. Please tell me you made him sign a prenup.”
“I did,”
I said.
“My boss at the time insisted. Greg signed it without reading it because he wanted to prove he didn’t care about the money. But I haven’t looked at it in 10 years. I don’t remember the specific clauses.”
“Then we find it,”
Zoe commanded.
“Tonight we find every piece of paper. We build a fortress. And tomorrow we launch the nuclear strike.”
We spent the next 4 hours turning my home office upside down. We found the prenuptial agreement in a safe in the back of the closet. We found the tax returns. We found the credit card statements I’d printed earlier.
As we worked, Zoe kept poking holes in my reality.
“He told you that you were barren?”
she asked, sorting through receipts.
“Veronica, didn’t you tell me once that Greg refused to get tested?”
I stopped.
“Yes. He said he knew his guys were fine. He wouldn’t go to the urologist. He said the problem was obviously me because of my stress.”
“Right,”
Zoe snorted.
“Or maybe the problem is him. And Barb got knocked up by the trainer at her gym and they’re pinning it on Greg because he has a rich wife.”
I froze. The thought hadn’t even occurred to me.
“Barbara wouldn’t… Greg wouldn’t be that stupid.”
“Greg is exactly that stupid,”
Zoe said.
“And Barbara is exactly that manipulative. We’re adding a paternity test to your list of demands.”
By 3 a.m. we had a mountain of evidence: the consulting fees that were actually gifts to Barbara, the timeline of the affair based on credit card location data, the prenuptial agreement which, upon rereading, contained a devastating infidelity clause.
I looked at the pile of paper. It was ugly. It was a chronicle of my foolishness and their greed. But it was also ammunition.
“You know what you have to do, right?”
Zoe said, pouring the last of the wine.
“You can’t just divorce him. You have to annihilate them. If you give them an inch, they will take everything. You have to go gray rock. No emotion. Just the law.”
“I know,”
I said. The grief was completely gone now, replaced by a cold resolve.
“I need a shark. Not a family lawyer. A shark.”
“Diana Sterling,”
Zoe said.
“She handled my cousin’s divorce. She eats cheating husbands for breakfast. I’m making you an appointment for 9:00 a.m.”
I looked at my phone. Another text from my father: We are waiting for your response, Veronica. Don’t make us come over there.
This time I typed a reply: I will respond through my attorney. Do not contact me again or I will file for harassment.
I hit send. Then I blocked his number.
“Good,”
Zoe said.
“Now get some sleep. Tomorrow we go to war.”
I lay down on the sofa, unable to go back to the bed Greg had defiled. I closed my eyes but I didn’t sleep. I visualized the plan. They wanted a villain? Fine. I would be a villain. I would be the worst nightmare they could possibly imagine: a woman who knew her worth and had the receipts to prove it.
