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Chapter 31- Mark

The curtains she had loved were the first thing to go.

I’m not entirely sure why I started with them—maybe because they’d witnessed everything and done nothing when she walked out. Maybe because destroying something she’d chosen felt like the beginning of justice.

My heart hammered in my chest as I tore them straight off the rods, listening to the metal rings clatter against the hardwood floor like scattered bones. When I threw them across the living room, they landed in a heap.

It felt wrong, but I could do what I fucking wanted—this wasmyhouse. Every inch of it—the design, the renovations, the furniture—paid for with my money.

I picked up a lamp next, hurling it with enough force to shatter the base into jagged white fragments across the floor. The destruction felt good. Necessary.

In the hallway, our wedding photo still sat on the table.

I stared at it for a beat too long before slamming the frame against the wall.

Glass bit into my palm, but I barely felt it. Physical pain was nothing compared to the hollow, gnawing betrayal in my chest—the kind I couldn’t out-argue, out-earn, or drink away.

“She made a fool out of me,” I muttered, pacing like I was cross-examining ghosts. “Fucking played me.”

By morning, everybody at my firm would know—because Jenny didn’t know how to keep her bleached blonde mouth shut.

I should’ve never fucked a secretary.

I threw my head back and screamed. The sound that came out was animalistic.

I had given Zane everything—security, a respected name, a life without struggle.

And now?

Now she was playing house with some blue-collar nobody who thought swinging a hammer made him a man.

I ripped the throw pillows from the couch and hurled them across the room, knocking over the Charleston vase she’d insisted we buy.

When that wasn’t enough, I punched the drywall.

She thought she could just be with him and disappear.

I wouldn’t let her.

“You think this ends because you sent me some papers, you fucking bitch!”

Blood dripped from my cut palm.

I wrapped it in a dish towel, pulling it tight until the skin beneath turned white.

“This isn’t over,” I said to the empty room. “You think I’ll vanish from your life like some bad memory? That’s not how this works.”

Down the hall, I opened the safe.

My .45 sat inside.

I didn’t reach for it—just stared, contemplating.

Dark thoughts lingered in the back of my mind.

I could kill both of them.

I sat there, staring at the gun for longer than I should have before forcing myself back into the living room.