SCORNED EX WIFE : Queen Of Ashes Novel – CAMILLE’S POINT OF VIEW 001 Three years. One thousand and ninety-five days of trying to be the perfect wife, and this was my reward divorce papers on our anniversary. “Sign here. And here.” Stefan’s voice was distant, businesslike.
He’d laid out the divorce papers like contracts at one of his meetings, sticky tabs marking each signature line. “The highlighted sections need initials.” My hands wouldn’t stop shaking. “You’re doing this today? On our anniversary?” I stared at Stefan’s perfect signature on the last page, the ink still fresh. He must have signed them this morning, probably right after I’d left that st**id handmade card on his desk. The one I’d spent hours making, like a f**l who still believed in fairy tales.
The anniversary card I made for my husband Stefan still sat on the kitchen counter, untouched. Three years of marriage summed up in a handmade gesture he couldn’t even bother to open. I’d spent hours on it last night, writing words I thought mattered. My coffee had gone cold. Funny how you notice small things when your world is falling apart. “Camille.” He sighed, that familiar sound of disappointment I’d heard so many times before.
“There’s no point dragging this out.” The morning sun streamed through our kitchen windows, catching the diamond on my finger. Three carats, princess cut, picked out by his mother. “Not your style, dear, but it’s what a Rodriguez wife should wear,” she’d said at the time. Like everything else in my life, it had never really been mine. “Is there someone else?” The question hung in the air between us. Stefan straightened his tie, Italian silk, the blue one I’d given him for Christmas. “Yes.” One word.
That’s all it took to erase three years of trying to be perfect. “How long?” “Two months.” He wouldn’t meet my eyes. “She came back to town and…” “Two months,” I repeated. All those late nights at the office. The missed dinners. The way he’d stopped ki**ing me goodbye in the mornings.