My Husband Had a One-Year-Old Daughter While I Was Still Pregnant! Oops, Marriage Over Chapter 07

My Husband Had a One-Year-Old Daughter While I Was Still Pregnant! Oops, Marriage Over Chapter 07

With everything blown wide open, the mask finally slid off his mother’s face for good.

She glanced down at Derek on the floor, then let out a sharp, cold laugh. Her spine straightened. Every trace of the loving mother evaporated.

“Fine. Since you’ve dug up every last thing, I might as well say it to your face.”

She looked at me with the self-righteousness of someone who genuinely believed she was in the

right. “Yes, I was good to you. I treated you like my own daughter! But you’ve been married into this family for ten years and couldn’t produce a single child! What, you want the Ashford name to die

out?”

She actually believed this was all my fault. She jabbed her finger at me and let loose. “Megan may

not be in your league, but she gave me a granddaughter! I went over there to take care of my own flesh and blood-what’s wrong with that? My son is this talented and accomplished, and you expect him to spend the rest of his life tiptoeing around you without even leaving behind an heir?”

Derek shot to his feet and screamed at her, his voice cracking. “Mom! Shut up! Can you just stop!”

“Don’t you yell at me! Everything I did was for you!” She screamed right back, matching him

decibel for decibel.

I watched this mother and son tear into each other now that their lies had collapsed around them,

and I couldn’t be bothered to waste another word on either of them.

I stepped around them, walked straight into the bedroom, pulled open the drawers, and packed my

passport, my personal documents, and every piece of jewelry that was mine into a bag.

When I reached the front door, Derek threw himself against the doorframe, blocking my way.

“Zoe, please. Don’t go “He saw the bag in my hand and finally understood that I was done-truly,

irreversibly done. He was shaking from head to toe.

“Derek.” I looked into those terrified eyes of his and left him with two final sentences. “My father’s legal team and his forensic accountants will be at your office first thing tomorrow morning. Everything your family has taken from us-I’m going to claw back every last cent.”

I pushed him aside and walked out that door without looking back.

After I moved into my father’s house, the first thing I did was file for divorce.

Derek refused to sign. Refused to show up in court.

He probably figured that as long as he stalled, ten years of marriage would somehow buy him a

Second chance.

My father didn’t give him time to breathe.

He pulled every cent of the capital and every connection that had been propping Derek up, then airdropped an aggressive team of professional managers to take over the company’s actual

operations.

Derek was still technically a shareholder. But he’d been gutted. A figurehead with no power.

In the office, he used to be the guy who walked on water-the brilliant young CEO soaking up everyone’s admiration, especially the wide-eyed worship of girls like Megan.

Now he couldn’t approve a twenty-thousand-dollar expense report without groveling for permission from the new management team.

Business partners who had only ever been polite to him because of my father’s name couldn’t even bother to fake a smile anymore.

That fragile little ego of his was getting ground into the dirt, day after day after day.

And it wasn’t just at the office. His former sanctuary at Lakeview Estates had turned into a war

zone.