Chapter 9
Six months after the divorce was finalized, I got a call from Amanda.
“There’s something you need to see,” she said.
I met her at her office.
She had a file on her desk.
Her face was serious.
“What is it?”
She pushed the file toward me.
“Remember when we were going through Michael’s finances? We found something… unusual. A life insurance policy. On you.”
I felt my blood run cold.
“What?”
“$750,000. Taken out two years ago. Michael is the sole beneficiary.”
I opened the file.
There it was.
In black and white.
A life insurance policy.
On my life.
Worth three-quarters of a million dollars.
With my husband as the beneficiary.
The husband who’d been cheating on me for three years.
The husband who’d wanted me gone.
“He never told me about this,” I whispered.
“I know. And that’s not all. We found evidence that he’d been researching… accidents. Fatal accidents. Things that could happen to someone like you. Car crashes. Home invasions. That kind of thing.”
I felt sick.
Truly, physically sick.
“Are you saying he was planning to kill me?”
Amanda’s voice was gentle but firm.
“I’m saying we have evidence that suggests he was thinking about it. Planning for it. Maybe even preparing for it.”
She paused.
“The good news is, we’ve already frozen the policy. He can’t collect on it. And we’ve turned all the evidence over to the police.”
“The police?”
“They’re investigating. For attempted conspiracy to commit murder. It’s a long shot, but given the evidence… there’s a chance.”
I sat back in my chair, trying to process what I was hearing.
My husband.
The father of my child.
Had potentially been planning to kill me.
For money.
For my sister.
For the life he thought he deserved.
I thought about all the times I’d gotten in the car and wondered if the brakes felt right.
All the times I’d heard a noise in the house at night and thought it was just the wind.
All the times Michael had insisted I go somewhere alone.
Had he been waiting for his chance?
Had he been planning it?
The thought made my skin crawl.
But then I thought about something else.
The night Diane slapped me.
The night everything came out.
If Sarah hadn’t called at that exact moment.
If Diane hadn’t been so angry that she’d spilled the secret.
Would I be here today?
Would I be alive?
A chill ran down my spine.
Diane had saved my life.
In her own twisted, horrible way.
By being too angry to keep the secret.
By being too cruel to let Michael get away with his lies.
She’d exposed the affair.
And in doing so, she’d possibly saved me from something much worse.
The irony was almost too much to bear.
“What happens now?” I asked.
“Now the police investigate. Michael will be questioned. He might be charged. He might not. But either way, the policy is gone. He can’t hurt you for money anymore. And with the supervised visitation, he can’t get close to you or Emma without witnesses.”
I nodded.
I should have been scared.
Terrified, even.
But I wasn’t.
I was angry.
Furious that this man had taken so much from me.
And now this.
But I was also relieved.
Relieved that I knew.
Relieved that I was safe.
Relieved that Emma was safe.
We’d gotten away.
May you like
We’d survived.
And that was what mattered.
