He Ignored My Dying Call, Now the Billionaire Begs for Me Back

Chapter 2 Ash and Ink

The heart monitor kept beeping after I woke. I stared at the ceiling and counted each sound until a nurse came in with a sedative.

“No,” I said.

Her eyes moved to the empty space beside my bed. No husband. No flowers. No tiny hospital bassinet.

She set the syringe aside.

As soon as she left, I pulled the IV from my hand. Blood spotted the tape. I dressed in the clothes salvaged from the wreck, though the fabric had dried stiff in places.

I took a taxi to the crematorium.

Julian had made no arrangements. I gave the attendant the forms myself and refused the polished wooden urn he showed me.

Inside my purse was a crystal vial no bigger than my thumb. I had bought it to hold our son’s first curl after his first haircut.

I put the vial on the counter.

“Use this.”

The attendant looked at it, then at me. He asked no questions.

When he returned, fine gray ash filled the cut glass. I wrapped both hands around it before putting it in my pocket.

The villa was quiet when I arrived. I passed the designer clothes, jewelry, and art Julian used when clients came to dinner. I left all of it where it was.

In his study, I moved the Rothko aside and opened the hidden safe.

The Vance Foundation’s offshore-account files were in the back. I stacked them on his desk with the crisis PR protocols for his latest hostile takeover.

Then I typed the passwords, key contacts, pending deadlines, and the names of the people holding the Sterling deal together.

It took an hour. When I finished, Julian had everything I had once managed for free.

The divorce agreement waited beneath the safe’s bottom folder.

My lawyer had drafted it six months ago, after Julian skipped our ultrasound and flew to Paris for Serena’s birthday. I had hidden it instead of using it.

This time I signed.

Chloe Evans.

The name looked right on the line.

In the master bathroom, I cut off the long blonde hair Julian loved. The first lock landed across the sink. The rest fell around my shoes.

My old residency coat was still at the back of a storage closet. The wool was worn at the cuffs and smelled faintly of antiseptic.

In one pocket, I placed the vial. In the other went Dr. Harris’s creased letter of recommendation.

That was all I took.

On the flight to Zurich, I switched on my phone. Messages from Julian’s assistant filled the screen, followed by missed calls from three board members.

A financial alert sat at the top: *Vance Group Stock Plummets Amidst Hostile Takeover Crisis*.

I turned the phone off and left it in the seat pocket.

Three days later, Julian walked into the villa. He had hung up while I was trapped and left our child to die. He still expected me to apologize for the trouble I had caused.