Midway through our most important investor dinner in Manhattan, my husband Daniel’s personal assistant Madison stood up, walked around the table, and slapped me hard across the face in front of eighteen executives, loudly announcing that if I didn’t know how to behave at a business function I should go sit with the rest of the waitstaff like I belonged.

Daniel’s car was idling at the curb outside the trust building.

Madison was already in the passenger seat, furiously texting on her phone. Her face was a mask of rage and humiliation. She had spent three years carefully constructing her future, and in the space of one dinner, Claire Bennett had smashed it to pieces.

Daniel got in behind the wheel.

He didn’t start the engine.

He just sat there.

Staring at the steering wheel.

“Drive,” Madison said.

Daniel didn’t move.

“She can’t do this,” he said, more to himself than to her. “She wouldn’t dare. The family would never let her destroy the company.”

Madison laughed.

It was an ugly sound.

“Wake up, Daniel,” she said. “She just did. And your precious family? They’re already on her side. You heard her. Uncle Robert has been feeding her information. How long has that been going on? How long have they all been watching you and waiting for you to make one mistake?”

He turned on her.

“This is your fault,” he snapped. “If you hadn’t slapped her—”

“Me?” Madison’s voice rose. “You told me she was harmless! You told me she was a doormat who would take anything rather than make a scene! You said once the deal closed we’d be free of her forever!”

“I was wrong,” he shouted. “Okay? I was wrong about her! I’ve been wrong about her for ten goddamned years!”

The silence in the car was thick enough to cut.

Madison looked at him.

Really looked at him.

For the first time, she saw him not as the handsome billionaire CEO who was going to make her dreams come true, but as what he really was. A weak man. A man who had never had to fight for anything in his life. A man who had gotten by on charm and a last name and the generosity of a wife he had never deserved.

And suddenly, she was afraid.

Not of Claire.

Of being tied to him when everything fell apart.

“Daniel,” she said, her voice calmer now. “We need a plan. Right now. Before she does any more damage.”

He shook his head.

“There is no plan. She controls the trust. Without the trust’s guarantee, the lenders pull out. Without the lenders, the Austin deal dies. Without the Austin deal, we default on the bridge loans. Game over.”

“Then we find another lender,” Madison said.

“Who? In ten days? Nobody touches Bennett Group without the trust behind it. That’s the whole point of the guarantee. Claire built that firewall ten years ago. She always said it was to protect the family. Turns out it was to protect the family from me.”

Madison pulled out her compact mirror.

Checked her cheek.

The redness was fading, but there would be a bruise tomorrow. Good. She could use that.

“There’s another way,” she said.

Daniel looked at her.

“What are you talking about?”

“The prenup,” she said.

Daniel’s eyes narrowed.

“What about it?”

“You told me it was ironclad. She gets the apartment on Fifth, the house in the Hamptons, five million in cash, and that’s it. No company stock. No trust access. Nothing else.”

“It is ironclad. Her father’s lawyers drew it up. I’ve had mine check it a dozen times. If we divorce, she walks away with almost nothing relative to what the family has.”

“Exactly,” Madison said. “So we file first. Tomorrow morning. Before she freezes everything. We hit her with divorce papers and a restraining order. She hit me, Daniel. In front of eighteen witnesses. We say she’s unstable. We say she’s been threatening you. We say she’s acting irrationally with the family’s money because she found out about us and snapped.”

Daniel stared at her.

The pieces were clicking into place.

“We get a sympathetic judge,” Madison continued. “We freeze her access to the trust accounts temporarily. Long enough for us to go to the lenders and say the guarantee is still valid because Claire’s not in her right mind. The committee won’t want a public fight. They’ll force her to back down. We close the Austin deal. And by the time she unfreezes everything, we’ve already restructured the debt so the trust can’t touch us.”

“It could work,” Daniel said slowly.

“It will work,” Madison said. “But we have to move fast. Before she files first.”

Daniel started the engine.

The car pulled away from the curb.

“Call my lawyer,” he said. “Tell him to meet me at the penthouse in an hour. Tell him to have the papers ready to file at nine a.m. And tell him I want the most aggressive judge in the city. I don’t care what it costs.”

Madison smiled.

She had him back.

He was listening to her again.

“Already done,” she said.

She texted something on her phone.

Hit send.

Then she put her hand on Daniel’s leg.

The same way she had in the photograph from St. Barts.

“Everything’s going to be fine, baby,” she said. “Claire Bennett is used to getting everything she wants. She’s never actually had to fight for anything in her life. She doesn’t know how. And when she realizes we’re not going to roll over and die? She’ll fold. Rich girls always do.”

Daniel didn’t answer.

He was thinking about something else.

Something Claire had said in the office.

I have the emails where you told Madison that once the Austin deal closed, you’d divorce me and cut the trust out entirely.

How had she gotten those emails?

He had deleted them.

All of them.

From his work account. From his personal account. From his phone.

Unless...

Unless she had someone on the inside.

Someone in IT.

Someone in his own office.