I had read every single line of our prenuptial agreement.
And more importantly, I knew exactly what mandatory medical protocol had been triggered the moment five infants were pulled from a single mother.
For the first twelve months, Richard pretended we were dead.
His high-priced legal team sent heavy manila envelopes to my small apartment with cruel, mechanical efficiency. There were expedited divorce papers citing “irreconcilable differences.” There were heavy-handed defamation threats promising ruin if I spoke to the media. There was a formal cease-and-desist demand that I legally drop the Sterling name and revert to my maiden name immediately.
Victoria, playing the role of the aggrieved matriarch, arranged highly publicized interviews with Boston’s elite society magazines. She delicately referred to our marriage as “a tragic, brief chapter” and painted herself as “a fierce mother protecting her naive son from a grifter.”
Richard seamlessly transitioned into the role of the wounded, handsome prince of Boston real estate. Society wives threw their daughters at him.
He remarried exactly eighteen months after walking out of that hospital room.
Her name was Eleanor Vale, a blonde, impossibly thin charity board favorite whose family owned a string of luxury hotels. She wore diamonds like they were medieval armor. On the day of their lavish, two-million-dollar wedding, a paparazzi reporter shouted over the velvet ropes, asking Richard if he and Eleanor planned on having children.
Richard smiled warmly for the flashing cameras. “Real ones, someday. Yes.”
I watched that specific video clip at two in the morning. I was sitting on my worn living room rug, feeding two screaming babies with propped-up bottles while rocking a third in a bouncer with my bare foot.
