Claire looked at him.
“I was going to.”
“With stolen money?”
“You were going to benefit!”
“That isn’t the point!”
For the first time, Derek looked less like a villain and more like what he actually was.
A young, arrogant idiot who had walked into a much older mess believing he was the smartest person in it.
He looked at me.
“She told me you abused her.”
That
stopped me.
“What?”
“She said you controlled everything. Money. Friends. Where she went.”
Claire shook her head.
“Derek—”
“She said
you hit her once.”
I looked at my wife.
Fourteen years.
Never.
Not once.
Not even when she threw a wineglass at me during the worst year of our marriage.
“Did you tell him that?”
Claire said nothing.
