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He stared at me.
Then his arrogance disappeared.
“What do you want?”
Years earlier, I might have answered love.
Respect.
Honesty.
An apology.
Now the answer came easily.
“Nothing from you.”
His face twitched.
“There has to be something.”
“There isn’t.”
“You destroyed our entire life.”
I leaned back.
“Grant, our life was destroyed before I discovered Sabrina.”
He frowned.
“It ended when you started describing my work as your achievement.”
His expression shifted.
“You’re still angry about that?”
That question almost broke my heart.
Not because it hurt.
Because he truly did not understand.
“That question is the reason this marriage could never have survived.”
He stared down at the table.
“I was jealous of you.”
The confession surprised me.
He laughed bitterly.
“There. Does that make you happy?”
“No.”
“You walked into rooms and people trusted you. They trusted the numbers because you had checked them. They trusted the plans because you had drawn them. I had to make people look at me.”
I stayed silent.
“So I made myself bigger.”
“At my expense.”
“Yes.”
He finally met my eyes.
“And Sabrina made me feel like I was already the man I kept pretending to be.”
There was the truth.
Late.
Small.
Useless.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered.
I believed him.
It changed nothing.
Forgiveness and restoration are not the same thing.
“I hope you become someone who understands why you’re sorry,” I said.
Then I stood.
Grant looked up.
“That’s it?”
“Yes.”
“Fourteen years and that’s it?”
I paused at the door.
“No, Grant.”
I looked back.
“Fourteen years is exactly why this is it.”
PART 5 — THE VERDICT
The criminal case lasted eleven months.