“I expected that if you stopped loving me, you would have the basic human decency to tell me.”
“It wasn’t that simple!”
Mariana pulled out her phone and showed him the message Chloe had forwarded. “‘Where is she going to go? She doesn’t know how to survive on her own.’ Was that complicated, too?”
Alejandro stared at the screen, his face darkening. “I was angry when I typed that.”
“You were also angry when you told my colleagues to stay away from me.”
Alejandro blinked. “What?”
“Laura came to this house twice after the funeral,” Mariana said coldly. “Andrew called. You told them both that hearing about the hospital caused me to have psychological relapses.”
“I was trying to protect you!”
“I never asked you to protect me from my friends.”
“You don’t remember what state you were in!”
“I remember exactly what state I was in seven years ago,” Mariana said, taking a step toward him. “What I want to know is why you were still telling those exact same lies five, six, seven years later.”
Alejandro had nothing to say.
“You also told Sergio that you routinely passed up career opportunities because of my ‘panic attacks,’” she added. “You turned my grief into a convenient professional excuse for your own failures.”
Alejandro sneered and gestured toward the open suitcase. “Are you going to pack your bags and leave then?”
“No,” Mariana said smoothly. “That suitcase is for you. You’re leaving.”
Alejandro stared at her, then laughed sharply in disbelief. “To where? This is my home!”
“I bought this condo five years before I met you, Alejandro. The deed is in my name alone.”
“We’ve lived here together for fifteen years!”
“And it ends today.”
Alejandro’s face flushed deep red. “Do you honestly think you can handle everything on your own?! The mortgage, the HOA fees, the taxes, the maintenance?! You won’t last a single week!”
A week earlier, those words might have terrified her.
Now Mariana finally heard them for what they were.
Not a warning.
A desperate attempt to keep her small.
