Chapter 6 - The Debt Behind the Betrayal
Javier owed money.
A lot of it.
The development contract contained a personal guarantee tied to an advance he had already received.
The money was gone.
Gabriel traced the transactions over the following week.
Some had gone into Javier’s struggling consulting business.
Some had covered loans.
Some had funded a lifestyle I had mistakenly believed his company could afford.
The expensive dinners.
The new watch.
The weekend trips.
Even the anniversary gift he had given me.
Debt disguised as success.
The beach house wasn’t generosity toward his parents.
It was his escape route.
If he could move ownership away from me, he could unlock the development deal and solve his financial crisis.
At least temporarily.
I sat across from him one week later in Gabriel’s conference room.
Our attorneys were present.
Javier looked exhausted.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” I asked.
“You would have judged me.”
“I was your wife.”
“You loved security.”
“I loved honesty.”
“You loved your father more than me.”
I stared at him.
There it was again.
My dead father.
Always the rival.
“He’s dead, Javier.”
“And he still controls our lives.”
“No. He protected something that belonged to me.”
Javier laughed bitterly.
“Exactly.”
He still didn’t understand.
And when he pushed divorce papers across the table, I realized he never would.
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But the signature at the bottom revealed one final attempt to take what my father had left me.
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