Signed Mrs. Sterling Chapter 06
That night, I returned to our Fifth Avenue penthouse to pack my bags.
In the living room, Henry was curled up on the sofa, clutching the new tablet Vanessa had bought him. The floor around him was littered with potato chip and candy wrappers.
That kind of junk food used to be contraband in our house. Now, it was scattered across the carpet like trophies of war.
Henry didn’t even look up when he heard me dragging my suitcase down the stairs.
“Vanessa said I can eat as much as I want, as long as I’m happy,” he mumbled, his mouth full of candy. “Only a control freak like you would tell me not to eat sugar.”
“Well, if your dad’s okay with it, you better hope your dentist is too,” I replied coldly.
Henry’s head snapped up, his eyes wide with shock. He wasn’t used to a mother who didn’t bend to his every whim.
I ignored him and walked over to the console table in the foyer.
I slipped the five-carat diamond ring off my finger.
Harrison thought I didn’t know, but I’d seen the old magazine interview.
The ring’s design was inspired by a “lost love.”
He had commissioned the diamond two years before proposing to me. It had been made for Vanessa.
For five years, I had worn someone else’s ring, played someone else’s understudy.
I dropped the ring into its blue velvet box with a sharp click. Next to it, I placed the keys to the penthouse.
As I pulled my suitcase past Henry, he suddenly jumped off the sofa and blocked my path.
“Where are you going?” His voice held a hint of panic, but it was mostly bravado.
“Your father and I are divorced, Henry. From now on, you get to live with your favorite person, Vanessa. Isn’t that your birthday wish? Congratulations, it came true.”
Henry’s little face scrunched up, and he screeched like a cornered cat.
“You have nothing! Without my dad, you can’t even afford an Uber!”
“Fine! Go! I can’t wait to live with Vanessa! She’s way cooler than you! She’s an artist, and you’re just a boring housewife!”
With that, he snatched his tablet again and cranked up the game volume, trying to drown out the tension in the air.
Looking at this spoiled child, the last bit of guilt in my heart evaporated.
“Henry,” I said, giving him one last look, “I hope you get to be this ‘free’ every day for the rest of your life.”
I pushed open the heavy, ornate doors and stepped into the cool New York night.
The doorman loaded my luggage into the black SUV that was already waiting.
“Where to, ma’am?”
“Montauk,” I said, leaning back against the seat and watching the Manhattan skyline recede. “Just drive east, toward the ocean.”
The wind blowing through the window was no longer the city air, thick with money and exhaust, but the salty breeze of the sea.
After five long years, I was finally Julianne Miller again.
Not someone’s wife. Not someone’s mother.
Just me.
When Harrison got home, the apartment was dark.
No matter how late he used to be, Julianne always left a warm, yellow light on in the foyer—a signal that she was waiting for him. Tonight, there was only cold, empty darkness.
He irritably tore off his tie and flicked on the lights.
The walls where Julianne’s curated art used to hang were bare. The flowers she always kept on the coffee table were gone. The apartment suddenly felt like a real estate agent’s showroom—luxurious, but dead.
He strode upstairs and pushed open the master bedroom door.
Her vanity was completely empty, except for a solitary blue velvet ring box.
The diamond flashed under the light, cold and sharp, as if it were mocking him.
Henry emerged from his room in his pajamas, rubbing his eyes. His face lit up when he saw Harrison.
“Daddy! That woman is gone! Does that mean Vanessa is moving in tomorrow?”
Harrison looked at his son’s expectant face, and a strange emptiness washed over him. He didn’t pick Henry up like he usually did. Instead, he coldly called for the nanny.
“Take him to bed.”
He picked up the ring box, his knuckles turning white as he clenched it in his fist.
“Julianne Miller,” he whispered through gritted teeth. “Let’s see how long you last before you come crawling back to me.”