Chapter 6 - The Luxury Desertion
Vanessa woke up at 9:00 AM to a silent, sun-drenched apartment that suddenly felt entirely too large.
She rolled over, reaching across the mattress expecting to find the heavy weight of my arm or the sound of my breathing.
Her hand met only cold, empty sheets.
"Michael?" she murmured sleepily, propping herself up on one elbow and rubbing her eyes.
The apartment was dead quiet, save for the hum of the central air conditioning unit.
She slipped out of bed, wrapping a silk robe tightly around her waist as she walked out into the living room.
My jacket was draped over the back of the sofa, but my wallet, keys, and phone were completely gone.
"Ugh, typical," she muttered, rolling her eyes in annoyance. "Left without even saying goodbye because of his dramatic wife."
She walked into the kitchen to pour herself a cup of coffee, tapping the screen of her tablet to check her morning notifications.
The local Miami news feed popped up instantly, flashing a breaking headline that made her breath catch in her throat.
BREAKING: Prominent Real Estate Developer Michael Sterling Arrested by Federal Agents at Mercy General Hospital on Charges of Wire Fraud and Embezzlement.
Beside the headline was my mugshot—hair disheveled, eyes wide with panic, staring blankly into the camera.
Vanessa dropped her coffee mug.
It shattered against the tile floor, splashing dark liquid across her bare feet, but she didn't even flinch.
Her fingers flew across the screen, clicking on financial blogs and legal updates that detailed the total collapse of my company and the freezing of all corporate and personal assets.
"No, no, no," she whispered frantically, backing away from the spilled coffee as if the news itself could contaminate her.
She walked over to her designer handbag on the entryway console, pulling out her phone to check the balance of the joint shopping account I had set up for her last week.
Transaction Declined. Account Frozen by Federal Order.
Her face drained of all color, her manicured fingers trembling violently as she tried refreshing the banking app three, four, five times.
The digital balance remained stubbornly at zero.
"The bastard used me," she hissed, her voice turning sharp and venomous as the realization washed over her.
All the expensive dinners, the VIP booths, the designer bags she thought she had secured—it was all tied to fraudulent funds that were now the property of the federal government.
Without a moment of hesitation, she walked over to her contacts list, found my name, and hit the delete button.
Then she blocked my number, packed two suitcases of her own clothes within twenty minutes, and called an Uber to take her straight to Miami International Airport.
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She wasn't going to stick around to be questioned by federal investigators or dragged into a courtroom as an accomplice to a sinking ship.
By noon, Vanessa was airborne on a one-way flight to Los Angeles, erasing every trace of our relationship as if I had never even existed.
