Chapter 3

The next afternoon, Charlene Swanson, the CFO of Stanley's company, came by the house.

She'd been with Stanley for the eight years he'd been building the company, and I'd met her plenty of times.

In the old days, whenever a holiday came around, she'd address me as the boss's wife in the family group chat.

Back when the company had just moved into its first office, she'd even come by the house to pick up drawings.

This time she came in carrying a document envelope, and the first thing she noticed was the old floor plan hanging beside the entryway.

"You still have this?"

I followed her gaze.

It was the layout of Stanley's first office. I'd revised it four times back then, and he'd had the final version framed, saying that no matter how big the company grew, he never wanted to forget what it had looked like at the start.

Charlene gave a small smile. "Stanley couldn't afford a design firm back then. The desks, the conference room, the front desk — you set all of it up for us. Thinking about it now, that was a long time ago."

She said it lightly, then seemed to remember something else. "And that year, at the end of it, the company could barely make payroll. You were the one who put up the money and got us through. Stanley always says that stretch was the hardest, and thank goodness there was someone at home holding things up."

I didn't answer.

Nobody had brought that money up again since.

She handed me the documents soon enough.

"Stanley asked me to drop off a few files."

The top sheet slid loose, and when I bent to pick it up, I saw a string of numbers in the bottom right corner.

The same as the household settlement statement.

I looked up. "Your company put that statement together?"

Charlene paused, then nodded. "The figures came from Stanley. I had a finance assistant run them through a template. He's raising money right now, so he wants everything sorted out ahead of time."

"Even the household accounts go through your finance team?"

She seemed to catch the edge in my voice, and her smile thinned.

"Don't read too much into it. Stanley just doesn't want anything getting murky down the line. Keep business as business and private as private. Working it out in advance is better for both sides."

Before she left, she reminded me again. "The fundraising is at a critical point right now, and he's under a lot of pressure. Try not to let things at home spill over onto the company."

After the door closed, I stood looking at that old floor plan for a long time.

My signature and the date were still there in the bottom right corner. The paper had yellowed, but the glass had been wiped spotless.

So even Charlene still remembered.

It was just that none of it had ever shown up in the accounts Stanley drew up for me.

That night he came home and produced another agreement.

The company was negotiating a new round of investment, and once the deal closed, his shares would be revalued.

The agreement spelled it out plainly: the existing equity, all future dividends, and any later appreciation would belong to Stanley alone.

I asked, "Why do you need me to sign?"

"The investors are doing due diligence. They don't want the marriage affecting the equity later on."

When he finished, he set the $1.07 million settlement statement down on top of the agreement.

"Sign it, and you won't have to pay this back."

I looked at him. "So first you calculate that I owe you a million and seventy thousand, then you use that same million and seventy thousand to buy out any claim I'll ever have on the company?"

Stanley frowned. "Pansy, I built the company in the first place. I'm only sorting out what should be kept separate."

I didn't ask anything more.

I just put both documents away together in the drawer.

He was right.

Some things really did need to be sorted out.