“You can’t divorce her now,” Margaret said. “The prenup leaves you with nothing.”
“I’m suffocating,” Nathaniel snapped. “Chloe’s tired of hiding.”
“Then be patient. The pregnancy is high-risk. A little stress. A vitamin mistake. Nature can be… helpful.”
“And the tea?” he asked.
“She drinks it every night.”
That night I poured the tea into the hydrangeas outside my bedroom window.
By morning, they were black.
I didn’t confront them. I couldn’t. Nathaniel had connections. He would paint me unstable, hormonal, paranoid. I would lose everything—including my child.
So I called Dr. Collins.
“It’s anticoagulants,” he said grimly after testing the capsules Margaret insisted I take. “Strong enough to cause catastrophic bleeding during labor.”
“We go to the authorities,” he urged.
“No,” I said. “They’ll deny everything. I want them confident. I want them careless.”
For months I performed weakness. I smeared makeup under my eyes. I pretended to faint. I allowed Nathaniel’s cruelty to escalate while recording every conversation through discreet devices installed throughout the estate. I emptied poisoned capsules and refilled them with sugar.
They celebrated my decline.