My Husband Regrets Divorcing Me novel · Chapter 1 of 24
Chapter 1: The Plus-One
Selah carries plates at the gala where her husband is named VP, her husband thanks his first love, and she walks into the tower as the Chair.
My husband thanked everyone in the ballroom except the woman who signed his promotion.
That woman was me, and I was standing by the coat check holding a tray of crab puffs.
"Selah, don't just stand there," Maureen said. "The table by the stage is empty-handed."
Maureen was my mother-in-law, and she said it in the voice she used on freshmen who ran in the hall.
"I'm not on the catering staff, Maureen."
"Tonight you are the help, dear. Look at your cardigan. Nobody would know the difference."
She smiled and turned her back before I could answer.
The Omni William Penn ballroom had four hundred people in it, and every one of them worked for me.
Not one of them knew it.
Olmstead Freight was my grandfather's company, and my father's, and since I was twenty-seven it had been mine.
The staff thought the owner was an old recluse who sent memos signed T. Olmstead.
Fran Mahoney, our COO, stood on the stage and read those memos aloud.
I had written the one she was reading now.
"Olmstead Freight is proud to name Colin Coughlin our new Regional Vice President of Operations."
The room clapped.
Colin walked up in a navy suit I had picked out for him, and his chipped front tooth showed when he grinned.
Two years ago he had been a night dispatcher on the graveyard shift.
I had watched him drive a dying driver's last route himself, because the driver's wife begged and nobody else would go.
I had signed the promotion because he had earned it.
He took the microphone and looked out at the crowd, and then he looked at the front table.
"I want to thank someone who taught me to aim higher," he said.
My heart did a stupid, hopeful thing.
"Peyton Ferris, who is back in Pittsburgh tonight after eight years."
A blond woman at the front table stood up and put her hand on her chest.
She wore a white dress and a smile.
Colin's first love had left him at twenty-four for a job in Chicago.
He had never said her name in front of me without a pause.
The room clapped again, harder.
Colin did not look at me once.
I set the tray on the coat check counter.
Maureen appeared at my elbow and handed me her empty champagne glass.
"Peyton has such a presence," she said. "She'll be a real asset to him."
"Colin's wife is standing right here," I said.
"Is she?" Maureen said, and looked at me like a lost button.
I should have thrown the glass.
I set it down instead and walked toward my husband, because I wanted him to see my face.
He stood laughing beside Peyton with her hand on his sleeve.
When I reached him, he glanced at me and then at my cardigan, and he lowered his voice.
"Selah, not now. Mom said you were helping with the plates."
"Your mother handed me a tray, Colin. I didn't volunteer."
"It's a work night," he whispered. "Please just stay out of the photos."
Peyton smiled at me with her whole face.
"You must be the wife," she said. "Colin said you do something with spreadsheets."
"Bookkeeping," Colin said quickly. "She freelances."
Two years of lying to him had been my idea, and I hated that in that moment it was easy to keep going.
I had meant to tell him on our third anniversary.
Now I looked at the man I loved, in the suit I had picked, and I decided I would not tell him anything at all.
The party moved to the lobby, and I stood at the curb in the cold while the valets pulled cars.
Colin came out with Peyton's coat over his arm.
"Her hotel's across the river, and she doesn't know the roads," he said. "Take a cab home, babe, okay?"
Then he opened the passenger door of our car for her.
Our car.
Peyton slid in and gave me a little wave through the glass.
The taillights went around the corner, and I stood there with no coat and a bag with ten dollars in it.
I did not call a cab.
I walked the six blocks to the Liberty Avenue tower, with the wind biting my ears.
The night guard at the side door looked up from his crossword and went pale.
"Good evening, Ms. Olmstead," he said. "The Chair's elevator is ready."
I rode forty floors alone in a lift with my father's initials in the brass.
In the empty executive suite, I sat in the leather chair I had not sat in for two years and dialed Fran.
She picked up on the first ring, laughing, with a champagne flute clinking behind her.
"Put Colin Coughlin's promotion on Monday's agenda," I said. "And tell the board I'm coming in person."
Want to keep talking to characters like these? Chat with AI romance characters: AI Boyfriend · AI Girlfriend · Dark Romance · Fantasy Romance · BL (Boys’ Love) · Billionaire Boyfriend · Mafia Boyfriend · Possessive Boyfriend · Hockey Boyfriend · Older Boyfriend · K-Drama Boyfriend · Anime Boyfriend · Vampire Boyfriend · Werewolf Boyfriend · Demon Boyfriend · Fae Romance · GL (Girls’ Love) · Anime Girlfriend · Goth & Alt Girlfriend · Gamer Girlfriend · Tsundere Girlfriend · Fantasy Girlfriend