A cold sense of relief washed over me, but I kept my face completely blank.

“Five minutes,” I repeated, pointing toward the open front door.

Ethan looked at me, his eyes wide with a mixture of anger and panic.

“Please, Sophia,” he muttered. “Just give us a few days to figure something out.”

“No,” I said. “You chose your family’s schemes over our marriage. Now you can live with them.”

Linda glared at me, her lips drawn into a thin, bitter line.

“You are a monster,” Linda spat. “Your mother would be ashamed of you.”

“My mother is the one who set up the trust to protect me from people like you,” I said.

Ethan grabbed his coat from the wooden peg by the door.

He did not look at me as he started walking out onto the porch.

“Come on, Mom,” Ethan said quietly. “Let’s go.”

Linda stood her ground for a second longer, her hands clenched into tight fists at her sides.

Then, she grabbed her designer purse from the chair and marched past me, her heels clicking loudly on the concrete porch.