I didn’t slow down.
Grant still sends letters from prison.
He insists that I destroyed his future.
That I turned everyone against him.
That Crosswell should have belonged to both of us.
I never read beyond the envelopes.
They are returned unopened.
For years, Grant had treated my company, my money, and eventually my life as things he could claim simply because he was my husband.
Celeste believed the same thing.
They thought surviving the crash would leave me frightened enough to surrender.
Instead, surviving it reminded me exactly who I had been before I ever met Grant.
The woman who built Crosswell.
The woman who owned her decisions.
The woman who didn’t need anyone else’s permission to control her future.
One evening, long after the trials had ended, I sat alone in my house.
There were no documents waiting for my signature.
No carefully rehearsed voices explaining what was supposedly best for me.
No husband pretending concern while calculating what my death would give him.
For the first time in years, the silence felt peaceful.
That night, I slept without fear.
Because my company was mine.
My future was mine.
And most importantly—
**my life finally belonged completely to me.**
