Chapter 41 #2
“She’s dating him.”
“And?”
“They’re not sitting around discussing quarterly earnings, Mom.”
Her face goes blank. “And?”
The anger hits fast, clean, embarrassingly familiar. “She is still legally married to me.”
Mom doesn’t even blink. “You were legally married when you put your cock inside two other women.”
The words land like a slap.
“It’s not the same.”
“Great.” She folds her arms. “Explain the difference without using the word mine.”
I open my mouth and discover I’ve got nothing.
Mother gives me one slow nod, picks up her bag and heads for the door.
“Yeah,” she says. “Thought so.”
Then she leaves me standing there with a key to a house I already sold and absolutely no fucking argument left.
∞∞∞
Mercer’s special committee drops its preliminary damages allocation three days later, and Charles spends ten fucking minutes leaning on preliminary like the word is going to make the total less offensive.
On its own, the number won’t kill me. Stack it beside the Russell debt, bridge interest, dead endorsements, divorce lawyers and the tour reserve, and suddenly my financial life looks like it lost a bar fight.
Charles starts rattling off what we can push back on—causation, lender fees, audit costs—but I’m already gone. Catalogue Correction Proposal. Most of it is boring cleanup until I hit Magnolia Rain.
Laurel Bellamy, sole writer. Bellamy House Songs, publisher. Grant Mercer nowhere on the fucking page.
“I developed it.”
Charles barely glances over. “The record?”
“I changed the second verse.”
That shuts him up for a beat. He has Daniel’s notes, Sloane’s recordings, the original demo—the whole ugly stack.
“Did you?”
I stare at Laurel’s name until even I get tired of my own bullshit. “No. I changed the arrangement.” Saying it out loud feels like swallowing a nail. “I thought we wrote it together.”
Charles leans back in his chair. “Maybe you thought being in the room counted.”
To hell with him for putting it that cleanly. Fuck me for knowing he’s right.
∞∞∞
Final mediation starts the following week with Laurel in another conference room and Walter Greene bouncing between us, passing offers back and forth like we’re too fucking divorced already to sit at the same table.
The Nashville house appraises well, and I’m still entertaining the dumbass idea of buying her out until Charles asks what magical pile of money I plan to pull from my ass.
I mention the lake-house sale. He reminds me that cash already got swallowed by the bridge deficiency and my Mercer subscription, so unless dollars have started fucking and making baby dollars, that well is dry.
Refinancing means stacking fresh debt on top of pledged royalties, tour exposure and every other financial headache currently chewing holes in me. Selling is the sane move. Fuck sane.
“Sell it.”
Laurel agrees thirty minutes later; just like that!
No fight for the house, no request for time, not even sentimental speech about the kitchen we renovated twice or the bedroom we slept in for years.
Mutual Sale hits the settlement sheet and our home can be disposed of in two words and a wire transfer.
The rest starts coming together, and that pisses me off even worse.
Laurel doesn’t come for my money. No spousal support, no grab at my publishing, no attempt to carve extra pieces out of Mercer.
She wants her catalogue fixed, her money accounted for, her existing shares left alone and Bellamy House kept the fuck out of my hands.
Eleven years married to me and she could make this divorce hurt financially if she wanted. She doesn’t even bother.
I start, “What if Vale—” and Charles shuts his eyes like he’s asking Jesus personally for restraint. “Grant, I swear to God.”
Fine. The Russell debt stays mine. I keep my Mercer shares, she keeps hers, securities get divided, the cars stay with me until they sell. Then we hit personal property and that’s where the insult really starts.
Laurel wants some of the notebooks she left behind. That’s it! No framed photos, no stupid souvenirs from trips, no wedding shit, no anniversary crap. Not one random object that means anything only because we bought it together.
Eleven fucking anniversaries, fourteen years of knowing each other, houses and tours and Christmas mornings and birthdays and all the dumb little traditions people collect when they think they’re building a permanent life, and Laurel doesn’t ask for a single thing that says us.
She takes what was hers before me, what became hers on paper, what I never had any right to touch in the first place—and leaves the rest of our marriage sitting on my side of the damn table.
That’s what finally takes me out. The fact that Laurel doesn’t want a single fucking thing from our life together has me bent over in a hotel chair, elbows on my knees, crying so hard my ribs hurt.
Charles has the good sense not to touch me. He walks to the window instead and gives the city his full attention until I manage to drag myself back into something resembling breathing.
“Does she hate me?”
“Grant.”
“Does she?”
He turns halfway. “I’m your lawyer.”
“I know what the fuck you are, Charles.” My voice comes out wrecked, and I hate that too. “I’m asking if you think she hates me.”
He looks at me for a long second. “I don’t know.”
I wipe my face with both hands. “She loved me.”
“I’m aware.”
“No, she fucking loved me. She used to look at me like—” My throat closes around the rest, so I shake my head and stare at the carpet. “I loved her too.” Charles says nothing. “I still love her.”