prelude

As the scion of a colossal dynasty, my husband, William, sat atop a fortune worth billions. Yet, he guarded against me as one guards against a thief, terrified that I might covet his family's wealth. His control over our household expenditures reached a pathological extent; every month, he allotted my son and me a mere two hundred dollars for living expenses.

However, when his childhood sweetheart, Sophia, returned to the country, he did not hesitate to squander a fortune, presenting her with a yacht and a luxury apartment in Manhattan as a welcome-home gift.

Later, when our son suffered a severe asthma attack, a life that could have been saved with a specialized treatment costing only five thousand dollars, he accused me of boundless vanity. He claimed I was using the boy's illness as a pretext to swindle money for my own extravagance, and even had his secretary chase me out of his office.

And so, I watched helplessly as my son ceased to breathe in the emergency room. At that very moment, my husband was accompanying his childhood sweetheart on a romantic cruise dinner in the Aegean Sea.

After handling our son's funeral arrangements, my husband returned from his vacation, his expression as haughty as ever. He remarked casually:

"Hey, Elena, haven't you and the boy always wanted to go camping? Next week, I'll take you to that free campsite nearby."

But what he did not know was that the moment our son died on that pale hospital bed, I had already decided to end this marriage.