Chapter 522: "I Belong To..." "Time for yourself? Patricia, your entire life is time for yourself. You don’t work that much. You don’t have responsibilities—" There it was. The core rot. The thing that had hollowed them out for years. She walked to the window instead of to him. The lawn outside was perfect, manicured within an inch of its life. A postcard of a life she didn’t want anymore. "You really don’t see me at all, do you?" "What are you talking about now?" "My middle name," she said. "What is it?" He blinked. "This is— Patricia, come on." "Try." Silence. His mouth opened. Closed. Nothing. "It’s Mercy," she said. "Patricia Mercy Sullivan. You’ve signed that name a hundred times and you don’t even know it." "These are trivial details—" "What did I major in at college?" His silence this time felt like a confession. "What was my mother’s name? What did she die from? How old was I? What am I allergic to? What medication do I take every morning? What nightmare have I had since I was eight?" Richard’s jaw flexed so hard it looked painful. "Patricia, this isn’t—" "Who was my best friend in college?" she cut in. "The one I used to get coffee with every month until you—" She stopped. Breathed. "Never mind. You don’t remember her either." He rolled his eyes — his favorite defense mechanism. "If you’re trying to make some point—" "The point is you don’t know me, even the simplest things like those." Her words were soft, but they hit like steel. "You know a role. A function. A wife. A mother. A hostess on your arm at events. But me? The actual person? You never looked." She stepped closer but stayed just out of reach — the emotional no-man’s-land they’d lived in for years. "You don’t know that I wanted to be a teacher. That I volunteer at the literacy center twice a week and have for twelve years. That I donated half my grandma inheritance to women’s shelters. That I speak French. That I write poetry. That I have endometriosis and you called it ’normal female overreacting.’" Each sentence landed. He actually stepped back, like he was being physically hit. "These aren’t trivia, Richard. This is who I am." He swallowed, throat tight. "Patricia—" "And then there’s Linda Carter." His face drained instantly. Like she’d pulled the plug on him. "Let’s talk about the threats," Patricia said, voice shaking but steady at the same time. "Every time I tried to help her. Every time I wanted to be human, you dangled my own shares at Morrison Constructions and your control in my own hospital over my head." "That was—" "’If you talk to her, you’ll lose your inheritance.’" Her imitation of him was scarily accurate. "’If you help her, I’ll make sure there are consequences.’" She let that settle. "Linda adopted a baby, Richard. A child. And you punished her for it. You punished me for caring." His hands gripped the desk like he needed it to stay upright. "She was connected to that woman," he muttered. "She was connected to a baby," Patricia snapped. "A baby whose mother died. Meanwhile, you were busy chasing the ghost of a woman you couldn’t let go of." "I never—" "Yes. You did." Her voice was quiet now, the quiet that hurts more than shouting. "And I let you. That’s the part I’ll hate myself for." She wrapped her arms around herself like she suddenly felt cold. "That’s when I knew," she whispered. "The moment you made me complicit in your cruelty. That was the moment the marriage died for me." Richard looked like he was trying to breathe through concrete. "And now," she said, straightening, "we get to what you really care about." His eyes flicked up. She’d hit the nerve. "Morrison Constructions." He froze. "That’s what this is about," Patricia said. "Not me. Not our marriage. Not seventeen years of being invisible. It’s about your empire. Your image. The way investors will whisper that a man who can’t keep his wife happy probably can’t manage a merger either." "That’s not what—" "It’s exactly what you’re thinking." Patricia’s voice came out colder than the marble floors. "I can see it in your eyes. You’re already running PR damage control in that accountant-brain of yours. Already drafting the press release in your head—’amicable separation,’ ’mutual decision,’ blah blah blah. Anything to keep the Morrison name polished like a trophy nobody asked you to win." She moved toward the door. Richard cut her off, reaching for her arm. "Don’t touch me!" Patricia jerked back so hard the heel of her shoe scraped against the floor. "Don’t you fucking dare." Richard froze. His hand hung in midair like he suddenly remembered she was a person. 𝗳𝐫𝚎𝗲𝚠𝚎𝗯𝕟𝐨𝘃𝚎𝗹.𝗰𝗼𝗺 Patricia steadied herself, chest rising and falling like she’d run a marathon. The disgust on her face didn’t even try to hide. "I belong to someone else now," she said, voice trembling but steady enough to carry. "Someone who sees me. Who actually wants me. Who makes me feel like I’m not made of smoke." Richard’s face buckled. Not with heartbreak—he wasn’t built for that. But with the sick panic of a man realizing the leash he thought he held was never clipped to anything real. "Patricia, please," he said, desperation leaking into his voice like a crack in a dam. "Think about the fallout. The family. Jack. The business. The Delgado merger is already unstable after Jack’s... situation with Sofia. If you add a divorce scandal—" "There it is," Patricia said, laughing once, sharp and humorless. "The holy trinity of your heart: reputation, business, mergers." "I’m trying to be practical—" "No. You’re trying to save face." Her voice spiked, brittle and alive. "You want to keep me in this house like a prop because God forbid Richard Morrison has a wife who grew a spine." She reached for the door handle. "Well, I’m done being practical," she said. "I’m done offering myself on the altar of Morrison Constructions. I’m done playing The Woman Who Makes You Look Successful." "You’re being irrational—" "Rational?" Patricia turned, eyes bright, wild, alive. "This is the only rational thing I’ve done in seventeen fucking years." Richard stared at her—not with love, but like someone studying the fuse burning into a bomb they thought was decorative. "What are you saying?" he asked, voice tight. Patricia inhaled. Deep. Final. "I’m filing for divorce."