My Husband Pushed Me Off the Balcony

The penthouse was full of people I didn't know. I smiled at them anyway. That was what I did. I wore the right dress, poured the right wine, and made sure everyone felt welcome in our home. Our home. The words tasted like metal in my mouth, but I swallowed them down with the champagne.

I slipped away from the crowd. The noise pressed against my skull. I needed air. I needed Donovan. I wanted to tell him about the gallery owner who had called that afternoon, the one who wanted to feature my work. He would be proud. He had to be proud.

I moved through the living room toward the terrace. The glass partition was half-open. I could see two figures outside, silhouetted against the city lights. Donovan and Tate. I started to call out, then stopped.

Donovan's voice carried through the gap. Cold. Clinical. The voice he used in boardrooms.

"We let her carry it to term. Then we bring in the attorneys. Full custody. Sasha gets cut out clean."

I froze.

Tate said nothing for a long moment. Then: "And Kehlani?"

"Kehlani stays exactly where she is." Donovan laughed. It was a sound I had heard a thousand times. It had never sounded like that before. "She's the perfect wife. She won't ask questions. She never does."

My nails dug into my palms. I pressed my thumb and forefinger together. Hard. The pain was sharp and clean.

I thought about the nights I had waited up for him. The excuses I had swallowed. The way I had convinced myself that love meant endurance. That if I was patient enough, gentle enough, quiet enough, he would see me again the way he had in the beginning.

I had been so stupid.

I opened my clutch. The divorce papers were folded inside. I had carried them for two weeks. I kept telling myself I didn't need them. That I was overreacting. That marriages went through rough patches.

I unfolded them now. The sound of the paper was loud in my ears.

I stepped through the partition onto the terrace.

Donovan turned. His expression shifted when he saw me. Not guilt. Annoyance.

"Kehlani. We're in the middle of something."

"I know." My voice came out steady. I was surprised by that. "I heard."

Tate went pale. He took a step back.

Donovan's jaw tightened. "You heard what, exactly?"

"Everything." I set the divorce papers on the railing between us. "I want a divorce."

For a moment, he just stared at me. Then he laughed. The same laugh from before. "You're being hysterical."

"I'm being clear."

"No one will believe you." He stepped closer. His voice dropped. "You think anyone cares what you think you heard? You're my wife. You're upset. You're imagining things."

"I'm leaving."

His hand shot out and closed around my arm. Hard. "You're not going anywhere."

I tried to pull away. "Let go of me."

"You don't get to leave." His grip tightened. "You don't get to walk away from me."

"Donovan—" Tate's voice was uncertain.

Donovan ignored him. His face was close to mine now. I could see the fury in his eyes. The disbelief. "You think you can just leave? After everything I've given you?"

"You've given me nothing." The words came out flat. Empty. True.

He shoved me.

I stumbled backward. My heel caught on the edge of the railing. For one terrible, weightless moment, I felt nothing but air.

Then I was falling.

The world spun. Glass shattered. Pain exploded through my ribs, my wrist, my skull. I hit the lower balcony and everything went white.

I couldn't breathe. There was something wrong with my chest. I tasted copper. Blood. My mouth was full of it.

Above me, I heard a door open. A woman's voice. High and frightened.

"Donovan! Something's wrong. The baby—"

Sasha.

I tried to move. Tried to call out. My body wouldn't respond.

Footsteps. Running. Away from me.

Donovan's voice, distant now. "I'm coming. Hold on."

An engine started. Tires on pavement.

Silence.

I lay in the glass and the blood and the silence, and I understood.

He had left me.

Then Tate was there. His face swam into view above me. He was saying something. His hands pressed against my head. Warm. Wet.

"Stay with me. Stay with me. I'm calling—"

The world went gray at the edges.

I thought about the painting I had finished last week. The one I had hidden in my studio. Dark blues and blacks, shot through with gold. I had called it *Fracture*.

I hadn't known why at the time.

Now I did.