Ten Years of Split-Bill Marriage, Then I Walked Away

In the tenth year of my split-bill marriage into the Sanchez fortune, I still hadn't sobered up from love—but William Sanchez's payment QR code was already shoved in my face.

"Tonight's condom. Venmo me your half."

I hadn't even had time to get dressed before I opened my phone. My balance: thirty dollars.

"I don't get paid until tomorrow," I said, voice small. "Can I send it then?"

William just looked at me with that smile of his. "That million you took when you betrayed me ten years ago—spent it all already?" He tilted his head. "You don't have to pay, of course. Just think of yourself as a hooker. We go another round, and I'll waive the fee."

My lashes dropped. I said nothing, scanned the code, and transferred the money. Only then did he get up and head for the shower.

What actually happened ten years ago was a blank in my memory.

When I woke up in the hospital, everyone told me the same story: that I'd eloped with William, couldn't handle the hardship, begged his mother Mary Sanchez for a million dollars, and agreed to disappear.

A few fragments flickered through my mind, and my skull split with pain—

William's phone buzzed on the nightstand.

Something possessed me to pick it up.

His secretary had sent several photos. Lingerie shots. Skin on display.

"Mr. Sanchez, when are you going to divorce the old hag?"

My hands trembled as I scrolled through their messages, punishing myself with every word. Conversations. Flirting. Dates. Locations.

Tears dried on my cheeks and fell again, dried and fell, over and over.

Finally, I typed a reply from his phone: "Tomorrow."

——

At two in the morning, I crept out of bed without a sound.

It was time to go clean the toilets at Sanchez Tower.

Ten years ago, I'd agreed to a split-bill marriage with William, but the cost of living among the ultra-wealthy was beyond anything I could have imagined. Even if I ate nothing but plain noodles in tap water, just breathing inside that mansion cost a fortune—monthly maintenance fees alone were astronomical.

Mary Sanchez had been generous enough to arrange a job for me: janitor for every restroom in the Sanchez Group building.

I knew it was meant to humiliate me. I took it anyway.

Because where else was I going to find a job that paid fifty thousand a month—enough to afford the price of staying by William's side?

But starting tomorrow, I wouldn't need it anymore.

The cleaning chemicals were especially harsh today. My eyes burned red, again and again.

It was nine in the morning by the time I finished scrubbing every restroom in the building, top to bottom.

That was Mary's requirement.

She'd looked at my smooth, unblemished hands that day and smiled. "Pamela Bishop, dear, every restroom in the building needs to be spotless before the staff arrive. You can manage that, can't you?"

I'd gritted my teeth and agreed. Even though those hands had once been made for painting.

Exhausted down to the bone, I curled up in the utility closet behind the last restroom to rest.

BANG BANG BANG—

The pounding on the door nearly stopped my heart.

I opened it. Vivian Lawson stood outside in a crisp designer suit, William's secretary, looking down at me like I was something stuck to her shoe.

"Mrs. Sanchez! So this is where you've been hiding to slack off." Her tone was perfectly polite. Her eyes were not. They slid over my cleaning uniform like a blade. "The second stall in the women's room is clogged. Would you mind taking care of it?"

My fists clenched at my sides, nails biting into my palms hard enough to draw blood. I didn't feel it.

In the end, I pulled on my mask and gave a numb nod.

When I reached for the long-handled pliers, Vivian raised a hand to stop me.

"Mrs. Sanchez, the company just replaced all the toilets. Each one is a fifteen-thousand-dollar smart toilet. Tools like that could damage them."

I frowned. "Then what do you want me to do?"

"I'm sure you'll figure something out. Just... no tools."

The implication couldn't have been more obvious.

I knew that if I didn't do what she wanted, she'd never let it go.

My paycheck hadn't come through yet. I didn't want trouble.

I dropped to my knees mechanically. My stomach lurched—whether from the smell or the humiliation, I couldn't tell. Acid climbed up my throat.