The email from a gossip columnist arrived an hour before my birthday dinner. The subject line read, 'Fact-Checking: Gold-Digger Narrative for Fletcher Aldridge.'
I showed it to Noah. He read it, his face a calm mask. He said, “Let them print it, Stacy. It makes the boardroom buyout easier if they think I’m the victim here.”
The article ran. It called me a calculated waitress who trapped the tech billionaire. It said I was draining him. Noah was quoted as being “too loyal to comment on personal matters.” He never corrected it. His mother, Lucille Aldridge, sent me the link with a single emoji: a smiley face.
My presence became a negotiation. Every vacation cancelled for a last-minute merger. Every anniversary interrupted by his father, Don, calling about stock dips. Then he hired his childhood best friend, Peyton Mulford, as his chief of staff. Suddenly, Peyton was in the car service logs for our apartment building at 2 a.m. She was the one briefing him on my doctor’s appointment. She started wearing his college ring on a chain around her neck. When I asked him about it, he sighed. “Don’t be jealous, Stacy. It’s undignified.”
The breaking point was a charity gala. A reporter shoved a microphone in my face and asked how it felt to be the most hated woman in Silicon Valley. I looked for Noah. He was across the room, laughing with Peyton, his hand on the small of her back. He didn’t even glance my way.
I left the gold band he gave me on the stainless steel counter of our penthouse kitchen. The one he never set foot in. Did he even notice I was gone? Or was I just another asset he’d failed to properly manage?
