VALENTIN Babysitter

After Ellie finished a grueling thirty-six-hour shift in the neurosurgery ward, a blizzard hit Manhattan. Ellie had called her husband, hoping he could pick her up, only to have him coldly reject her.

Braving the freezing snow, she pushed open the heavy oak doors of their Upper East Side townhouse and walked straight upstairs, only to look through the half-open master bedroom door and see her husband's new assistant lying on the marital bed she had once poured her heart into decorating, wearing her favorite silk robe.

Hearing the noise outside the door, Vanessa Hayes scrambled off the marital bed in a fluster. She deliberately tugged at the loose collar of the robe, revealing a fragile panic. "Mrs. Oliver, you're home early."

Ellie's eyes were like a pool of stagnant water. There was no anger, only the chilling, numb detachment of a surgeon looking at medical waste.

Three years of marriage with this man. She and Ephram had long gone from being the envied campus couple to a pathetic, shattered reality. Ephram's infidelity was an open secret, and she, once cherished and adored, had been thoroughly reduced to a despised, discarded wife.

"You're quite special," Ellie said coldly. "Ephram has never brought another woman back here."

This townhouse was their marital home, bought three years ago when they got married.

A flash of triumph flickered in Vanessa's eyes as she softly explained, "Mr. Oliver had too much to drink. I drove him back."

Ellie hadn't seen Ephram in two months.

Two months ago, on her twenty-eighth birthday, she was eating dinner alone at a five-star hotel restaurant when she ran into him having a candlelight dinner with a young model.

She had marched up, slapped him across the face, and screamed at him with a twisted expression for being disgusting and shameless.

Ephram had only offered a chilling sneer, telling Ellie to look in the mirror and see what she had become. Then, he wrapped his arm around the model's waist and went straight to the penthouse suite to have sex.

That night, Ellie returned to this massive, empty house and smashed every fragile thing in sight. Looking at her unrecognizable face in the mirror, she suddenly broke down into loud, agonizing sobs.

How did she become this? How did she turn into such a hysterical, miserable woman?

After that night, Ellie moved out of this townhouse. Ephram never came looking for her.

She heard he broke up with the model shortly after, but she didn't expect him to find a new replacement so quickly.

Looking at Vanessa's triumphant face, Ellie felt a wave of cold disgust finally break through her numb facade.

"Take off my robe," Ellie demanded, her voice dropping to a freezing edge.

Before Vanessa could react, the master bathroom door clicked open.

Ephram stepped out, his hair damp from the shower, wearing nothing but a white towel wrapped loosely around his waist. Seeing Ellie in the doorway, his patience immediately vanished. He walked over and pulled Vanessa against his bare chest.

"You startled her, Ellie," Ephram scolded.

Vanessa's eyes immediately watered. She shrank back into Ephram's embrace.

"Miss Stark, you misunderstood," Vanessa whispered, her voice trembling perfectly on cue. "I accidentally spilled wine on my dress. Ephram just told me to put this on so I wouldn't freeze."

The deliberate use of "Miss Stark" instead of "Mrs. Oliver" hung heavily in the air.

Ellie's hands tightened inside the pockets of her wool coat. Her knuckles turned bloodless white against the lining.

Ephram frowned, his patience visibly wearing thin.

"It's just a piece of fabric, Ellie. Do you have to make a scene out of every minor detail? Where are your manners?"

"Manners are reserved for decent people," Ellie said.

She pulled her right hand from her pocket, holding a stiff manila folder.

She stepped forward and slapped the folder down onto the black-and-white marble vanity. The sharp crack echoed through the spacious bedroom.

Ephram's eyes dropped to the paper. Printed across the top in bold black letters, the header was impossible to miss: Divorce Settlement Agreement.

The room fell dead silent. Vanessa's rehearsed expression of distress froze on her face as she stared at the title.

"Sign it, Ephram," Ellie said, looking directly at him like a doctor delivering a terminal diagnosis.