14 No Home to Return To
Diane made a mistake. If she didn't want Christian to ever find out about the other private matter that led to her husband's cheating, she should have reminded his lawyers to keep their conversation between them.
Unfortunately, it never crossed her mind that they would report to him as he was their employer. She didn't think she needed to remind the lawyers of what privacy meant. That was her mistake.
After Diane left, Christian met with the lawyers and they had to answer his questions as they came up even though they were not open like the way Diane did with her problems.
At least they were considerate.
Christian was lost for a moment. He sank into deep thought with his brows furrowing one second and straightening out the next moment.
After a while, he finally lifted his gaze to them. "So, how do you solve a case like this?" He was sure that they had already discussed amongst themselves before he came out of his study.
The three lawyers exchanged glances before one of them spoke. "There is no legal method to stop Ms. Brown's husband from claiming half of her assets no matter how sneaky his moves were to get them."
"Really?"
"Yes," another confirmed. "He didn't break the law, so there is nothing to use against him."
The female lawyer chimed in, "We also shouldn't forget that even though Ms. Brown and her husband engaged in other sexual activities while their marriage was in a good state, they never had sex."
What the lawyer was trying to say is that receiving half of Diane's assets was like a form of compensation for Phillip as his wife indirectly denied him sex in their marriage.
Even though it was just Diane's body malfunctioning and rejecting anything from going inside her, the truth could not be denied.
The other lawyers made Christian see the bigger picture here.
"No matter how wrong it is, no husband can remain completely faithful or patient in a marriage of two years where he does not get to sleep with his wife no matter the other options she uses to try and satisfy him sexually."
The oldest lawyer amongst them with a lot of experience added as he adjusted his reading glasses, "Ms. Diane claimed that when she sought medical help recently, her husband wasn't supportive. And it was because he didn't show any form of care towards her was why she didn't put in much effort towards looking for an external solution."
In a situation like this, Phillip could have done better by being loving, patient and helping Diane when he noticed the huge problem in their sexual life. But instead of that, he shamed her and ignored her most of the time.
Even if Diane wanted to be understanding of the reason he would cheat on her, the prenup fraud wouldn't let her.
Christian listened to all these without giving off another reaction apart from worry.
Taking into consideration what his lawyers said regarding there being no legal means of solving the prenup issue, he inquired, "Is there an illegal means then?"
The three lawyers did not flinch. This was a normal question and approach to them.
The female lawyer, Clara, answered the question which assured him in the process. "Dr. Brown's husband looks like a tough one, but rest assured that we will find a way to get him to give up the prenup."
"Good." Christian seemed satisfied. He trusted his lawyers because he had single-handedly picked each one of them. "Clara, you are going to work directly with Dr. Brown's lawyer on her divorce proceedings and get it to end as soon as possible."
Even he did not have the patience to wait for a long time because of the disputes that were involved.
If Diane and Phillip did not come to an agreement, their divorce proceedings might drag on for two years straight or even more and he did not want that.
---
Diane still had an hour extra before her morning shift at the First Family Hospital started, so she drove home to change her clothes from yesterday. But arriving at the door to her condo, she realized a problem.
Her door refused to open after she had keyed in her PIN. That was shocking to her.
Her brows furrowed as she tried the same pin again but nothing changed. She almost thought that she had forgotten the PIN code to her condo and had to cross-check it in her head before slowly keying it in again.
Nothing worked again.
It was at this point that Diane realized what was happening. There was no other humanely possible explanation for this other than the fact that Phillip changed the PIN code to their condo.
At first, Diane did not want to believe that. She didn't want to believe that her husband who had stopped sleeping over at their condo would suddenly come around when she wasn't in the change the codes.
'Was it because of a few days ago?' she thought to herself as her heart raced in her chest.
Diane lifted her wrist to glance at her wristwatch. Time was not on her side and it was not like she could get the door open in that short amount of time, so she left.
In the elevator, she tried to reach Phillip a few times but his phone number did not go through.
"I hope he hasn't blocked me yet," she muttered as she rushed out of the elevator and headed for her car.
---
At the hospital, Tricia was the first person to spot Diane walking in with the same clothes from the previous day.
"Girl, don't tell me you didn't sleep in your house," she said while giving her a warm hug before stepping back to take another glance at her.
Diane sighed. "There was a bit of an issue," she replied, refusing to explain further. Luckily, Tricia understood and did not probe further.
"I thought you do keep some change of clothes in your car?" Tricia asked as they resumed their steps in the hospital lobby.
"I forgot to take them to the laundry since I'd been busy all week." Diane released a sigh of regret.
She never knew that she would have this kind of emergency and she wasn't prepared for it.
"At least you have a day off tomorrow. Use it to do your laundry and write your thesis," Tricia smiled.
Hearing her mention the 'thesis' she needed to write, anger rose in Diane's chest as she remembered that her laptop was locked up at home.
She wanted to murder Phillip but had no energy for him at the moment. Because she has a day off tomorrow, she had a long day today.
---
Diane finally clocked off work around 8 PM. She was tired and needed to feel the softness of her mattress unfortunately, she had no home to return to.
How would she do it?
