There's a strange kind of peace that follows the telling truth.
Not comfort. Not ease. But peace the kind that comes when you stop pretending things are ok. When you finally let the wreckage lie and decide to build again, brick by careful brick.
The board doesn't fight me.
Some are cautious, some are skeptical. But no one challenges me directly. I can feel their fear, not just of the scandal, but of what I might become if I choose to rise.
Good.
Fear, I can work with.
I step out of the meeting with Gloria at my side. She gives me a proud little nod. "That was boss-level damage control."
I smile faintly. "It wasn't damage control. It was ownership."
We head back to my office, and for the first time in weeks, it feels like mine again. I sit behind my desk, fingertips brushing across the mahogany surface like I'm reacquainting myself with something sacred.
A knock at the door.
"Come in," I say.
It's Sandra my senior accountant. One of the few who stayed back through the chaos.
She looks nervous. I motion for her to sit.
"I didn't want to say this before," she begins, voice quiet, "but there were signs. Little things. Transfers routed through dummy vendors. Unusual approval chains."
"Why didn't you say something?" I ask gently.
She winces. "Because I thought maybe… you knew. That maybe it was something you approved quietly. And with Kolade being your husband…"
I nod slowly. "I understand. But from now on, if you see anything, you speak. No matter who it implicates. Even me."
Her eyes widen. "Yes, ma'am."
She leaves, and I exhale.
There's more damage than I thought. More places where he inserted himself, like a virus elegant, quiet, deadly.
But we'll clean it up.
We'll heal.
Not in a week. Not in a month. But one honest step at a time.
+++
Later that evening, I go through the nursery again.
But this time, I bring a notebook.
I sit on the floor, legs crossed, belly gently rounding under a soft t-shirt. I open a fresh page and title it: Plans for Us(My baby and I ).
Underneath, I begin to write not financial forecasts, not quarterly goals. Just small, real things.
Paint the nursery again. Yellow is lovely, but I want something softer. A pastel lavender maybe.
Find a new doctor. One who actually listens.
Prenatal yoga? (Gloria says it's good. Worth trying.)
Talk to Mom. Or her grave. Or myself. Wherever she listens now.
I pause, my pen hovering.
Then I add the most honest line yet:
Forgive myself.
Not for loving Kolade.
Not for falling.
But for forgetting, for a moment, who I was without him.
+++
Around midnight, Gloria finds me asleep on the nursery floor, journal still open.
She covers me with a blanket and doesn't say a word, or wake me up to go to my room.
And in that silence, something shifts.
I'm not yet healed.
But I'm no longer broken.