Hired To Divorce His Mistress

My reunion with Lincoln Shaw after twelve years came in the most professional of settings: across a mahogany desk, with me acting as the divorce attorney he was trying to hire.
Sloane, I know you despise her, which is exactly why you should help me without hesitation. Once shes out of the picture, we can finally be together, the way we were meant to be.
I offered a dry, almost imperceptible laugh. "Im sorry, Mr. Shaw, but I don't take cases Im emotionally conflicted on. And I definitely don't take your case."
He choked on the refusal. For a long moment, he just stared. Then, a sudden softness crept into his voice, the kind of manipulative nostalgia that used to reel me in. "Sloane, you've changed. You used to be the one who couldn't stand the thought of me being unhappy or hurt."
"Twelve years of erosion can break any kind of love, Lincoln. We're well past the age for empty romantic gestures."
"You're truly heartless, aren't you, Sloane?"
Heartless?
There was nothing left between us to protect, let alone save.
1
I certainly hadn't expected to see him again like this. The man across from me, though now in his early forties, still maintained that air of polished, refined charm.
But I knew, intimately, what kind of cold, self-serving core lay beneath that perfectly tailored exterior.
He showed no surprise at seeing me, which told me everything: he came here looking for me.
He wore that expertly crafted maskhalf-warm, half-shrewdas he talked conditions, just as he had when we divorced. His words were soft, yet sharp, like a snakes tonguea venomous caress.
Every syllable was a carefully hidden strike.
"Sloane, I'm getting a divorce, and I want... I want you to handle the case."
He spoke slowly, meticulously tracking my reaction.
He was clearly disappointed. He pressed on, a nervous edge to his voice. "Arent you going to ask why I'm leaving Talia?"
"Mr. Shaw, if you're here to hire counsel, please state your legal requirements. I am not interested in your romantic backstory. My time is extremely valuable, and I have a heavy caseload to manage."
My cool dismissal seemed to actually satisfy him. A flicker of excitement crossed his face. "I knew you still cared."
I rolled my eyes, a gesture he chose to ignore.
He was always skilled at ignoring things, particularly peoplejust as he'd ignored me during the end of our marriage. He continued his self-pitying confession.
"It wasn't until you left that I realized her sweet, charming act was just a fa?ade. Everything she did was to get me to discard you so she could waltz in and claim everything."
"Sloane, you have to help me. You know I was manipulated, misled into divorcing you."
His attempt at a soulful, sincere look made an irrational surge of anger flare up inside me. "Mr. Shaw, please confine your comments to the details relevant to the dissolution of your marriage. I only require your precise demands."
"I want Talia to leave with nothing."
He spat out the terms, then fixed his gaze on me. "You can make it happen. They say you're the best divorce attorney at this firm."
"Youre mistaken, Mr. Shaw. There are cases I cannot win. Don't you recall? When I divorced you, I was left with practically nothing, too."
My smile was pure, bitter irony. His face momentarily seized up, a shadow of that old memory passing over him.
Lincoln Shaw. After years of playing the benevolent husband, he probably genuinely believed he was a good man.
2
Lincoln was a natural-born entrepreneur, a genius, really. His talent began to show when he was barely out of his teens.
I met him at a college track meet. Back then, he was a little solitary, yes, but he hadn't yet become this crass, calculating man.
The story is a clich: Id stained my white track shorts, and he was the one who leaned in and mumbled, "Hey, um... your shorts are stained."
He blushed crimson before I did.
Mortified and scrambling for a way to hide the disaster, I was saved when he awkwardly pressed a grey hoodie into my hands. "Take this. No one will notice on your walk back."
That hoodie rescued me from an embarrassing moment, but it also plunged me into a whole new storm.
Lincoln was the undisputed star of the Business Schoolthe campus golden boy. He was devastatingly handsome, but so consumed by his investment studies that he was utterly uninterested in dating. He was a long-standing campus legend of singlehood.
Until he handed me that hoodie.
Suddenly, the campus forum exploded.
Who is that girl? Looks like shes in the Law department.
So, our God-tier Lincoln likes the delicate, petite type.
Shes pretty plain, honestly. Guess the Big Shot's taste is... different.
The private messages started flooding insome trying to forge a connection, most of them nasty, passive-aggressive jabs.
The comments dug into me.
I was notorious for being a bookworm, completely inept at relationships. For years, dating hadn't even registered on my radar.
My unhappy childhood had solidified a single, consuming goal: I had to become a lawyer.
I refused to end up like my mother, beaten senseless by my father year after year, eventually just existingcrawlingto survive.
Id pleaded with her to divorce him, but she was too terrified.
"Sloane, your dad promised hed kill us both if I ever tried to leave."
She shook when she spoke, fear having calcified her spirit.
Once, I called the police on my own, which almost cost my mother her life.
After that, he cut me off from school funding. I started collecting scrap paper, taking any summer job I could find, penny-pinching my way through tuition, all to break free from the suffocating mud of that life.
I believed I was utterly rational. Love had no place in my life. I didn't trust it.
Then, Lincoln showed up.
Under the thread that cruelly exposed my family's financial struggles, he posted one single reply:
A persons background isn't a choice, and yet you use it as gossip fodder. You are the ones who should be ashamed.
His comment ignited a firestorm.
A new topic erupted: The Great Lincoln had engaged in a campus forum debate.
His influence was immense. The people whod been criticizing and mocking me actually started sending apologies.
I didn't reply to any of them. My time was too scarce. I was in a race against the clock to excel in my studies.
A few days later, a text popped up: Can we talk? This is Lincoln Shaw.
Lincoln again. A headache started throbbing. Since I'd gotten tangled up with him, my world felt unnecessarily complicated.
Finally, I accepted the connection. Some things, I decided, had to be cleared up.
When we met, he held a bouquet of red roses, offering a sheepish smile. "I didn't know if you liked flowers. I hope it wasn't presumptuous. But this is my way of showing Im sincere."
The crimson roses were vibrant, and they sent a strange little ripple through my carefully guarded heart.
That day, we didn't discuss much beyond his apology for the unsolicited trouble Id faced because of him. Yet, I distinctly felt my pulse accelerating.
I started anticipating his messages, even posting meaningless updates on my social mediaa totally new behavior for me.
My roommate, June, noticed and watched me with a raised eyebrow. "Well, look at you. Looks like someones heart is blossoming."
3
Lincoln commented on every post. He seemed incredibly knowledgeable. Eventually, I even risked posting a difficult legal question on my feed, and hed respond with one or two profoundly insightful suggestions.
I thought Id found a kindred spirit, a true soulmate. I couldnt ignore his presence anymore.
But June brought me back to reality with a cold dose of water.
"Sloane, sometimes soulmate connection can't conquer family ties. Do you even know what Lincolns family does?"
What does Lincoln's family do? I froze.
I didnt know. I only knew he was affluent.
His posts featured photos of global travel; his clothes were high-end.
Id always assumed he was rewarding himself with the profits of his first entrepreneurial successes.
But June shook her head. "Naive Sloane. A genius can't win without massive capital backing, too."
I felt a suffocating tightness in my chest. I managed a strained, weak smile. "June, Im not pursuing anything with him."
I meant it. I couldn't dare to. With my broken family, even if Lincoln truly loved me, what good would it do?
Besides, he hadnt actually said he loved me.
Reality told me he was probably just trying to make amends for the mess his attention had caused me.
That stunning bouquet of roses eventually dried out. I preserved them, still deep red, but lifeless.
I realized it was a beautiful illusion, a mirage in a glass. I pressed the dry flowers into a bookmark and listed it on a second-hand marketplace.
A day later, a buyer contacted me.
He offered double the price but insisted on an in-person exchange.
The money tempted me, but I was hesitant about meeting a stranger. Safety was a concern.
Finally, I suggested a compromise: we could meet at the busy coffee shop across from the university. No risk there.
The buyer agreed instantly.
I was stunned when I arrived and saw Lincoln waiting.
He saw the bookmark in my hand, sent the payment via Venmo without a word, and then looked at me, his eyes gentle. "I never realized how clever you are with your hands. Now, this bouquet has a new meaning."
The roses hed given me had circled back to him.
Even later, after we married, that bookmark hung framed on our wall.
But just like that object, even the most cherished thing becomes stale and unexciting after you look at it for too long.
After that meeting, Lincoln started asking me out to coffee and dinner constantly.
I exhausted every possible excuse to avoid him, but he was relentlessly persistent.
When we finally met again, he cut straight to the chase. "Sloane Reynolds, are you trying to avoid me?"
I couldn't speak, guilt making me flustered.
Taking a deep breath, I forced myself to be direct. "What exactly do you want, Lincoln?"
He looked momentarily lost for words. Then, he answered with some difficulty. "I thought you knew. Im trying to court you."
I froze. Hed just said it, plainly and simply.
A rush of pure, unadulterated joy slammed into me. My heart hammered against my ribs.
Years later, I would still think about that afternoon, and feel a pang of that first exquisite thrill. But the irreparable fissure of what we became would always follow.
Seeing my silence, he pressed, "Is there something Im doing wrong that stops you from accepting my feelings?"
"Sloane, you can reject me, but I'll keep trying until I win you over."
"I truly only want to be with you, until the end. We'll be together, forever and ever."
4
Lincoln lied.
His family vehemently disapproved of our relationship and promptly cut him off. He was literally kicked out of their penthouse.
His mother looked at me with open contempt and scoffed, "A girl like her is just a fleeting crush. This love will lead nowhere."
Lincoln refused to believe her. He used the connections and small amount of seed money he had to invest aggressively, and, astonishingly, he carved out a successful path for himself.
Then, he set his sights on the international market.
During this time, we were inseparable. I was moved. Hed practically rebuilt his life for me.
"I want you to know that I can support you just fine, even without them," he promised.
To give me peace of mind, he found a lawyer for my mother and forced my father into a divorce. My mother moved near my university and lived with us. Lincoln even helped her set up a small boutique shop.
It felt like our lives had finally turned a corner.
My mother adored Lincoln. "Your taste in men is so much better than mine, honey."
My heart swelled with a secret sweetness. A voice in my head argued against the whole world: If there is only one genuinely good man in this universe, it's Lincoln Shaw.
But Lincoln was struggling. He was sleeping only two hours a night, his work schedule a crushing cycle. He was visibly wasting away.
During those rare moments, hed hold me tight and repeat his vow, "Sloane, as long as youre by my side, I can handle anything."
Yet, this man, who supposedly loved me so fiercely, cheated on me just three years into our marriage.
It was with an intern from his companya nervous, timid girl who seemed like the last person Lincoln would ever notice.
The bitter irony? I was the one who kept her on staff.
Shed applied for an executive assistant position, but her English skills were poor, and she booked a crucial meeting at the wrong time.
Lincoln flew into a rage. "Who hired this deadweight? This blunder is costing us thousands! Who's going to pay?"
He spotted me, then slumped into my arms, the picture of aggrieved exhaustion.
He held me, complaining, "Im furious. How can a person be so utterly incompetent?"
I saw Talia Vance cowering in a corner, trembling, and I saw a flash of my former self. I couldn't help but defend her. "Maybe she just wasn't ready for that position. Let her move to a different role to train, and she can come back later."
Lincoln was furious and gave me the cold shoulder for an entire day.
"You think everyone is as driven as you are? That girl has no ambition. She doesn't belong in my company."
"But I started out just as anxious and timid as she is! Lincoln, you're the golden boy. You dont understand how long it takes for the rest of us to recover from one small mistake."
That single sentence stuck in his mind. It also became the knife he eventually used to stab me.
He started giving Talia a second chance. He would occasionally mention her to me: "The girl has potential. She just needs confidence. She could be a star someday."
His focus on her began to intensify. He even coached her through a project during our movie date.
When the movie ended, he offered an apologetic smile. "Her project is actually really promising, just a little rough around the edges. Sorry, Sloane. I lost track of time when I got into work."
I told him it was fine, that I should be understanding. They were working hard.
Until our anniversary. I went to the office to surprise Lincoln, who claimed he was working late. The staff who saw me had a strange, knowing look in their eyes.
A woman's intuition is rarely wrong. I walked quickly to Lincoln's corner office. The moment I pushed the door open, I heard Talias sugary, breathless voice:
"Oh, Lincoln, stop it. Youre being naughty. I cant"

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