"My mistress was sleeping in our bed when a phone call revealed my wife had quietly divorced me yesterday."

Madison Sterling had packed her designer luggage and left with her brother's legal team, leaving behind only the empty scotch glasses and the bitter memory of my own self-destruction.

I sat in the rear seat of my private black sedan, driven by my loyal chauffeur, Arthur—the only employee who hadn't been terminated during the corporate takeover.

"Where to, Mr. Morgan?" Arthur asked softly through the glass partition.

"Take me to her parents' house in Lake Forest," I commanded rasply, pulling my coat collar up against the chilly rain lashing against the windows. "I don't care about the attorney's warnings. I need to see her."

Thirty minutes later, the sedan pulled up to the iron gates of the Bennett family estate in Lake Forest—a majestic stone manor surrounded by ancient oak trees and high security walls.

I stepped out into the pouring rain, rushing up to the iron gates, pressing the intercom button frantically. "Claire! Claire, please! Open the gate! It's Daniel! Let me talk to you!"

The security speaker crackled to life.

A cold, professional voice answered: "Mr. Morgan. This property was sold forty-eight hours ago by Bennett Holdings. The premises are vacant."

My breath caught in my throat. "Sold...?! Where did her family go?!"

"Mrs. Claire Bennett has permanently relocated her personal and legal residence outside the jurisdiction of the State of Illinois. You are currently trespassing on private corporate property. Vacate the perimeter immediately or security officers will execute an arrest."

I backed away from the gate, the cold rain soaking through my expensive wool coat, sticking my dark hair to my forehead.

She was gone.

Not just from my penthouse. She had erased her entire footprint from Chicago.

She had sold her family's ancestral home, transferred her bank accounts into international trusts, closed her social media accounts, and instructed her security details to block every attempt I could make to trace her.

I leaned my back against the cold iron bars of the gate, sliding down until I was kneeling in the wet grass, burying my face in my trembling, wet hands.