Delphine studied them both for a long moment, letting the silence stretch until it became uncomfortable. “Do you remember what your mother said to me at that dinner table, Marcus? That I had two choices. Apologize, or leave.” She looked at Regina. “I chose the door. You made that choice easy for me.”

Regina’s composure cracked further. “We were wrong. We know that now. Please, Delphine, the company employs hundreds of people. Their jobs, their families, all of it depends on this.” Delphine almost laughed at the audacity, the same woman who’d stripped her of credit and dignity now invoking the livelihoods of others as leverage.

“You should have thought about those employees before promoting someone with no technical experience into a position she couldn’t handle,” Delphine said evenly. “You should have thought about consequences before deciding my labor was worth stealing but my presence wasn’t worth defending.” Marcus reached for her arm, and she stepped back before he could touch her. “I’m not the person who can fix this. I’m not that person anymore, and honestly, I’m not sure I ever should have been.”

“So that’s it?” Marcus said, his voice rising with desperation and disbelief. “You’re just going to let it all fall apart?” Delphine met his eyes steadily. “It’s already fallen apart, Marcus. It fell apart the moment you decided your dinner mattered more than your wife. I simply stopped holding it together with my own hands.” She adjusted her bag on her shoulder and stepped past them toward the elevator.

Behind her, she heard Regina’s voice crack into something like a sob, and Marcus calling her name one final time, but she didn’t turn around. The elevator doors closed on the family that had spent seven years using her brilliance while denying her recognition, her respect, and finally, her humanity. Delphine returned to her office in New York that afternoon, signed the final divorce papers a week later, and never once looked back at the empire she’d built for people who never deserved to hold it.