The flight back felt longer than it should have.

I sat beside the window, watching the clouds move beneath the plane, but my mind kept returning to one sentence.

“Ethan Foster is missing.”

Yesterday, he was my husband.

Today, he was a missing person.

And somehow, despite the divorce certificate already being stamped, I was still being dragged back into his chaos.

When we landed, the police immediately took me to the station for another statement.

This time, there were more questions.

More documents.

More uncomfortable details.

The investigator placed several photos on the table.

A wedding venue.

A luxury hotel.

A waiting room.

And finally…

Ethan’s car.

Abandoned in a parking lot three kilometers away from the hotel where his wedding was supposed to happen.

“Miss Shen,” the officer said, “we found something strange.”

I looked at him.

“What?”

“His phone was turned off at 8:17 in the morning.”

I frowned.

“Before the wedding?”

“Yes.”

The officer flipped another page.

“At 8:05, he sent a message to someone.”

“Who?”

The officer looked at me.

“You.”

My heart skipped.

“Me?”

He turned the screen around.

It was a message from Ethan’s number.

Only five words.

“Don’t trust anyone in my family.”

I stared at the screen.

I couldn’t breathe for a moment.

Because I had received nothing.

No message.

No call.

Nothing.

“That’s impossible,” I said.

The officer nodded.

“That’s why we’re investigating.”

Then he showed me another piece of evidence.

A screenshot of Ethan’s bank account.

Three large transfers.

The total amount…

Fifty million yuan.

Transferred the night before our divorce.

My fingers tightened.

“Where did that money go?”

The officer remained silent for a few seconds.

“To an offshore account.”

I laughed softly.

Not because it was funny.

Because suddenly everything started connecting.

Ethan’s sudden wedding.

His mother’s panic.

The fake concern.

The demand that I return to take care of him.

It wasn’t about Ethan being sick.

It was about something else.

Something they were afraid I would discover.

The officer leaned forward.

“Miss Shen, before your divorce, did Ethan have any financial problems?”

I thought carefully.

For five years, Ethan always presented himself as successful.

A businessman.

A man who had everything under control.

But I remembered the small things.

The late-night phone calls.

The hidden documents.

The sudden changes in his mood.

And the way he became desperate to marry Claire Moore so quickly.

“Yes,” I finally answered.

“He was hiding something.”

The officer looked interested.

“What?”

I looked down.

“I don’t know.”

And that was the truth.

But I knew one thing.

Ethan had not disappeared because he wanted to escape his wedding.

Someone had forced him to disappear.

That evening, I returned to the house that had once been ours.

The divorce agreement said I could stay temporarily until I found another place.

I opened the door.

Everything looked exactly the same.

Except something was wrong.

The living room table had been moved.

A drawer in Ethan’s office was slightly open.

I walked inside slowly.

My instincts told me not to touch anything.

But then I saw it.

A small black notebook hidden behind the bookshelf.

It was Ethan’s handwriting.

I opened it.

The first page contained only one sentence.

“If something happens to me, Maya must know the truth.”

My hands started shaking.

I continued reading.

Page after page.

Names.

Dates.

Payments.

Contracts.

And one name appeared again and again.

Lydia Foster.

His mother.

I stopped.

My ex-mother-in-law.

The woman who had called me that morning.

The woman who wanted me to return immediately.

The woman who claimed Ethan was hospitalized.

But the notebook revealed something completely different.

Ethan had discovered that his own family had been using his company as a front for years.

And worse…

They had planned to transfer all the debt and legal responsibility to him.

The wedding with Claire wasn’t because he loved her.

It was a transaction.

The Moore family had money.

The Foster family had connections.

And Ethan was the piece they needed to complete the deal.

But then why divorce me?

I turned the page.

And there it was.

My name.

“Maya Shen.”

Below it was a sentence that made my blood run cold.

“The only person who can protect me is the woman I destroyed.”

I closed the notebook.

For five years, Ethan had chosen his family over me.

He had abandoned our marriage.

He had asked for freedom.

And now, when everything collapsed…

He had written my name as the only person who could save him.

My phone suddenly rang.

Unknown number.

I answered.

Silence.

Then a weak voice.

“Maya…”

I froze.

I knew that voice.

“Ethan?”

His breathing was unstable.

“Don’t trust my mother.”

My entire body went cold.

“What happened to you?”

Before he could answer, I heard another voice in the background.

A woman’s voice.

Lydia.

“Ethan, who are you calling?”

The line went dead.

I stared at the phone.

My divorce was supposed to be the end of my relationship with Ethan Foster.

But now I understood.

The divorce wasn’t the ending.

It was the beginning of the biggest secret his family had tried to hide.

And the next person I had to confront…

Was the woman who had spent five years pretending to love me.

My ex-mother-in-law.