My husband slapped divorce papers on the table and told me I had 48 hours to pack my things and get out because his new girlfriend owned the house now. I smiled, said nothing, and agreed like it didn’t matter. But the moment she walked through that front door, she realized that house came with a nightmare she never saw coming.

I leased a restored brick townhouse closer to downtown, with a small courtyard full of rosemary and white roses. I restarted the interior design consulting work I had set aside years earlier when Eric’s business became the center of everything. Old clients returned. Then new ones. Within a year, I had more work than I wanted and the luxury of choosing continue reading …