In three days, he was gone, and that was the last time she saw him. After getting those divorce papers, she theorized that this was his surprise.
Since they did not accumulate large amounts of assets during their years together, the termination of the marriage was simple. There were no major possessions to divide.
He purchased his building before they got married, and the house she received from her parents was hers.
Since she had no intentions of contesting the divorce or asking for alimony, she signed the papers and returned them in the enclosed self-addressed stamped envelope.
She was now legally divorced.
After remaining in the apartment for six months, Marsha started to look for another place to live. She no longer wanted to stay in Ted's apartment building and thought about moving back home with her parents but decided not to.
Not that her parents would not have welcomed her back home, quite the contrary; they would have jumped for joy to know their daughter had finally come to her senses and said adieu to that leech of a so-called husband.
Her parents would have been stunned if they knew their daughter was the one dumped. It would not be long before the truth would come out.
She found a nice studio apartment in Brooklyn Heights. Since there was not much money left in her trust fund, she would rent out her island home to bring in additional income and work on expanding her business.
If Marsha thought she was finally free of Ted, she had another thought coming. There were more problems brewing. While she was packing, to move into her new place, a letter arrived from the Property Tax Assessment Department. She opened it and could not believe what was in that letter. The apartment building was in arrears for back taxes, totaling over six hundred thousand dollars.
How could Ted have let this tax thing get out of control? What was he doing for the past eight years? The money he collected in rents should have been going towards paying the property tax, she said to herself.
Two months later, she received a letter forwarded to her new address from the Internal Revenue Service showing that she and Ted owed over four hundred and fifty thousand dollars in back taxes.
Then, she discovered that he and his sisters did not own the apartment building. The previous owner never intended to sell or give the property to anyone; the proprietor suffered from short-term dementia and unknowingly signed the title over to Ted.
Somehow, he and his sisters were able to manipulate the man into thinking Ted was his long-lost son. Since the owner did have a child from a casual affair in his earlier years and never kept in contact with the mother or her child, he assumed Ted was his biological son.