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Janna smiled thinly. "I have found laws so constricting that I have found a good hatred for lawyers. My profession on the other hand have rules that can be bent and changed depending on the person as everyone has different genetics. I'm also not a marriage counselor so I can't say what you should do about your situation.  I've been divorced myself so my advice should be taken without any professional weight, but I do think that Henry is a nice person and that you should give him more of a chance."

Ellie tried to look at Janna kindly, but felt incredibly offended that Janna thought that she was leaving Henry when it was the other way around.  She was surprised that Nolan had not hammered that point to her, but decided to let it go. "Janna if you had the upper hand on Nolan, would you make him stay married to you if he wasn't sure?"

The doctor looked at her with concern.  "Nolan has free will to do whatever he wants.  What makes you say that? Is there something else wrong with you that you have been hiding from me."

Ellie shook her head.  "I don't know what has gotten into me." She quickly made an excuse and walked out of the room.  She could feel Wu's eyes boring holes into her back as she talked to Nolan before leaving the clinic.  She considered calling for a taxi but then changed her mind. Ellie thought maybe walking through the New York rain would make her come to some sort of epiphany.

She felt trapped in the situation she was in.  Ellie knew that to everyone else that their relationship looked perfect.  People had always expressed incredulity that she would be trying to get out of such a perfect marriage.  All of her close friends had been trying to push her to 'trap Henry with a baby or two.' Ellie put her hand on her stomach as she considered the strange possibility.  In truth, she wouldn't mind having a child with her husband. But, to have one without Henry knowing about it felt strange. She knew this was the right thing to do, but somewhere deep inside she felt the forbidden impulse to keep a leash tight around her man.  Ellie wished that this legal process didn't exist at all and that Henry would be forced to try to make their relationship normal. What would she have to do to make him see they should give this a chance?

Even if they got to that point, Ellie wondered if that would be enough for her.

=//=

In less than a week, their tickets for the United Kingdom were booked.  Henry had taken care to have the London branch made aware of his impending arrival.  He didn't know for sure why, but he felt good that he was taking a break from the city.  It hadn't been easy to plan things in such a short span of time, but he felt prepared nonetheless.  He had been surprised on the other hand to learn that Ellie wanted to start the annulment proceedings already.  As the papers had been filed in a public courtroom, he had come home to find a swarm of reporters waiting outside.  The flashes had made him flinch as he saw one short photographer brandishing a tabloid showing one of Ellie's calendar photos next to his Forbes one with the headline: Driving Henry Wong Up the Wall--Divorce of Secret Marriage.  Henry had to wait until he was inside the elevator to silently shudder to himself as the panic of people finding out had finally took him. It was his worst nightmare.

As he rose from his fetal position, he had finally decided that the reporters were wrong.  Ellie was nothing like that. She was kind and understand of him. At the end of the day, he thought to himself as he squared himself to face her, an annulment was not as damaging as a divorce.

Henry didn't mention the tabloid to her or anyone else to the next few days.  His business partners and associates had brought it up as a joke that they hadn't been invited to his wedding.  Ellie had stayed up above it all. Henry didn't like to think that anyone should upset her just because she had made a dying decision for him.  He would make sure that she was shielded from all that stress.

Initially his secretary had book him passage commercially through British Airways, but Henry knew seeing the photographers outside that it wouldn't be such a good idea.  The press had eventually escaladed to flying helicopters close to the roof, just to get a glimpse of his elusive soon to be ex-wife. It was all very irritating as he and Michael would sit brooding over a map of the city and various routes they could take to escape.  Henry hated even thinking that he was trying to avoid this all for the stupid publicity. It was strange to think that these type of situations was where Michael's military experience really shone. The route he had mapped out was really ingenious. They would be using the underground garage and have several decoys so not even the serving staff would know where they all were.  The plan involved driving out to a small commercial airport and flying to Iceland, before taking a smaller charter plane to land on the Scottish coast.

Ellie's nurses had been unhappy to hear that their patient was going to be weaned off of them.  Although Ellie had been delighted to hear that she was finally going to have autonomy in her own baths.  Madeline, the other woman in his life, had not been happy to see Henry packing his luggage into suitcases.  The corgi had wedged herself into his underwear case and peed all over it in irritation. Her delight had decreased tenfold when the dog had seen her kennel brought out and cleaned.  The dog had decided to hide under Henry's bed until further notice.