The lottery ticket had been Daniel’s idea. Every Friday, he bought a few tickets, joking that one day we would finally escape our ordinary lives. I usually laughed at him, reminding him that we had bills to pay and groceries to buy. But that particular Friday, I picked the numbers myself. The next morning, Daniel checked the results while drinking his coffee, then suddenly jumped from his chair and shouted that we were millionaires.

We hugged, cried, and spent the entire day imagining our future. Daniel promised we would pay off the house, help our children, and finally travel to places we had only seen in photographs. For the first time in decades, I believed we could enjoy life without worrying about every expense. But within weeks, he became distant. He took private phone calls, met financial advisers without telling me, and began locking documents inside his office. Whenever I asked questions, he accused me of being suspicious. I wanted to believe the money had simply overwhelmed him, but deep down, I felt something was terribly wrong.