At her husband's promotion party, Megan Perry hears him call her “the employee I don't have to pay.” After ten years of marriage, she's done letting her work count for nothing. But leaving Dale means more than taking off her apron. With no recent income and her daughter's custody at stake, Megan needs to build a future she can prove belongs to her.Armed with her grandmother's apple pie recipe, years of carefully kept household records, and her daughter Macy's unwavering support, Megan turns her baking into a business. A farmers market stall leads to a championship—and a chance to put her own name on something that matters. Then Dale's affair and his lover's theft of her recipe threaten everything she's earned. Facing a corporate copycat, a bitter custody battle, and a family that still expects her to serve, Megan fights back with evidence, skill, and a bill for the labor they always called free. As her business grows and Dale begins to understand what he lost, she must decide what she's willing to accept—and what she'll never take back.
