Chapter 2 - THE AFFAIR WAS ONLY THE DOORWAY
The baby was fine.
That was the first thing the obstetrician told me at Northwestern Memorial.
No bleeding.
No signs of placental trouble.
My shoulder was bruised.
My blood pressure was high.
I needed rest.
I nearly laughed at that.
Daniel sat beside my hospital bed without touching me.
Vanessa had left our house before the police could be called.
I hadn’t tried to stop her.
Neither had Daniel.
That decision would bother me later.
At the time, I wanted her gone.
I also wanted to know why she had been in my house with my husband.
“You said it ended,” I told him.
Daniel looked down.
“I know.”
“You said three weeks.”
“It did.”
“Then why was she upstairs?”
“She came over.”
“For what?”
“To talk.”
“About the affair?”
“Yes.”
“While I was supposed to be in Milwaukee until tomorrow.”
He closed his eyes.
“I didn’t know you were coming home early.”
Not an answer he should have given.
I turned my face away.
The affair had lasted four months.
Daniel admitted it six weeks earlier after I found restaurant charges and a hotel confirmation.
Vanessa worked in business development for Carter & Vale, the Chicago construction-management company Daniel’s father had co-founded thirty years ago.
Daniel was now chief operating officer.
He had promised to cut contact with Vanessa except through HR and counsel.
I had believed he was trying.
Maybe he had been.
Believing that didn’t make me feel less humiliated.
“What Carter files?” I asked.
“I don’t know.”
“Try harder.”
His jaw tightened.
“Vanessa asked me questions about old projects.”
“When?”
“During the affair.”
There it was.
Another omission.
“What projects?”
“The Lakeshore redevelopment. Old partnership stuff. My dad’s first company.”
“Why?”
“She said she was working on a corporate-history presentation.”
“And you believed her?”
“At the time.”
I stared at him.
“How much did you tell her?”
“Not much.”
“That phrase has become meaningless to me.”
The security system had captured more than the confrontation.
Daniel downloaded the available clips before leaving for the hospital.
The unfamiliar man never appeared on camera.
His voice came from Vanessa’s phone.
She had apparently stood on the staircase forty-five minutes before I arrived, speaking to him on speaker.
One line repeated in my mind.
Make her look unstable.
That wasn’t something Vanessa improvised when I caught her.
Someone expected a confrontation.
Someone expected me.
Which meant my early return may not have surprised everyone.
Daniel pulled out his phone.
“There’s something else.”
He showed me a text Vanessa had sent that morning.
Rachel’s Milwaukee panel ends early today, right?
My stomach turned.
“How would she know my conference schedule?”
“I don’t know.”
“She knew when I’d be home.”
“Yes.”
“And she came here anyway.”
“Yes.”
I looked at him.
“She wanted me to find you.”
Daniel didn’t answer.
He didn’t need to.
The affair had not merely been exposed.
May you like
It had been staged for an audience of one.
Me.
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