Chapter 1 - THE HAND BEHIND MY COAT
Damon was pulling up his black trousers when I pushed open our bedroom door.
“You were supposed to be gone longer.”
His belt hung loose. The silver watch I had given him on our fifth anniversary caught the warm light from the bedside lamp. Behind him, our white comforter had been dragged halfway off the mattress.
I stood in the doorway of our Westfield, New Jersey, home wearing the champagne maternity gown I had bought for the hospital photographs. In my hand was the ultrasound image of our daughter’s face.
“I came home to show you our daughter.”
Damon stepped toward me, blocking the open closet.
At first, I noticed only the white dress shirt near the bench. Then I saw a champagne lace camisole beneath it, one strap turned upward. A tiny blue charm hung from the lace.
Claire had shown it to me after her engagement dinner.
“Owen spent way too much on this,” she had said, laughing as she held it against herself. “I’m saving it for our honeymoon.”
Damon reached for the shirt.
“Don’t turn this into something ugly.”
Inside the closet, one of my cream maternity coats shifted.
A hand was gripping its sleeve.
The diamond on that hand belonged to Claire, my best friend of twelve years and the woman who had agreed to become my daughter’s godmother.
Damon believed I hadn’t seen her. Relief softened his face when I pressed one hand to my belly and said I felt dizzy.
He went to the bathroom for water.
I lowered my phone and took one photograph: the camisole, his shirt, the wrecked bed and the narrow strip of Claire’s hand behind my coat.
Then I walked into the nursery without confronting either of them.
A minute later, soft footsteps crossed the hallway. The side door opened and closed.
By the time I returned, the bed had been straightened and the lingerie was gone.
Damon was downstairs running the kitchen faucet.
I locked the nursery door and opened our home-security app. Claire had an emergency entry code because I had trusted her with my house.
Her code had been used six times in three months.
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Every entry matched a prenatal appointment Damon had claimed he was too busy to attend.
The first visit had happened three days after Claire held me while I cried about becoming a mother and promised she would never let me do it alone.
