Chapter 5 - Erica Was Not the Woman Claire Expected
Erica chose a coffee shop near a crowded shopping center.
Claire appreciated the neutrality.
The woman who arrived looked nothing like the secret rival Claire had imagined.
She wore scrubs under a winter coat and apologized because her shift at an assisted-living facility had run late.
“I’m not here to defend Mike,” Erica said.
“Good.”
“I’m also not here to destroy him.”
Claire nodded.
Erica explained that she and Mike had slept together once after a regional sales conference eight years earlier.
She had known he was married.
She did not excuse that.
When she became pregnant, she told him she intended to keep the baby.
Mike agreed to financial support after Lily’s paternity was confirmed.
Erica never asked him to leave Claire.
She never wanted to build a household with him.
For years, Mike saw Lily sporadically.
Birthday lunches.
Some weekends.
School events when he could manage them without Claire noticing.
“Why agree to secrecy?” Claire asked.
Erica looked uncomfortable.
“At first I was ashamed too.”
Then Lily grew older.
She began asking why her father never brought her to family gatherings.
Why he never mentioned her brother.
Why his name was not on school pickup forms.
Erica started pushing him to tell Claire.
Mike kept promising he would.
Then, eighteen months earlier, someone else showed up at Erica’s townhouse.
Naya.
Claire stared at her.
“Naya knew before my divorce?”
“Yes.”
“How?”
“She followed Mike.”
That answer surprised Claire.
Erica remembered Naya arriving furious.
Not at Erica.
At Mike.
Naya asked questions for nearly an hour.
Was Lily really his?
How long had he been lying?
Did Claire know?
Erica told her everything.
“What did Naya say?”
Erica’s expression softened slightly.
“She said, ‘My sister deserves the truth.’”
Claire sat back.
That did not fit the Naya she thought she understood.
“What happened next?”
“I don’t know exactly.”
But Naya returned once more.
This time she was calmer.
She brought Lily a birthday gift.
Erica had a photograph from that afternoon because Lily insisted everyone stand beside the cake.
She showed Claire.
Naya was in the picture.
The date was eleven months before Claire and Mike separated.
Claire zoomed in.
Naya looked uncomfortable.
Mike stood several feet away.
Lily was smiling between them.
“That means Naya lied yesterday.”
“Yes.”
But Erica added something Claire did not expect.
“When she first came to me, your sister wasn’t protecting Mike.”
“Then why didn’t she tell me?”
Erica shook her head.
“That’s the part I’ve never understood.”
Claire left with one partial answer.
Naya had known.
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But apparently she had once intended to expose Mike.
Somewhere between that afternoon and Claire’s divorce, Naya changed sides.
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