Chapter 2 - The Digital Evidence and the Blind Fiancé
For the next forty-eight hours, I moved through our house like a ghost. I cooked dinner, nodded at Damon’s fabricated stories about long hours at the architectural firm, and smiled when he kissed the top of my head. Every touch made my skin crawl, but I kept my composure. I needed time. I needed to build a fortress of proof so airtight that neither of them could wriggle out of it with their practiced lies.
That night, while Damon slept soundly beside me, breathing heavily with the exhausted ease of a man who thought he had outsmarted his wife, I slipped out of bed. I took my laptop into the guest room and locked the door.
I downloaded the security app data, exporting every single timestamp where Claire’s emergency code had unlocked our front door. I matched those timestamps against Damon’s calendar entries, his text message logs that I managed to sync from our shared family tablet, and Claire’s social media check-ins where she claimed to be visiting her mother across town. Every single entry was a calculated betrayal. They hadn't just slipped up once in a moment of weakness; they had run a systematic, months-long affair right under my nose, utilizing my own trust against me.
Then I looked at the photograph of the champagne lace camisole beneath our bed. The metadata showed the exact minute it was taken, complete with GPS coordinates inside our master bedroom.
My phone vibrated on the desk. A text message from Claire.
Hey sweetie! Are we still on for lunch tomorrow? I want to hear all about the nursery color scheme! Love you so much!
I stared at the screen, a cold numbness settling deep into my bones. Twelve years of friendship. Twelve years of sharing secrets, celebrating promotions, crying over broken hearts, and planning futures. And she was typing those words while hiding behind my maternity coats, wearing lingerie bought by her own fiancé.
Owen.
Owen Sterling was a brilliant, dedicated surgeon who worked eighty-hour weeks at Mercy General Hospital. He was devoted to Claire, working tirelessly to provide the lavish lifestyle she constantly bragged about on Instagram. He was scheduled to marry her in three months. He deserved to know the truth before he walked down the aisle with a woman who was using his ring as a shield while sleeping with my husband.
I needed an ally. And Owen was the only person with as much at stake as I had.
I picked up my phone and dialed his private number. It rang twice before his deep, tired voice answered.
“Maya? Is everything okay? Is the baby okay?”
“Owen,” I said, my voice barely above a whisper, but steady. “I need to see you. Tonight. Without Claire knowing.”
There was a heavy pause on the line. “Maya, it’s past midnight. I just finished a fourteen-hour shift in surgery. What’s going on?”
“It’s about Claire. And Damon.”
Another pause, longer this time. The clinical fatigue in his voice vanished, replaced by sudden tension. “Where are you?”
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“In my guest room. Can you come over, or should I meet you somewhere?”
“Stay right where you are,” Owen said firmly. “I’m getting my keys. I’ll be there in twenty minutes.”
