The Long Way Home (Infidelity #8)

Chapter One

“Umm…” I hum, looking between the two dresses.

The saleswoman doesn’t miss a beat. Her smile stays perfectly in place as she lifts one slightly higher. “This one is made from sustainable fabric,” she says.

“But that one looks more comfortable,” I murmur, pointing to the other.

Biting my lip, I stare at them until my head starts to hurt.

“You know what? I’ll take both.”

“Excellent choice,” the woman says smoothly, draping the dresses over her forearm. “Can I show you anything else today?”

“No, that’s it. Thanks.”

“Would you like these gift wrapped?”

I force a smile. “Sure.”

The word comes out slightly strained.

They could’ve been for me. She doesn’t know I have a faulty uterus and that they’re for the woman carrying my baby.

I swipe my card, grab my shopping bags, and leave the boutique before the ache in my chest can settle too deeply. Maybe I went a little overboard with the baby shopping lately, but sue me, I’m excited.

Getting into my Range Rover, I toss the gift bag into the passenger seat beside me. The dresses for Laila peek out from the tissue paper.

I’m just going to stop by her apartment and drop them off. Kind of a housewarming-slash-thank-you-for-carrying-my-kid gift.

Not that I need to thank her. We’re paying her generously. Brad even found her a new apartment because apparently a university dorm was “no place for a pregnant woman.”

Still, I want us to get along.

It takes me three tries to find the building. Brad told me it was close to the hospital in case of emergencies, but he never actually gave me the address.

Silly me. I never asked.

Then again, Laila seems to want distance from me.

I googled it. Apparently it’s normal. Surrogates sometimes resent the intended mother. I wanted to confront her about shutting me out of appointments, but Brad convinced me not to.

“She’s pregnant, Wyn,” he’d said gently. “Whatever she’s feeling right now won’t matter once the baby’s here.”

Once the baby’s here and we get custody.

So I kept my mouth shut.

But I’m trying. Like my mother said, relationships don’t improve unless you make the effort.

And I am making the effort.

I bought pastries from that fancy bakery Laila mentioned once. Two dresses. Even a little candle that smelled like vanilla.

I feel ridiculous the second I climb out of the car.

I should’ve just asked Brad for her apartment number because now I’m standing here balancing shopping bags and pastry boxes with absolutely no idea where she lives.

Shifting everything into one arm, I pull out my phone and hit Brad’s contact.

The line barely rings before it disconnects.

A second later, a text comes through.

In surgery.

I purse my lips.

I’ve told him a hundred times I hate when the nurses hang up on me from his phone. Just answer and say he’s unavailable like a normal person.

Shaking my head, I glance up, searching for the apartment entrance.

That’s when my eyes land on a black car parked along the street.

My stomach drops instantly.

No. No, that’s ridiculous.

This is LA. Black luxury cars are basically city pigeons.

But not all of them have Brad’s stupid customized license plate, the one he refuses to admit cost extra.

“It’s probably nothing,” I whisper to myself.

Maybe hospital parking was full again.

Still, unease crawls under my skin as I approach the building entrance.

There’s a panel beside the door with tenant names and buzzers.

I find Black, Laila.

Then I press the button. Static crackles.

A man’s voice comes through the speaker.

“Yes?”

My entire body goes cold.

I know that voice.

My mouth opens, but nothing comes out.

“Hello?” Brad says again. “You’re covering the camera.”

I still can’t move. It feels like my body stopped listening to me.

“You know what? I’m coming down anyway.”

Panic snaps me back to life.

I hurry across the street and duck behind a parked SUV just as the building door swings open.

Less than a minute later, my husband steps outside.

He glances around once, confused, before looking toward the buzzer panel.

Then he walks calmly to his car, gets in, and drives away.

It takes a woman yelling at me to finally snap me out of it.

“Hey! Get away from my car!”

“Sorry,” I mumble automatically, stumbling back onto the sidewalk.

“Are you on something?” the woman asks, her voice weary.

I turn toward her, finally getting a proper look.

She’s older than her voice, fifties maybe, with dark cropped hair and huge silver hoop earrings. She’s wearing paint-splattered overalls over a black crop top, like some effortlessly cool LA art teacher. On any other day I probably would’ve admired her.

Right now I can barely breathe.

I shake my head slowly, my eyes drifting back to the apartment building like it holds all the answers.

“I’m sorry for yelling, darling,” she says, her voice gentler now. “Thought you were trying to steal my car.”

“I wasn’t.” My throat tightens. “My husband…”

The words barely come out as I point uselessly toward the building.

Her expression softens instantly.

“Oh,” she murmurs.

Then, carefully, like I’m something fragile, she puts an arm around my shoulders.

“Let’s get you out of the street.”

“But-”

“Let’s not do anything hasty right now.”

If I’d been in a better state of mind, I probably wouldn’t have followed a stranger down a narrow set of concrete stairs into a basement studio.

The space smells like paint thinner, and coffee.

It’s cramped in a way that somehow still feels lived in. Massive canvases line the walls, some finished, others abandoned halfway through in violent strokes of color. Empty easels stand like skeletons around the room.

There’s an old upright piano shoved into one corner beneath stacks of sheet music and takeout containers. A desk disappears beneath towers of sketchbooks, paint tubes, brushes sitting in cloudy jars of water.

The entire place is chaos.

I glance around carefully, trying not to judge.

“I live upstairs,” the woman says as she kicks aside a pile of fabric with her boot. “I just work better in chaos.”

“I’m the opposite,” I mutter. “Chaos makes me itchy.”

That earns a laugh from her.

“What do you do?” she asks, clearing paint-covered cloths off a stool without caring where they land.

I stare at her hands instead of answering.

Paint under her nails. Rings on almost every finger. Smudges of blue across her wrist.

“Sorry,” she says after a moment. “I’m Claire.”

She extends a hand.

I look down at mine before carelessly dropping the shopping bags onto the floor. The bakery boxes I set gently on the cluttered table.

“Bronwyn.”

I shake her hand.

“That’s a beautiful name,” Claire says with a smile.

“Thanks.” I glance away. “My husband hates it. He insists on calling me Wyn.”

Claire frowns slightly. “I’m sorry?”

“I like Wyn,” I admit quietly. “But it’s not my name.”

For a second, neither of us says anything.

Then Claire gestures toward the cluttered kitchenette tucked into the back corner of the studio. “Would you like some coffee?”

The abrupt subject change would usually be rude, but today it feels merciful.

I nod. “Sure. That’ll go great with the chocolate mud brownies and sea salt cookies.”

“Now you’re speaking my language,” she says.

While she moves around the kitchenette, I turn back toward the easels.

One painting in particular catches my eye.

Walking closer, I stare at the vivid colors splashed across the canvas. Blues melting into golds, violent streaks of green cutting through crimson.

I wish I could say it made me feel something profound, but the truth is… I don’t really understand art.

Scenery, sure. I get landscapes. Mountains. Oceans. Things that are obviously beautiful.

But this?

It just looks like paint.

“Do you like it?”

I jump slightly at Claire’s voice behind me.

Looking back at the painting, I search desperately for a way not to offend the woman who just rescued me from having a breakdown on the sidewalk.

“It’s vivid,” I settle on.

Claire laughs immediately. “You hate it.”

“No, I-”

“It’s okay,” she says, waving me off. “I used to paint realism.”

“Realism?”

“You know. Actual figures. Real objects. Portraits. Landscapes.” She hands me a steaming mug. “People don’t really buy that anymore. They buy this shit.”

“You don’t like this?”

She shakes her head before leaning against the wall beside me.

“I was broke twenty-five years ago,” she says. “Like, choosing-between-rent-and-food broke. One night I got drunk, threw paint at a canvas, called it emotional commentary or whatever, and some rich guy bought it for enough money that I could eat something besides ramen for a month.”

I blink at her. “So you sold out?”

“Yes,” she answers easily.

The honesty catches me off guard.

“I’d love to tell you there’s dignity in staying true to yourself, but truthfully? Staying true to myself got me homeless and starving.” She smirks into her coffee. “Besides, not completely.”

I frown. “What does that mean?”

“Stand here.”

Before I can react, she gently grabs my shoulders and moves me a few feet to the left.

“Now tilt your head a little.”

I do.

Then I look back at the painting.

My breath catches.

The chaotic streaks of color suddenly shift into something else entirely.

A tree.

Not a perfect one. Not obvious. But there, woven through all the mess, is the most hauntingly beautiful tree I’ve ever seen.

“Wow,” I whisper.

Claire smiles softly. “It’s not finished yet.”

“It’s beautiful,” I say, and this time I mean it.

“Thanks.”

She walks back toward the table and sinks into her chair.

I follow slowly, opening the bakery box and laying out the brownies and cookies between us.

The studio falls quiet for a moment except for the distant sound of traffic overhead.

Then Claire tilts her head. “So… why were you hiding behind my car?”

I rub my lips together nervously. “Why did you invite me in?” I counter instead of answering.

Claire smiles like she sees straight through what I’m doing.

“You looked like you needed help.”

I stare at her.

No one’s really said something like that to me before. Not without wanting something in return.

“A woman found me on the street once too,” Claire says casually, breaking apart a cookie. “I’d run away from home, moved to LA with about fifty dollars to my name, got my bags stolen the second day here and just…” She shrugs lightly. “Stood there. Lost.”

“And she helped you?”

“She bought me a sandwich and let me crash in her apartment for four months.”

I blink. “I’m definitely not going to need to crash here.”

“You don’t have to.” Claire smiles softly. “I just try to help.”

“So you’re paying it forward?”

“I try to.” She takes another bite of her cookie. “Doesn’t always work. One time I accidentally helped a man who tried to rob me. Thankfully I know Krav Maga.”

A startled laugh escapes me.

“Well, hopefully you won’t need it with me.”

Claire snorts into her coffee.

The moment of peace passes and reality settles back over me.

“My husband…” I start quietly. “Brad and I… we have a surrogate. Laila. She lives in that building and today…” I swallow hard. “I went there to give her a gift.”

My eyes drift toward the bags sitting abandoned on the floor.

“And instead, I saw my husband leaving her apartment.”

Claire’s expression softens carefully, like she’s trying not to push me too far in either direction.

“Maybe she needed help,” she offers gently.

I shake my head immediately.

“He literally texted me that he was in surgery five minutes before.”

Claire winces a little at that.

“It could still be innocent,” she says after a moment. “Maybe he didn’t want you to worry.”

I smile sadly into my coffee. “You’re optimistic.”

“I try to be.”

Silence settles between us again.

I stare down at my untouched brownie.

“I’m a housewife,” I say eventually. “Which means I have way too much free time. And when you have too much free time, you end up reading things online.”

Claire hums knowingly.

“I kept seeing these stories,” I continue softly.

“About husbands falling for the surrogate because she’s carrying their child.

And I always thought it was ridiculous. Dramatic.

Just fiction people write to scare women or…

gain readers.” I stare down into my coffee.

“But now…” My voice cracks slightly. “I don’t know. ”

Claire studies me quietly for a long moment before speaking.

“Are you sure that’s what’s happening?”

I shake my head immediately.

“No. It could be innocent.” I laugh once, bitter and shaky. “But how will I ever know?”

“You could ask them.”

“And they could lie,” I throw back instantly.

The words come out harsher than I mean them to. Claire doesn’t flinch.

“What if…” I start before stopping myself. My chest tightens so hard it almost hurts. “What if they are having an affair?” I blurt suddenly, my voice rising. “What if they’re in love?”

The studio echoes with the words for a second before silence crashes down again.

I sink back into my chair.

“Oh my God,” I whisper.

The realization hits me all at once, ugly and suffocating.

“They’re going to raise my baby together.”