Chapter Eight
CHAPTER EIGHT
“I need to do something,” I say as soon as I close the passenger door of my car.
Caprice assesses me carefully before pulling out of my empty parking lot. “I’m not sure you should do anything until you’ve had a chance to sleep on this, hon.”
I shake my head. Anton was all I could think about this afternoon. I barely functioned through my staff meeting or any of my phone calls. I hardly even registered the pic my mom sent of my new tiny little nephew. My mind just kept spinning around whether this whole thing is just about the hot springs or—my gut twists every time I consider—it goes deeper. If what Anton did was inevitable or if I could’ve done something to prevent it. And despite my anger, I keep getting stuck on that second possibility. Either way, I don’t think I’ll be able to sleep until I know what I’m going to do about it.
“Do I confront him?” I fidget in my seat, still unable to come up with any approach other than just screaming at him. “How do people deal with this sort of thing?”
Caprice raises her eyebrows, pursing her lips as she navigates west, crossing Colorado Boulevard. It’s a gorgeous evening, sunny and serene, though it looks like a bank of clouds will roll down from the mountains with the sunset, promising an evening shower. “According to my research, you have a variety of options. Personally, I’m in favor of moving out while he’s at work and having him served with divorce papers. Though, if you want to get creative, we could probably hack his Unmatched profile and change it to say he has STIs and a tiny dick.”
I frown.
“Too much?” she asks.
I shake my head. “It isn’t tiny.”
She nearly runs a red light, slamming on the brake at the last second, pitching poor Heartthrob halfway into the front seat. He braces himself on the center console and licks her cheek, as if questioning her ability to drive the vehicle.
“Ugh, get your stinking dog out of my lap, Lydia!”
“Heartthrob, off!” I say, and he quickly retreats. “Um, sorry...”
She grumbles, wiping the side of her face with her sleeve. I reach back and give his ears a rub when she’s not looking.
“I appreciate you letting him tag along.”
“The dog might be smelly, but he’s currently higher in my esteem than your stupid husband.”
I exhale. “Yeah, mine too.”
We drive in silence the rest of the way to her apartment building. Caprice recently upgraded to a studio in one of the newer high-rise towers southeast of downtown. She’s close to everything, and while she doesn’t have a ton of space, she has the most amazing views of both the front range—the literal purple mountains sweeping above the city to the west—and Denver’s glimmering skyscrapers to the north. She’s also steps from Washington Park, one of my favorite green spaces, with two lakes, sprawling lawns, and several jogging paths. I keep Heartthrob on a close leash as we follow her through the plush lobby and up the elevators to the tenth floor. Once inside, he makes a circuit of her apartment, sniffing over a few things, but quickly loses interest. Maybe because Caprice doesn’t have pets.
I unroll a portable dog mat and lay it by the front door. I already fed and walked him, but he must be so confused that we haven’t gone home. A lump forms in my throat when I think about it too. I point to the mat and he takes my cue, circling twice and settling down .
Caprice pulls a couple of foil-wrapped burritos from a brown paper bag. “Here, I picked up Illegal Pete’s on my way to get you. Potato and green chile okay?”
“Thanks.” I accept a plate and sit next to her on one of the barstools at the kitchen counter, though my stomach protests as I stare at the food. After listening to her chew for a few minutes, I look down at the counter and say, “I don’t want to get divorced.”
Caprice sets down her burrito and grabs a couple bottles of water from the fridge, handing one to me. “You could try therapy?” She doesn’t even try to hide her curling lip.
I twist my fingers in my lap. “I just wish I knew how serious this is. How far he’s taken it.”
“Lydia,” she says dryly, waiting for me to look up. “What is there not to know? He made a profile on a dating site for married people . He told other women he wants to spend ‘naughty afternoons’ with them.”
I close my eyes, a wave of heat passing over my face. “But what if it’s just a profile? Maybe he hasn’t actually...”
What has he done?
I’m bombarded with images of his bare skin against someone else’s. Embracing a woman who isn’t me between his muscled arms and chest. Kissing her. Whispering to her. Penetrating her.
I shudder. “He can’t be sleeping with someone else, for God’s sake. He’s only ever slept with me!”
Caprice pauses, her drink halfway to her mouth. “I think I knew that, but I really didn’t need to know that.”
I rest my head on the counter, my thoughts racing back to the weekend, to our non-encounters in the kitchen, in the bed. My whole body flushes hot. If I’d just kissed him and said I’d go to the stupid hot springs, done anything else right, would his “dating” profile even exist? Or has this been going on longer? We’ve been avoiding each other for days now. What does he do while I’m gone? Who is he with?
What if he already loves someone else?
I sit back in my chair, staring into nothingness until Caprice’s voice finally reaches me again.
“Lydia. If he’s stepping out, throw his ass out the door.”
I look up at her. The world seems thick and foggy. “You think I should?”
“You’re not going to just ignore this and look the other way.”
“No.” I shake my head. “I don’t think I could.”
My phone lights up with yet another baby-gushing text from my mom, but instead of looking at it, I open my thread with Anton. Normally, we text all the time, but we’ve only exchanged a handful of messages the past few days. He asked me a question about our taxes, and I’d answered, then there were a few lame comments about the weather. I scroll up to last week, before the water heater and the hot springs and the tension, to some bantering we did about politics and a lively meme-filled discussion about whether or not kale belonged on our grocery list. I’d sent him a silly picture of Heartthrob wearing my glasses the day before that, and Anton had made a joke about him making an efficient secretary. My heart aches as I read back over our conversations, feeling foolishly nostalgic for that everyday back-and-forth. Now it’s tempting to type out:
Found your Unmatched profile. Did you cheat?
But as much as I want to straight up ask, I’m also afraid. What if he doesn’t answer? What if I come home to an empty house and I never see him again?
I guess I’ve figured out one thing. I need to confront him in person, look into his eyes, and get an answer.
But I don’t know where to start.
I tap out a message telling him I’m working late, which feels totally resentful but also completely believable. Then I switch over to the browser and plug in the Unmatched web address. It won’t let me past the landing page without an account.
“What’s your login?” I ask.
Caprice glances over my shoulder at the screen, doing a double-take. “You want to torture yourself more?”
“Can I have it or not?” I point to the site in front of me. “Or should I just make my own?”
“No, don’t do that,” she grumbles. “You don’t need to get yourself in trouble.” She tears a sheet of paper out of her notebook and jots down :
Username: LonelyGirl8
Password: 1nFiDel!ty
She hands me the paper with some hesitation. “I was sort of kidding about changing his profile. We’d need someone to hack his account if you really want to do that.”
“I’m just looking,” I mutter.
I go to Anton’s page first, glancing over the stats and reading the description again. I’ve endured an undercurrent of nausea ever since I first saw it, but looking at it a second time, nothing new pings. It honestly seems sort of generic. I click away to the favorites tab on Caprice’s profile. Here, I find a cache of men. Some of the profiles clearly use stock images, others appear more genuine, and there’s at least one besides Anton I think I recognize, but I can’t say from where. A few of their descriptions are overtly filthy. One or two might pass for gentlemanly if I didn’t know what they were there for. But most are honestly boring. Looking to cheat. Tired of my wife. My queasiness increases. I’m not sure what I’m after, but the more I scroll through, the less any of these assholes stand out.
I tap my finger against my lips and go back to the main page, clicking on “Ladies” in the search instead of “Men.”
This doesn’t pull up thousands of results like the dudes, but apparently there are enough unscrupulous women in the area to generate several pages. My lip twitches as I scroll, wondering if my husband has looked over each of these same faces. Darkly, I try to guess which ones he might’ve clicked.
There’s “Isabella,” the alluring Hispanic woman. Or maybe he’d prefer “Rachel,” the busty redhead. Or hit a little closer to home with “Madison,” the blonde. My free hand curls into a fist in my lap. None of their profile pictures are very clear—they’re either highly filtered, the camera is centered on their cleavage, or they’re peeking through a mane of hair—but they all strike me as genuine. Some of their descriptions claim they’re frustrated in their marriages too. Some of them just don’t seem to care and want to break the rules. I suppose any one of them could be with my husband right now. Solving his problems, if not their own .
I push my dinner plate farther away on the counter.
Caprice is next to me, scrolling on her phone, jotting things in her notebook.
“So, this blog series you’re working on,” I say, my voice coming out dry and hoarse. “Are you going to, like, name names? How are you going to find out who people are?”
“It’ll be an exposé, yeah. The website is really just a starting point. I have a PI friend who’s helping me track some of the dudes down, trying to get photos of them sneaking around. It’s actually kind of stupid how easy some of them have been to find.”
“No kidding.”
She presses her lips into a grim line. “Anyway, a lot of dirt can be found online, but I’ve had to get creative to find out what happens beyond the site. I’ve gotten in touch with some of the women, offering them anonymity in exchange for their narratives.”
“You are good,” I say on an exhale.
She grins. “I’m also considering going undercover. I’ve already got the profile, obviously, but I might be able to take it to another level if I pose as one of the girls and see how much I can get some of these guys to say and do.”
I furrow my brow at her. “That sounds dangerous.”
“I’m not actually going to meet any of them in person.” She laughs, waving away my concern. “There’s a chat feature on the site. I can do messages, phone calls, or even video. I just need to draw them into an exchange where they think something’s going to happen so I have more to report on.”
“Okay, good.”
“I can’t confirm it yet, but I suspect I’ve found at least four political figures and several high-profile businessmen.”
“Wow.” I sit back on my stool. “And you’re okay knowing you’re going to piss off some powerful people?”
“It’s why I got into journalism.” She sniffs. “Anyway, nothing’s going to happen to anyone who doesn’t deserve it.”
I look back down at my phone, navigating to the list of favorite dudes and seeing them in a somewhat different light. Now they’ve become a list of victims—just not the kind you feel sorry for. I pause when I scroll past my husband’s face, thinking over Caprice’s plan, an idea forming in the back of my mind.
“Look, I don’t want this to get messy for you,” Caprice says, flipping through pages in her notebook. “I’m going to talk to my lawyer friends and try to feel out if we’ve got enough on Anton with just his profile for you to take him to court. There’s a chance we’ll need to dig deeper, though, figure out more about what he’s done. I can ask my PI?—”
“ No. ” The sharpness of my voice startles me, but suddenly my brain is churning.
“Okay...” She looks up from her notes and gently asks, “Are you thinking you might be open to forgive him?”
I shake my head quickly. My empty stomach roils, and now I’m glad I haven’t eaten. “I—I just want to do it myself.”
She furrows her brow. “Not sure I follow?”
I sit up straighter, the details coming together as I speak. “You want an exposé? I’ll get it for you.”
She purses her lips, but her eyes tell me to continue.
I fold my arms over my chest. “If someone’s going to get their hands dirty looking at the dark corners of my marriage, it’s going to be me.”
“Lydia.” She covers her mouth with her hand. “I was never going to write about you and Anton.”
I curl my lip. “If he’s been unfaithful, I give you permission to. Anonymously. But I don’t want some other person finding that out and telling me. I want to be the one to confront him myself.”
“How are you going to do that?” she asks, raising a skeptical brow.
I grab my phone, pull up the generic Unmatched profile she created, and start inputting my own details.
Sex: Female
Age: 29
Height: 5’7”
Weight: 140lbs
Eyes: Blue
Hair: Blonde
Build: Curvy
Interest: Me n
When I’m finished, I hand the phone to Caprice with a trembling hand and sit back in my chair. “All I need now is the right profile picture. What do you think?”
Her eyes widen as she reads. “Lydia, this is...”
“Brilliant?” I ask.
“ Don’t call yourself curvy, ” she says.
I frown. “Uh, well, I’ve got mega hips and boobs.”
“Yes, you do, but curvy means something totally different to the men on here.” She edits my profile briefly and keeps scrolling.
I wrinkle my nose, looking over her shoulder. “I’m not ‘athletic.’”
“You’re more athletic than curvy to these guys, trust me.”
“Fine. What about the rest?”
She clears her throat and reads aloud. “‘Bored, unfulfilled wife looking for discreet out-of-town adventures with fit, early-thirties male. Preferably on the beach, but let’s get started between the sheets at a nice hotel.’ Nice nod to his profile. ‘If we hit it off, you can spank me for being naughty—’” She looks up from the screen, lip curled in curious surprise. “ Spank you, huh?”
I thought it seemed racy and daring when I wrote it, but my face burns with her looking at me that way. “Maybe I’ll skip that line...”
“No. If you want it, keep it.” She hands the phone back to me with a look I’ve never seen. Like I’m someone she hasn’t met before. I can’t tell if she thinks this is a good or bad thing, but it’s exactly the reaction I was shooting for. “I still don’t get it, though, Lydia. What are you going to do with all this?”
“What else?” I ignore the hot prickle of my skin, pressing my mouth into a hard smile. “I’m going to cheat.”