Chapter 15
Amanda
The master bedroom was a disaster. The white duvet lay in a crumpled heap on the floor, the sheets were violently tangled, and the door stood wide open, exposing the hallway beyond.
The room, which just twenty minutes ago had felt like a thrilling, stolen hideaway, now felt stripped of its secrecy.
It was just an ugly, glaring crime scene.
Amanda stood beside the bed, her left cheek pulsing with a hot, radiating sting.
The physical pain of Olivia’s slap was sharp, but the humiliation burning in Amanda’s chest was a living, breathing thing clawing at her throat.
Not because the baker’s wife had actually had the nerve to hit her.
But because James had watched it happen and done nothing to truly defend her.
Only after Olivia had slapped her did he finally come to Amanda’s side.
Twice. She had been slapped twice before he chose her.
Worse than the slap was where James’s attention had immediately gone.
When the confrontation broke open, he had not looked at the woman who had been taking his cock in his bed just moments before.
He had not looked at the woman he had been whispering breathless promises of the future to for the last eleven months.
His focus had snapped straight to Olivia.
To the wife. To the collateral damage. To the pristine, perfectly curated life he was suddenly terrified of losing.
James was not looking at Amanda now, either.
He was moving around the room in a frantic, pathetic panic.
He grabbed his dress shirt from the floor, shoving his arms into the sleeves.
He searched wildly for his belt, his shoes, his phone—gathering whatever he needed so he could run down the stairs and chase after a woman who had just walked out on him.
Amanda watched him, her eyes narrowing as a toxic cocktail of fury, rejection, and deep, aching disappointment flooded her veins.
She replayed the confrontation in her head.
When Olivia had first appeared in the doorway, looking absolutely shattered, a dark, vicious part of Amanda had expected to feel satisfaction.
She had imagined this moment for months, even if she rarely admitted it out loud.
She had wanted the sweet, naive, flour-dusted wife to finally realize that James had been choosing Amanda every single day. She had wanted the definitive victory.
But the actual reality of the moment had not tasted like victory at all.
Olivia had not looked pathetic. She had looked destroyed, yes, but her grief had quickly sharpened into something lethal and clear. And James? James had not looked like a man who was finally free to claim the woman he actually wanted. He had looked terrified. He had looked like a coward.
When James had desperately pleaded with Olivia, Amanda had felt the ground drop out from under her. He was not trying to protect Amanda from Olivia's wrath. He was trying to protect himself. He was willing to sacrifice Amanda in a heartbeat if it meant saving his own skin.
She gritted her teeth, thinking bitterly that she should have expected it. What else should she expect from a man who had been lying to the woman he lived with for nearly a year?
But expecting betrayal in theory was vastly different from standing half-naked in a bedroom and watching it happen to you. Amanda loved him. In her own twisted, ambitious way, she truly loved him. She had believed his promises. She had believed she was different.
This had not been a one-time mistake. It had not been a drunken lapse in judgment or a few stolen kisses after a corporate event.
The affair had been going on for almost a year.
James had carved out room for her in almost every hidden corner of his life.
They had fucked in five-star hotels across the country, bent over the desk in his corner office, and pressed against the vibrating door of a first-class airplane bathroom.
He had taken her on out-of-town trips he disguised as client meetings.
He had looked her in the eyes, buried deep inside her, and told her he loved her more times than she could count.
He had brought her into this house over and over again.
A specific, brutal memory flashed through Amanda’s mind.
A few months ago, James had led her downstairs into the kitchen.
He had handed her one of Olivia’s canvas bakery aprons and told her to put it on with absolutely nothing underneath.
He had made her lean over the cold granite island, pretending to mix something in a bowl, while he hiked the apron up and fucked her hard from behind.
Amanda had moaned loudly the entire time, throwing her head back as he grunted her name.
She had loved the cruelty of it. It made her feel powerful, as if she had not just stolen James’s body, but had actively defiled the sacred, domestic symbols of Olivia’s pathetic little marriage.
After he poured himself inside her with a loud grunt, he told her that he loved her, and she kissed him, whispering her love for him right back.
Now, watching James blindly button his shirt in a cold sweat over Olivia leaving, the memory twisted into something sickening.
It no longer felt like proof that James belonged to Amanda.
It felt like proof that James had turned both women into nothing more than convenient props for his own towering ego.
"Stop moving," Amanda hissed, stepping forward.
James barely registered her voice. He was spiraling, talking frantically to himself as he hopped on one foot to pull his shoe on.
"I have to go after her. I have to fix this," James muttered, his eyes wide and unseeing.
"We can go to couples therapy. We can go to couples therapy.
If she tells people what she saw, if she connects the accounts, if she goes to a lawyer, I'm ruined.
The board will eat me alive. I have to turn this around.
I have to win my wife back, or I am completely screwed. "
The phrase win my wife back hit Amanda like an open-handed strike.
He was not saying he needed to calm Olivia down. He was not saying he needed to make sure she was safe driving home. He was saying he needed to win her back because losing her meant losing his control, his reputation, his money, and the flawless executive image he demanded the world believe in.
But it still burned like acid in Amanda's chest, because he was talking about Olivia as the ultimate prize he needed to keep, while Amanda was standing right in front of him.
"James, look at me," Amanda demanded.
He ignored her, cursing under his breath as he realized he had buttoned his shirt unevenly. He ripped the fabric apart to start over, checking his phone screen, calculating exactly what Olivia might do next.
Amanda snapped.
She closed the distance between them, drew her hand back, and slapped him across the face.
The sharp crack echoed loudly against the bedroom walls.
James’s head jerked to the side. He froze, his eyes widening in shock before narrowing into furious indignation. He touched his jaw, staring at her as if she had lost her mind. "What the hell is wrong with you? Why did you do that?"
"Because you are having a hysterical crisis," Amanda spat, her voice dripping with venom. She was not crying. She was not pleading. She was furious, humiliated, and completely done watching him act like she was disposable. "And you need to listen to me."
"I don't have time for this, Amanda!" James yelled, reaching for his keys on the dresser.
"You are not going after her," Amanda commanded.
"You do not get to tell me what to do!"
"Someone has to," Amanda fired back, stepping into his path, "because you are about to make everything worse! You're acting like a cornered rat."
"Olivia needs to hear me out. I can explain—"
Amanda let out a harsh, bitter laugh. "Explain what, exactly, James? The year-long affair? The stolen marital funds? Or maybe you want to explain what it looked like when I was taking your cock deep in her bed while she stood in the doorway?"
That stopped him. His jaw snapped shut, the reality of the disaster finally penetrating his panic.
Amanda pressed the advantage, her voice turning sharp and lethal.
"It is over. There is no putting Olivia back in the dark now.
There is no sweet, manipulative apology that will make her un-see what just happened on those sheets.
There is no version of this where she comes back home tonight and pretends to be your trusting little wife again. "
"You don't know Olivia," James argued stubbornly.
"I know enough," Amanda sneered. "I know she looked broken, but she did not look stupid. You have been underestimating your wife for years, James, just because it made lying to her easier. Well, she isn't blind anymore."
The truth stung, and James flinched. "You made this worse," he accused, his voice rising again. "You taunted her! You pushed her!"
"I made it worse?" Amanda screamed, jabbing a finger into his chest, her composure breaking as the sheer unfairness of his accusation hit her.
"You made it worse by bringing me into this house, into this bed, and into your marriage!
You assured me she would not be coming back to the house tonight.
That is why I agreed to come here! Do you think I would be stupid enough to expose myself to this kind of risk if you hadn't sworn we were safe? "
"You wanted this too!" James defended himself.
"Yes, I did!" Amanda yelled right back in his face, her voice cracking with raw, unvarnished pain. "But I did not agree to be discarded like trash the second she found out! We have plans, James! And right now, you are scared, and you are acting dumb."
"I never said I was discarding you."
"You tried to call our relationship a mistake with me standing right there!"
"I was buying time!" James shot back desperately.
"You were buying yourself a way out!" Amanda roared.
The silence that followed was heavy and hostile.
Amanda breathed heavily, feeling a toxic mix of rage, jealousy, and cold, calculating fear.
She did not want to lose James. She loved the power, the money, and the intoxicating thrill of being his chosen equal.
But even more than that, she absolutely refused to be the only one left paying the price for his reckless choices.
If Olivia had proof of the financial fraud, James could go down.
And if James went down, Amanda knew she could easily be dragged right into the mud with him.
She refused to become the disposable mistress in a public scandal.
She was not going to lose her high-paying corporate job.
She was not going to be named in messy legal documents, shredded in workplace gossip, or listed as the homewrecker in a high-profile divorce proceeding while James offered her up as a meaningless lapse in judgment to save his own skin.
She forced her racing heart to slow down. She locked her emotions behind a wall of pure survival instinct and shifted gears.
"If you go running after Olivia right now," Amanda said, her voice dropping into a terrifyingly calm, strategic register, "you will look desperate. You will look guilty. You will give her all the power."
James swallowed hard, his panic ebbing as her logic cut through the noise. "I have to stop her before she talks."
"No," Amanda corrected sharply. "Trying to stop her directly will only make you look worse. You don't need to stop her. You need to control the story."
James stared at her.
"You already started doing it," Amanda reminded him. "You went to her friends. You planted the seeds. Now you need to be smarter. You need a plan. You need to know exactly what proof she has, who she has told, and what she intends to do next."
Amanda watched him process the shift. She was angry, yes, but she was calculating. James was drowning in panic; Amanda was building a lifeboat.
"There is only one way for us to get out of this unscathed," Amanda told him, her dark eyes locking onto his.
"What do you mean?" James asked, his voice rough.
Amanda stepped closer, her mind moving with rapid, ruthless precision. "Olivia is highly emotional. She is humiliated. And right now, she is staying under the roof of a man who has obvious feelings for her. We can use that."
James went perfectly still, the shape of what she was suggesting slowly dawning on him.
"We don't need Olivia to forgive you right away," Amanda explained, her voice smooth and venomous.
"We just need people to doubt her. We need people to wonder if Leo influenced her into making up these accusations.
We need her friends and the board to question whether Olivia is actually reacting to a betrayal, or if she is just using your financial mistakes as a convenient excuse to run off with another man. "
James did not argue. He did not defend his wife's honor. He just listened.
"You cannot chase her like a guilty husband begging for forgiveness," Amanda instructed. "You have to look like the reasonable one. The worried one. The abandoned one. You are the man desperately trying to save his marriage while his unstable wife is being pulled away by someone else."
Amanda touched her burning cheek, then looked at the man who had almost made the mistake of choosing panic over survival.
"You’re not going after her," she said. "You’re going to make everyone wonder why she ran to him."
James stared at her as the meaning settled over his face.
Amanda smiled without warmth.
"There’s only one way we walk away from this clean, James. We make sure Olivia looks messier than we do."