Chapter 2
The Woman Behind the Secret
The call ended before Mollie could say another word.
Freddie lowered the phone slowly.
Lucy was still standing across the room.
The white roses had become an absurd detail between them, bright and beautiful in a moment that had suddenly turned ugly.
"Photographs," Lucy said.
Freddie said nothing.
"She said someone sent photographs to the press."
His jaw tightened.
"Lucy, let me explain."
"Explain what?"
"Nothing is what you think."
A bitter laugh escaped her.
"That's the sentence you chose?"
He put the phone on the table.
"I made mistakes."
"How many?"
Freddie looked away.
That tiny movement answered more than he intended.
Lucy felt the floor shift beneath her, though she remained perfectly still.
"How many, Freddie?"
He rubbed a hand over his face.
"One."
"One what?"
"One relationship."
The room went silent.
Lucy stared at him.
The word relationship was almost worse than affair.
An affair could have been a mistake.
A relationship required time.
Choice.
Planning.
A second person who had been given something that belonged inside their marriage.
"Mollie."
He nodded once.
"Yes."
Lucy looked at the roses again.
Then she looked at her husband.
"How long?"
"Lucy..."
"How long?"
He swallowed.
"Several months."
She closed her eyes.
Several months.
Her mind immediately began searching through memories, attaching dates to moments that had once seemed ordinary.
Their anniversary.
The weekend in Aspen.
His sudden trip to Chicago.
Her birthday dinner he had missed.
The night he told her he was too exhausted to talk and left the room with his phone in his hand.
"Several months," she repeated.
"Yes."
"When did it start?"
"I don't know exactly."
"Don't lie to me now."
His eyes snapped toward hers.
"I'm not."
"You remembered enough to hide it."
That landed.
Freddie took a step toward her.
Lucy stepped back.
His face tightened.
"I never wanted to hurt you."
"You had months to avoid it."
"I know."
"No. You don't."
Her voice shook, but she refused to let it break.
"You don't get to tell me what you intended. I am asking you what you did."
Freddie stood silently.
Lucy reached for the remote on the coffee table and turned on the television.
The financial news appeared first.
Then the screen changed.
A photograph filled it.
Freddie.
Mollie.
Standing outside a restaurant.
His hand was at the small of her back.
They were not kissing.
They didn't need to.
The intimacy in the photograph was unmistakable.
Lucy stared.
She recognized the restaurant.
"That's Bellamy's."
Freddie said nothing.
"When did you take me there?"
His expression changed.
"Lucy."
"When did you take me there?"
"Six weeks ago."
She nodded slowly.
"And you had already been seeing her."
"Yes."
Something in her chest cracked.
Six weeks ago.
She remembered that night.
Freddie had ordered her favorite wine. He had laughed when she spilled a little sauce on her dress. He had reached across the table and held her hand.
She had gone home believing they were finding their way back to each other.
All the while, another woman had already occupied a part of his life.
"Did you take her there too?"
Freddie's silence was enough.
Lucy turned off the television.
"How romantic."
"Lucy, please."
"Don't."
He moved closer.
"I am sorry."
She looked at him.
There was genuine regret in his eyes.
That was almost harder to bear.
Because she knew he meant it.
He regretted being caught.
Perhaps he regretted hurting her.
But regret did not change the fact that he had kissed another woman while wearing his wedding ring.
Lucy walked toward the hallway.
"Where are you going?"
"To get my things."
"You don't have to leave."
She stopped.
"I think I do."
"Lucy, wait."
He caught her wrist.
She looked down at his hand.
Freddie released her immediately.
The gesture seemed to shock him as much as it did her.
"I'm sorry."
Lucy stepped away.
"Don't touch me unless I ask you to."
He nodded.
For once, he did not argue.
She went upstairs.
Her suitcase sat at the back of the closet.
She pulled it down.
Freddie remained at the bedroom door.
"Where will you go?"
"Somewhere you can't find me easily."
"You don't have to disappear."
"I've spent months living beside a man who disappeared without leaving the house."
His face tightened.
She began folding clothes.
"Lucy."
She ignored him.
"Can we talk about this?"
"We're talking."
"No. You're packing."
"Because I need space."
"I can give you space here."
She looked at him.
"You don't understand."
"Then make me understand."
Her hands stopped.
For a second, she wanted to tell him everything.
That she was terrified.
That she wanted to scream.
That she still loved him.
That she hated him for making her love feel humiliating.
Instead, she said, "I don't know who you are anymore."
Freddie had no answer.
Lucy packed the suitcase.
Then she saw the photograph again.
It had appeared on her phone while she was upstairs.
Another image.
This one was outside the Hawthorne Grand.
Freddie stood beside Mollie.
His hand rested against her cheek.
He was kissing her.
Lucy stared at the screen.
The date was visible.
Seven months ago.
Her fingers went numb.
Seven months.
She slowly sat on the edge of the bed.
Freddie appeared in the doorway.
"What happened?"
She turned the phone toward him.
His expression collapsed.
"Lucy..."
"Seven months."
He said nothing.
"Yesterday you said several months."
"I was trying to..."
"Protect me?"
"No."
"Protect yourself?"
His silence answered.
Lucy stood.
"You looked me in the face downstairs and told me you didn't know exactly when it started."
"I didn't think you needed every detail."
"Every detail?"
She laughed once, but there was no humor in it.
"You cheated on me for seven months and decided I didn't need the details."
"I was ashamed."
"You should have been honest."
"I was afraid."
"Of what?"
"Losing you."
She stared at him.
"You were afraid of losing me, so you made sure I couldn't make an informed decision about staying."
Freddie looked down.
Lucy felt anger pushing through the grief now.
It was cleaner.
Hotter.
Easier to hold.
She opened the closet again and pulled out another suitcase.
"I'm leaving tonight."
"I'll have the car brought around."
"No."
"Lucy."
"I don't want your driver."
"I'll take you myself."
"No."
"Please."
She stopped.
He had said the word quietly.
Not as a billionaire.
Not as the man whose name opened doors.
As her husband.
For one dangerous second, she remembered why she had fallen in love with him.
The early years.
The tiny apartment.
The cheap takeout.
Freddie working at the kitchen table until dawn while she slept on the couch beside him.
The night he had proposed with a ring he could barely afford.
"You are the only person I never want to lose," he had told her then.
She had believed him.
Lucy looked at him now.
"That's what makes this so cruel."
His eyes lifted.
"I believed you."
Then she walked past him.
She took the stairs instead of the elevator.
Freddie followed but kept his distance.
At the front door, Lucy picked up her coat.
She expected him to stop her.
He didn't.
That hurt too.
Outside, rain had begun falling.
Lucy stepped onto the pavement without waiting for the car.
Behind her, Freddie stood beneath the entrance canopy.
"Lucy."
She turned.
He looked broken.
Not ruined.
Not yet.
But shaken enough that she could see the first crack in the confidence he wore like armor.
"I love you," he said.
Her throat tightened.
"I know."
His face changed.
She continued.
"That's what makes it harder."
She walked away.
By midnight, Lucy was in a quiet hotel across town.
She had turned off her phone.
She had ordered tea she didn't want.
She had taken a shower and changed into an old T-shirt.
Yet sleep would not come.
She opened her laptop.
She told herself she was looking for a place to stay permanently.
Instead, she searched Mollie Knowles.
The results appeared immediately.
Mollie was not simply an employee.
She was a senior strategy consultant who had worked with Holloway International for nearly two years.
Two years.
Lucy clicked through article after article.
There were photographs of Mollie beside Freddie at corporate events.
Nothing suspicious.
Nothing obvious.
Until Lucy found an interview from eight months earlier.
The reporter had asked Freddie about the company's recent expansion.
Standing just behind him in the photograph was Mollie.
Lucy enlarged the image.
Freddie wasn't looking at the camera.
He was looking at Mollie.
The expression on his face was familiar.
Too familiar.
Lucy scrolled.
Another article.
A private dinner following a board meeting.
Mollie had attended.
Another.
A business retreat in Napa.
Mollie had attended.
Another.
A charity event.
Mollie again.
Lucy sat back.
Seven months of cheating.
But the closeness had existed much longer.
Maybe the affair had begun before seven months.
Maybe seven months was simply the date when they stopped pretending it was harmless.
Her phone buzzed.
Freddie.
Then again.
And again.
Lucy watched the screen light up.
She did not answer.
A message appeared.
Freddie: I know you don't want to speak to me. I understand.
Another.
Freddie: But there are things you don't know.
Lucy stared at the words.
Her thumb hovered over the screen.
Another message arrived.
Freddie: Mollie is not the only person I lied to.
Lucy sat completely still.
Her heart began pounding.
A fourth message appeared.
Freddie: Please let me tell you the truth before someone else does.
Lucy looked at the clock.
1:06 a.m.
Then she saw the final message.
Freddie: Check the anniversary account.
Lucy frowned.
She opened the banking application.
Their anniversary account was one of the few financial matters Freddie had always insisted they keep separate from his business.
Lucy entered the account details.
Her breath caught.
There were withdrawals.
Large ones.
Repeated withdrawals over the previous eight months.
Hotel payments.
Private transfers.
Luxury purchases.
She opened the transaction history.
One payment stood out.
A jewelry store.
Seven months ago.
The same week the photograph outside the Hawthorne Grand had been taken.
Lucy clicked the transaction.
A receipt appeared.
Her stomach turned.
The purchase was a necklace.
Not one she had ever received.
The recipient name was listed beneath the charge.
Mollie Knowles.
Lucy stared at the screen.
Then another transaction appeared.
A second necklace.
Then a designer watch.
Then a private suite.
Then another transfer.
Her breathing became shallow.
This wasn't one terrible night.
It was a hidden life.
Freddie had not merely cheated.
He had built an entire secret around the woman he claimed meant nothing.
Lucy closed the laptop.
For several seconds, she sat in darkness.
Then she whispered the question that frightened her most.
"What else did you lie about?"
Her phone buzzed again.
This time, it wasn't Freddie.
It was an unknown number.
One photograph was attached.
Lucy opened it.
Her face went cold.
It showed Freddie and Mollie together at the Hawthorne Grand.
But the date was not seven months ago.
It was eleven months ago.
And in the background, barely visible near the hotel entrance, stood Lucy herself.
She remembered that night.
She had been waiting outside for Freddie.
He had told her he was working late.
She had believed him.
Lucy zoomed in on the photograph.
Then she noticed something she had never seen before.
Freddie was wearing his wedding ring.
Mollie was wearing the necklace he had bought her.
And both of them were looking directly at the camera.
Someone had been watching them.
Someone had been collecting proof.
Lucy's phone buzzed one final time.
Unknown number:
You deserve to know what your husband has been hiding.
Lucy stared at the message.
Then another photograph arrived.
This one was worse.
Because Freddie wasn't with Mollie.
He was with someone else.
And Lucy knew the woman beside him.