The Other Woman at the Masked Ball

For nearly six years she told herself that Reed was on her side, even as his mother's remarks, Lexi Cavanaugh's constant presence, and a family history she had never shared made her feel like the wife everyone expected to disappear.

Then, at his Halloween masquerade, another woman arrives dressed like her and Reed kisses her; he swears he thought he was holding his wife, and she can see how the costume made Lexi—the woman his family always believed he should have married—easy to mistake for her.

The kiss itself is not what destroys their marriage; before the night ends she learns that something private and painful, something she believed belonged only to the two of them and that Reed knew she never wanted exposed, has reached the very people who never thought she belonged in his world.

She leaves for the Tennessee mountains, shedding the version of herself she built to win his family's approval, while he insists he loves her, never meant to betray her, and will do anything to save what they have.

Devotion was never what failed them; he simply stopped seeing the price she paid to remain at his side, and bringing her home will require proof that he sees her now.