Then she touched my back.
“And this is Emily Bennett. His wife.”
The woman’s smile tightened, but she didn’t look shocked.
Instead, she looked straight at me.
“Hi, Emily. Nice to finally meet you.”
That one word—finally—hurt more than seeing her hand in Daniel’s.
She already knew exactly who I was.
Chapter 2
Daniel visibly relaxed.
Standing upstairs in the darkness later, I realized Margaret had done that deliberately.
She wanted her son comfortable enough to believe she was still protecting him, because frightened liars hide things while comfortable liars grow careless.
I returned to the guest room, locked the door, and opened my laptop.
For years, Daniel had handled most monthly credit-card payments while I managed our household calendar.
That morning, I downloaded everything I could legally access—joint statements, insurance records, mortgage information, and credit-card history.
At first, the charges looked ordinary.
Then I found a $486 boutique hotel charge from a Thursday night in October.
I checked my calendar.
My stomach dropped.
That exact night, I had been at a work conference in Boston.
Daniel had texted that he’d had a long day and was going to bed early, ending with “Love you.”
A few pages later, I found a $1,240 jewelry-store purchase, though neither my birthday nor our anniversary was anywhere near that date.
Then came wine bars.
Parking garages.
Restaurants in neighborhoods nowhere near Daniel’s office.
My phone buzzed while I stared at the statements.
Daniel had written:
