Chapter 4 - The Affair Began While Their Daughter Was SickMaren lived twenty minutes away.
Rosalie's older sister opened the door, saw Lily standing beside two overnight bags, and immediately understood something was wrong.
She didn't ask in front of the child.
"Movie night?"
Rosalie nodded.
"Emergency movie night."
Lily brightened.
"Can we watch the dragon one?"
"Absolutely."
Maren looked at Rosalie over Lily's head.
Later.
Rosalie nodded.
An hour passed before Lily fell asleep on the sectional sofa beneath a pink blanket.
Only then did Maren speak.
"What happened?"
Rosalie stared at the untouched wine in front of her.
"Adrian's sleeping with Sienna."
Maren didn't react for several seconds.
Then:
"His assistant?"
"Yes."
"How do you know?"
"I found her in our closet."
Maren blinked.
"Literally?"
"Wearing the necklace he told me he'd bought for my birthday."
Maren sat down.
"Oh."
"There's more."
"There usually is."
Rosalie told her about the engraving.
October 14, 2024.
Maren remembered immediately.
"Lily was sick."
"Yes."
"You called me because Adrian was in Boston."
"Apparently not all the time."
Maren's anger arrived faster than Rosalie's had.
"That son of a—"
Rosalie looked toward Lily.
Maren lowered her voice.
"Sorry."
Rosalie smiled faintly.
Then stopped.
"I don't know what to do."
That was difficult to admit.
Rosalie Mercer was not a woman who frequently didn't know what to do.
Before Lily was born, she'd worked in financial compliance for a regional bank.
Afterward, she'd stayed home by choice.
Adrian's career accelerated.
Her world narrowed in ways she hadn't noticed until tonight.
School pickups.
Doctors.
Household accounts.
Birthday parties.
His dinners.
His travel.
Their calendar had slowly become his career with her family life arranged around it.
"I need to think."
Maren nodded.
"Then don't call him."
"He'll call me."
"Don't answer."
"He'll come here."
"Then I'll answer the door."
Rosalie looked at her sister.
That almost made her cry.
She hadn't cried yet.
Maren moved closer.
"Rosie."
Rosalie shook her head.
"Not yet."
"Okay."
"If I start, I don't know if I'll stop."
"Then don't."
Maren reached across the table.
"Just don't be alone."
Rosalie's phone vibrated.
Adrian.
She ignored it.
Again.
Ignored.
A text appeared.
Please come home.
Then:
Nothing happened tonight.
Rosalie stared at the wording.
Tonight.
Not nothing happened.
Nothing happened tonight.
She took a screenshot.
Maren noticed.
"Why?"
"I don't know."
Another message.
Sienna and I crossed boundaries. That's it.
Screenshot.
Then:
Do not let one stupid misunderstanding destroy our family.
Screenshot.
Maren looked at her.
"You're documenting."
Rosalie nodded.
Old instincts returning.
Compliance work had taught her something important.
When someone offered multiple explanations for one event, preserve every version.
Truth usually didn't need revisions.
Rosalie opened her calendar and scrolled backward.
October 2024.
Adrian's Boston conference.
Three nights.
She opened her archived email.
His hotel confirmation remained because she'd booked the original reservation using family points.
Boston Harbor Hotel.
Two guests?
The email didn't show.
She opened their shared credit-card account.
Maren watched.
"What are you looking for?"
"Anything."
October 14.
Dinner at a restaurant in Back Bay.
$486.
Adrian had told Rosalie he'd eaten room service while preparing for the investor presentation.
October 15.
Montrose Jewelers.
$7,850.
Rosalie stopped.
Maren leaned closer.
"The necklace."
"No."
"The date."
The necklace was engraved October 14.
Purchased October 15.
Meaning October 14 wasn't the day Adrian bought it.
It commemorated something.
An anniversary.
A beginning.
Rosalie's stomach turned.
She searched Sienna's name in old company newsletters.
Sienna Blake had joined Blackwell Development in January 2024.
Nine months before the engraved date.
Rosalie scrolled through photographs.
Holiday fundraiser.
Summer office event.
Executive retreat.
There.
September 2024.
Adrian and Sienna standing together at a company charity golf tournament.
Nothing inappropriate.
Except now everything looked inappropriate.
Rosalie zoomed.
Sienna was looking at Adrian.
Not the camera.
Maren whispered:
"You can't tell from a picture."
"I know."
Another message from Adrian.
Come home before Lily wakes up. We can fix this.
Rosalie replied for the first time.
How long?
The typing indicator appeared.
Stopped.
Appeared again.
Finally:
It wasn't an affair the way you're imagining.
Rosalie showed Maren.
"That's not an answer."
"No."
She typed:
How long?
This time Adrian called.
Rosalie declined.
A message arrived.
Since last spring.
Rosalie stared.
Spring.
More than two years?
Or did he mean this past spring?
She typed:
Which spring?
No answer.
Then another notification appeared.
Not from Adrian.
Unknown number.
A photograph.
Rosalie opened it.
Adrian and Sienna sat together on a hotel balcony.
He wasn't wearing a shirt.
Sienna was sitting in his lap.
The timestamp read:
May 9, 2024.
Five months before the necklace date.
May you like
Beneath the photograph was one sentence:
He is still lying to you.
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