Chapter 1 - The Floorboard Outside Her Door
The second floorboard creaked at 11:07 p.m.
I remember the exact time because my phone was still in my hand, displaying the unanswered message I had sent Jason seven minutes earlier.
Everything okay?
I stepped into the hallway.
The guest-room door was almost closed.
A thin stripe of yellow light crossed the floor.
Then I heard Amber whisper.
“Jason, she’s going to notice.”
My entire body went cold.
Jason answered too quietly for me to hear.
I pushed the door open.
For one strange second, nobody moved.
Amber sat on the edge of the guest bed wearing the champagne-colored slip she had changed into after the reception. Her hair was loose. Her makeup was smeared.
Jason stood beside her.
His dress shirt was unbuttoned.
His belt was on the floor.
The wedding band I had placed on his finger less than twelve hours earlier caught the light.
I didn't scream.
That seemed to disturb them more than screaming would have.
“Rachel,” Jason said.
Amber stood.
“Rach—”
“Don't.”
She stopped.
Jason moved toward me.
“This isn't what—”
I laughed.
“You're going to finish that sentence?”
He closed his mouth.
I looked at Amber.
Twenty-one years of friendship.
Sleepovers.
Prom dresses.
My father's heart surgery.
Her mother's divorce.
Every secret I had trusted her with.
“You stood beside me today.”
She started crying.
“I’m sorry.”
“How long?”
Neither answered.
That told me enough.
I turned toward Jason.
“You said you were going back to the venue.”
“I did.”
“And then?”
“Amber texted me.”
She shook her head sharply.
“Jason.”
He ignored her.
“She was upset.”
“About what?”
He looked toward her.
That glance made something inside me die quietly.
Jason said:
“Amber and I had history.”
I stared at him.
“What history?”
“She was my first love.”
I almost laughed again.
I had introduced them.
At least I thought I had.
“You met at my birthday dinner.”
Amber covered her mouth.
Jason said nothing.
I understood immediately.
Another lie.
“Before me?”
“Yes.”
“How long before me?”
“Rachel, tonight isn't the time.”
“Tonight was apparently the perfect time for everything else.”
At 2:17 a.m., after three hours of excuses, fragments, crying, and contradictions, Jason finally said the sentence that ended whatever remained.
“If you can't let this go, maybe we shouldn't be married.”
He expected me to panic.
Instead, I nodded.
“Maybe we shouldn't.”
I went into our bedroom.
I changed into jeans.
Put toiletries, medication, my laptop, and several days of clothes into a suitcase.
My wedding dress remained hanging on the closet door.
My ring remained on the nightstand.
Jason followed me.
“Where are you going?”
“I don't know.”
“Rachel, don't be dramatic.”
I stopped.
Then I smiled.
“That's the amazing part, Jason. I haven't even started.”
I walked downstairs.
On the kitchen counter sat his old iPad.
He had used it during wedding planning, mostly for spreadsheets and music.
I took it because my laptop charger was missing and I thought I might need another device for work.
That was all.
At least that was why I thought I took it.
By 4:40 a.m., I was sitting inside a hotel room twenty miles away.
My mother knew only that I was safe.
I couldn't tell her yet.
I couldn't tell anyone.
I opened the iPad to distract myself.
Jason had never changed the six-digit passcode.
Our anniversary.
I almost laughed at the irony.
The home screen opened.
Then an iMessage notification appeared.
Not from Amber.
From someone saved only as M.
You pushed too hard tonight.
Another message followed.
She was supposed to leave after signing the refinance package, not before.
My heart stopped.
I opened the conversation.
There were hundreds of messages.
The newest one was from Jason.
Don't worry. Rachel doesn't know anything.
Then M replied:
She will if she opens the iPad.
May you like
I looked down at the device in my hands.
And for the first time that night, the affair stopped being the worst thing Jason had done.
