Chapter 1

"You can stop pretending now. I'm back. Tell Adrian his wedding worked. It made me jealous."

I stared at my phone. It was the evening of my wedding anniversary, and the sender was Celeste, my husband's former girlfriend.

I picked up the homemade lemon tart I'd baked for Adrian and grabbed my keys. I wasn't going to condemn my husband over one cruel text. I needed to hear the truth from him.

Adrian had said he needed to handle a family matter at his mother's house before our dinner. I drove there with the white pastry box on the passenger seat.

Matilda's housekeeper let me in and pointed me toward the sitting room. Celeste's soft laughter reached me before I got to the partly open door.

I stopped and looked through the gap.

Adrian and Celeste sat across from each other, with an open bakery box on the coffee table between them. Inside it was another glossy lemon tart, identical to the one in my hands.

"Did you really marry her just to make me jealous?" Celeste asked.

"You canceled your engagement after you saw our wedding photos," Adrian said calmly. "I'd say it worked."

Celeste leaned toward him. "Do you love her?"

Adrian traced the rim of his coffee cup before answering. "Mara wanted a husband who would never leave her. I gave her that. Our marriage brought you back to me, so we both got what we needed."

Celeste took a bite of the tart. "You remembered. Lemon tart is still my favorite."

I stared at the yellow filling on her fork. Adrian had always claimed lemon tart was his favorite. I'd ruined three batches while learning to bake it.

He'd stood in our kitchen, wiping flour from my cheek, and told me the imperfect tart mattered because I'd made it for him. I'd baked one for every anniversary since.

The dessert I'd treated as ours had always belonged to her.

I squeezed the box until the sides buckled. Sticky lemon filling seeped through the crushed seam and coated my thumb. My ears rang as I backed away and hurried out before they could see me.

On the drive home, I remembered Celeste announcing her engagement to another man. Adrian had proposed to me the following afternoon.

I'd believed her engagement had helped him close an old wound and commit to our future. Now every detail pointed in the same direction. My marriage had been designed to bring Celeste back.

I washed my hands and sat in the dark living room.

Adrian came home an hour later carrying anniversary roses and a velvet jewelry box.

"Your fingers are freezing," he murmured, taking my hands. He rubbed warmth into them and studied my face. "Are you feeling sick, sweetheart?"

He placed a delicate silver necklace around my neck. His tenderness felt so real that a desperate part of me wanted to believe I'd misunderstood what I heard.

"I have a favor to ask," Adrian said. "Celeste went through a terrible breakup. She's back in town and needs somewhere safe to stay."

His thumbs moved gently across my knuckles. "I invited her to use our guest room for a few days. You know what it's like to have your life fall apart. She needs me right now. You'll understand, won't you?"

He had taken the worst year of my life and turned it into a reason I should welcome Celeste into my home. I still loved him too much to expose what I knew, so I forced myself to nod.

Relief softened his face. "I knew I could count on you."

After Adrian fell asleep, I locked myself in the bathroom and turned the shower on high. The rushing water covered my sobs as I sat on the cold tile with one hand pressed over my mouth.

When I could breathe steadily again, I called the attorney who had handled my previous divorce. "I need you to prepare the papers by Saturday."

She confirmed the information she needed and promised to call me the next morning. I ended the call and opened a message to my old friend Ben.

"Is the empty place you mentioned still available?"

His reply came less than a minute later. "Yes. When do you need it?"

I checked the date on my screen. "Saturday at ten. Forty-eight hours from now."