Chapter 2
I had no idea how much time had passed.
A car with flashing lights pulled up in front of me.
Two officers stepped out, and they looked at me with something I couldn't read.
"Ms. Emily Hughes?" one of them asked.
I nodded numbly, like a robot.
"Come with us. You need to go to the hospital, and then we'll need you to make a statement," the officer said.
They put me in the back of the squad car.
The heater blew warm air over me, and I couldn't feel any of it. If anything, I got colder.
At the hospital, they showed me to a small room.
A nurse brought me a clean towel and some clothes.
I dried myself off and changed, moving on autopilot.
My mind was a total blank the whole time.
David was dead.
The man who had just shoved me out of his car with disgust all over his face was dead.
What was I supposed to feel?
Sadness?
I didn't feel sad.
Relief?
Not even that.
It only felt unreal.
It was like watching a movie about somebody else.
A young cop walked in, holding a clear evidence bag.
"Ms. Hughes, these are the belongings we recovered from your husband's car. Please look them over and confirm," he said.
Inside the bag were a wallet, a set of car keys, and a phone with a cracked screen.
It was David's phone, the one I knew so well.
I nodded.
"Is that all?" I asked.
The young cop hesitated, then pulled out a smaller evidence bag from behind his back.
"We also found this at the scene," he said.
Inside was another phone.
It was black, and I had never seen it before.
The casing was slightly warped, but the screen was still intact.
I felt my heart tighten in my chest.
"He had two phones?" I asked softly.
The cop nodded with a sympathetic look.
He said, "Yes. He kept this one in a hidden compartment under the driver's seat, so the crash barely touched it.
"We tried to turn it on, but it's password protected, so we couldn't see anything on it.
"According to protocol, these are all his belongings, so we're handing them over to you."
With that, he set both bags on the table and walked out, leaving me alone with my thoughts.
I sat there, my eyes glued to that black phone.
Eight years of marriage.
I never even knew he had a second phone.
Why would a man keep a secret phone?
What could be on it?
Work secrets?
Or some other secret?
I picked up the evidence bag and slid the strange phone into my palm.
The chill of the metal sent a shiver through me.
I pressed the power button.
The screen lit up.
The battery showed 30 percent.
A password prompt appeared.
I took a deep breath and entered David's birthday.
Wrong.
I tried our wedding anniversary.
Wrong.
I tried our son's birthday.
Wrong.
I tried our daughter's birthday.
Still wrong.
My heart sank a little more with each wrong attempt.
That password had nothing to do with our family at all.
I put the strange phone aside and grabbed the one he always used.
The screen was shattered, and it wouldn't turn on at all.
I picked up the black phone again.
Without thinking it through, I typed in a six-digit number I had known for years and always pretended not to know.
It was his first girlfriend's birthday.
The phone vibrated.
The screen unlocked.
I looked at the crowded home screen, and every drop of blood in me went cold.