Chapter 2

After verifying my identity, the security company began restoring the vault records.

I stayed in the garage. Adrian had promised to return the necklace when the launch ended, so I parked opposite the private elevator where I could see everyone who came down.

While I waited, I opened our shared household account.

I had always managed the properties, insurance, driver, and domestic staff. Adrian rarely asked about those details. Sometimes he even had to ask me for the password.

The vehicle history showed six trips to Hotel Cresswell.

Adrian had made every booking. Sloane was listed as his companion.

The first trip had been twelve weeks earlier. Our driver dropped them off late at night and collected them the next morning. The other five trips followed the same pattern.

Every note said: Brand meeting.

I stared at the words.

Cresswell's top floor did have private suites where clients could meet. Adrian often worked late while preparing an overseas collection.

One meeting proved nothing.

Six overnights made the explanation feel thin.

The last had been three days ago. Adrian had gone straight to the shower when he came home, carrying the scent of unfamiliar soap. He told me someone had spilled wine on him and he had used the shower at the office.

I had believed him.

The cancelled dinners, the shirts he changed out of after midnight, and the answers that had always sounded too complete returned all at once.

I stepped out of the car. The garage smelled of gasoline and damp concrete, and every breath felt cold in my lungs. When my phone screen went dark, I realized I had been gripping my keys so tightly that the teeth had pressed into my palm.

I released them, exported all six trips, and saved them in an evidence folder.

The restored security records arrived next.

At three in the morning three days earlier, Adrian had used the family-administrator code registered in his name to enter my vault. He remained inside for forty-seven minutes. After he left, the same account cleared the front-end record.

I saved the file, then requested data recovery from the event team's backup phone. The system began processing it.

Upstairs, the music stopped. The garage fell quiet.

The private elevator descended.

Sloane came out first, wearing Adrian's suit jacket over her shoulders. The emerald still hung from her neck. Adrian followed, looking down at his phone.

He stopped when he saw me.

"You're still here?"

I walked toward them.

"Give me the necklace."

Sloane touched the pendant.

"There are additional photos tomorrow morning."

"Take it off."

Adrian pocketed his phone.

"I told you I would bring it home when the work was finished."

"The launch is over."

"The project isn't."

I held up the restored vault record.

"Three days ago, you entered my vault with an administrator code. You cleared the record when you left."

His eyes moved over the screen, and his face darkened.

"You've been investigating me?"

"I'm investigating who took my property. Why did you delete the record?"

"I didn't."

"The account is yours."

"That doesn't mean I used it. You are hiding in a garage, digging through your husband's records. How is that different from the way your father interrogated everyone who worked for him?"

My father had never trusted loyalty he could not verify. Five years ago, when I left the Bellandi family, Adrian said I was finally free from that life.

Now he was using my past to prove that I was the problem.

I opened the vehicle history.

"Twelve weeks. Six nights at Hotel Cresswell. You went in with Sloane and came out with her the next morning."

Sloane pulled his jacket more tightly around her shoulders.

"What were you doing there?"

"Meeting overseas clients."

"Every meeting required an overnight stay?"

"We drank after work and took separate rooms. You've been away from the company too long to understand what my job requires."

I looked at Sloane.

"You had your own room?"

She avoided my eyes.

"You should ask your husband."

Adrian immediately stepped in front of her.

The movement had already answered me, but I asked anyway.

"Did you sleep with her?"

Only the ventilation system broke the silence.

Adrian looked at me until his anger settled.

"No."

"Look at me and say it again."

"I did not sleep with Sloane. I fell in love with you after you saved my life. We have spent five years together. Do you really think I would trade all of that for a few nights in a hotel?"

He never looked away.

Five years earlier, when he changed the bandages on my injured hand, he had used that same unwavering voice to promise the pain would not last much longer.

My grip on the keys loosened.

I still wanted to believe him.

Then my phone vibrated.

Data recovery was complete.

A photograph deleted three days earlier filled the screen. Sloane sat on a Hotel Cresswell bed wearing Adrian's white shirt.

In the mirror, Adrian stood bare-chested.

The crooked scar on his left shoulder was the one I had stitched closed when I saved his life.