Chapter 2

Ethan came home just after midnight.

He smelled of expensive champagne and rain-damp city air.

I sat at the dressing table, pulling the pins from my hair one by one.

"You just disappeared," he said from the doorway.

He loosened his tie with a sigh. He sounded far more annoyed than concerned.

"Everyone at the after-party kept asking where you went."

He paused, watching my reflection in the mirror.

"If this is about the dance, the board wanted a dramatic visual. It was purely PR."

"Vanessa knows the implant's safety systems better than anyone. If my knee buckled, she knew how to catch me."

"I know," I said evenly. "I'm not angry."

He studied my face, searching for a crack.

I gave him nothing.

As he pushed away from the doorframe, his left knee began to tremble.

Then the leg gave out.

My body reacted before my mind could stop it. I crossed the room in a second and caught him by the elbow.

Five years of muscle memory made it impossible to stand there and watch him fall.

Ethan leaned most of his weight against my shoulder and waited for the spasm to pass.

"Lower strap," he said through clenched teeth.

I eased him onto the edge of the bed, then knelt on the rug to loosen the carbon-fiber brace.

The skin along his thigh was red from the equipment.

Just above the compression band were four distinct scratches.

Thin. Fresh.

Fingernail marks.

For one second, I forgot how to breathe.

Before I could look closer, Ethan yanked the fabric of his trousers back over his knee.

"The carbon fiber rubbed me," he said too quickly.

I did not look up.

"It'll bruise."

Ethan let out a long breath and left the weak excuse hanging between us.

He reached down and stroked his thumb over my wrist, trying to smooth away every sharp edge of the night.

"I know the launch was hard for you to watch," he said softly. "Let me make it up to you."

"You don't have to."

"I owe you a real dance." He gave me a tired, affectionate smile. "Next Friday. Our tenth anniversary. No cameras. No PR team. Just you and me."

I looked into the eyes of the man I had spent five years pulling back from the edge of death.

"All right," I said.

He kissed my forehead, certain the crisis had passed, then went into the bathroom.

Ten minutes later, he climbed into bed and fell asleep almost immediately.

I lay beside him, staring at the ceiling.

Sleep never came.

After an hour of listening to the rain, I slipped out from beneath the heavy covers and went downstairs.

The living room was dark.

My phone lit up on the coffee table.

[VELA CAREGIVER APP: ARCHIVE STORAGE FULL.]

For years, every physical therapy session had been recorded for the engineering team.

I opened the app to clear the cache and scrolled past thumbnail after thumbnail of Ethan struggling between parallel bars.

Then I stopped at a video from two months ago.

I pressed play.

In the locked private training suite, Ethan sat on the edge of a therapy table. His shirt was off, and the VELA electrodes were still attached to his spine.

Vanessa straddled his lap.

Her lab coat was gone. Her blouse had been pushed from her shoulders, exposing her bare chest.

Skin pressed against skin.

Her hands were buried in his hair as they kissed with desperate, breathless hunger.

This was not one impulsive kiss.

Their naked bodies moved together with practiced familiarity. His hands knew exactly how to hold her waist.

It was sickening.

My hands began to shake so hard that the phone nearly slipped from my fingers.

Before I could process the crushing weight in my chest, another notification appeared.

A new message from an unknown number.

[Did you enjoy their first dance tonight, Claire? He held my waist so tightly.]

I stared at the glowing words as all the air seemed to leave the room.

For two years, that anonymous number had haunted me.

It sent one disturbing message after another.

A blurry photograph of red heels arranged beside an empty wheelchair.

A message last Thanksgiving.

[He stays with you because he pities you. I'm the one who makes him feel alive.]

Until five minutes ago, I had dismissed everything as a sick prank, spam, or a competitor trying to disrupt our lives.

I blocked the numbers and deleted the messages like trash.

I never told Ethan because I did not want anything to interfere with his recovery.

But now the video burned behind my eyes, and every piece fell into place with brutal precision.

Those messages had never been a prank.

Every timestamp matched a night Ethan claimed he had to work late at the lab.

The floor creaked behind me.

I locked the screen. My heart turned to ice.

Ethan stood at the top of the stairs with one hand on the railing.

"What are you doing down there?"

"Clearing the archive. It's full."

"Let Vanessa handle it tomorrow. Come back to bed."

I walked upstairs and passed the husband who still believed I knew nothing.

Then I went straight to the closet, opened the safe, and took out my passport.

I placed it at the bottom of my suitcase beneath my old dance shoes.