Chapter 1
On the night of our seventh anniversary, his mistress sent me photos of the two of them in bed. In one of them my husband's hand, still wearing the ring I put on his finger at our wedding, rested on her waist.
I didn't scream and I didn't cry. I printed the photos, made them the cover of the invitations for our anniversary party, and mailed one to every guest on the list.
That included her father, who ran the district school board, and her mother, who chaired the Women's League.
*****
By eleven at night, Claire's whole house smelled of rose oil.
Claire lit the last of the scented candles, and the warm glow spread across the table she had spent the afternoon setting.
Long-stemmed roses stood open in a crystal vase, flown in overnight, water still beading on the petals. She reached over to straighten a plate, and the silverware gave back a soft shine in the candlelight.
A navy velvet box sat in the middle of the table. Inside was her anniversary gift for him, a hand-tailored suit with cufflinks she had ordered from a designer months ago.
Each cufflink carried a single letter, a C on one and an A on the other.
She picked up her phone and typed out a message.
Claire: [Drew, I'm finished up here. What time are you getting home?]
The message showed as read. No reply came.
Claire smiled and let it go. Andrew had been chasing a big account for weeks, and late nights came with that.
She walked over to the speaker and put on "Perfect." Seven years ago, at their wedding, he had held her hand in front of everyone and said, "This is our song. I'm going to listen to it with you for the rest of my life."
The piano intro had barely started when her phone buzzed again.
This time the number was one she didn't know.
Claire assumed it was a delivery notice and opened it without thinking. The screen lit up, and her breath stopped.
Three photos came through with no message attached.
The first one showed Andrew asleep, shot from the side. He always slept with a faint frown, and Claire knew that frown better than she knew her own.
What she didn't recognize was the hickey on his neck, dark purple and impossible to miss. Under the warm hotel lamp, it looked like a brand burned into him.
Claire's hand stopped over the screen. Her fingers had gone cold.
She swiped to the next one.
The second one showed a woman's bare back pressed to Andrew's chest. His hand rested on her waist, and the way it sat there said he thought she belonged to him.
Claire zoomed in, zoomed out, then zoomed in again. She stared at the hand, and then at the ring on it.
Claire zoomed in, then out, then in again. She couldn't look away from that hand, from the ring he wore.
The third one was a close-up.
The platinum band on Andrew's left ring finger threw back a cold shine under the lamp. The line engraved inside it, Forever Love 06.12.2019, sat pressed against the small dip at another woman's waist.
Claire knew that spot.
Three months earlier, on her birthday, Andrew had kissed her there and laughed and called it his own private dimple.
Now, that same spot had her wedding ring against it.
Her phone buzzed again, and this time it was text.
Emily: [Claire, he looks so sweet when he's asleep. He says your anniversary is way too much work and it's easier to just have fun with me.
Emily: [Oh, and he says you're like a dead fish in bed. He can't even be bothered to touch you. Seven years married and you're still sleeping alone. That's kind of sad, isn't it?]
Claire didn't cry.
Claire zoomed in on the third photo instead, calm as anything, and studied the background. The wallpaper was cream. The lamp on the nightstand had that odd mushroom shape. A corner of the window seat showed past the edge of the curtain.
That was the guest room in her own house.
His mistress had walked right into her home, slept on sheets Claire picked out, and spent the night in her husband's arms.
Andrew had run his hands over another woman with their wedding ring still on his finger.
Claire stood up and walked to the window. The city spread out below her, lit all the way to the edge of the dark.
Three years ago, when they bought this house, Andrew had held her and said, "Claire, I'm going to make you the happiest woman alive."
She raised her hand and looked at the matching band on her own ring finger. The stone caught the moonlight and threw it back, and it was every bit as cold as she felt.
Her phone buzzed again.
It was the same number. [Your anniversary dinner is tomorrow at the Grand Harmony, right? What kind of face do you think he'd make if I showed up out of nowhere? Can't wait!]
Claire looked at that message for a long, long time.
Then she opened her contacts and found the number saved under Emily Summers. She had seen it flash on Andrew's screen the week before, when he left his phone at home. He told her it was the new intern with a question about work.
The number the photos had come from was a different one. She copied it and pasted it into a search.
A profile came up right away. The picture showed a young woman in a slip dress on a beach, glancing back over her shoulder with a sweet smile.
Her banner photo was two hands with the fingers laced together, and one of those hands wore the same wedding band Andrew did.
She tapped through to the feed.
The newest post had gone up half an hour earlier. [Falling asleep in his arms. Best feeling in the world!]
The photo with it was a night view out of a hotel window, and the location tag read Sunset View Hotel.
Claire went back to the message thread and typed it out one word at a time.
Claire: [Thanks for the heads up.]
Claire: [The anniversary dinner is tomorrow at seven, third floor ballroom at the Grand Harmony.]
Claire: [Please come.]
Claire: [I'll have a very big present waiting for you.]
After she hit send, she saved all three photos at full size, uploaded them to the cloud, and copied them onto two separate drives.
Then she walked back to the table and blew out every candle.
In the dark, she picked up the box with the suit in it, carried it into the kitchen, opened the trash, and set it inside without a sound.
"Andrew," she said quietly to the empty living room. "Our game starts now."
Her phone glowed faintly in the dark, and the clock on it read 12:07 a.m.
Their seventh anniversary had arrived.