Chapter 2
Alex was using a supplementary card under my name, and every month the statements would land in my inbox. I never checked them.
That night, I went through six months of spending records and spotted three transfers that shouldn't have been there.
One transfer was for $12,000, labeled "necklace".
Another was for $6,000, labeled "hotel".
The third was for $30,000, labeled "ring".
That 30-grand ring was exactly the same one Ellie mentioned in the audio.
I sat on the couch in the living room, my face bathed in the light from my phone screen.
The sound of traffic outside washed over me.
Suddenly, it hit me that I'd spent the last three years watching a drama unfold, and I was the only one left in the dark about what was really going on.
I didn't confront Alex right then, and I didn't call Ellie to give her a piece of my mind either.
The next day, I took half a day off and went to the ground floor of Alex's office building.
I wasn't there to see him. I was after the security footage from the print shop across the street.
Alex's office was in an office building on Finance Avenue, and he always came downstairs for lunch. I wanted to see who he was eating with.
The print shop owner took 60 bucks from me and let me watch nearly a month's worth of entrance security footage.
On the first day, Alex came downstairs alone and headed to the restaurant next door.
On the third day, Alex came downstairs with a woman.
I enlarged the footage. It was Ellie.
She was wearing the beige trench coat I'd given her for her birthday last year, holding Alex's arm as the two of them walked into the restaurant next door.
I kept going through the footage.
In a month, they had lunch together eleven times.
Alex and I had been dating for three years, and we were even engaged, but the times he had lunch with me? I could literally count them on one hand.
He always claimed he was busy, said he could only make do with whatever was available at the office for lunch.
I even bought him a box of instant food and let him put it in his office.
He told me, "Thanks, honey. You're so good to me."
As for what happened to that box of instant food? I had no idea.
But I did know every one of those eleven restaurant bills was paid with Alex's supplementary card, and that was my money.
I took screenshots of all the records and saved them in a newly created, encrypted album. I named it "Wedding Materials".
From that day forward, my life took a whole new turn.
By day, I went to work; by night, I investigated.
On the surface, I was still the bride-to-be, busy planning my wedding.
I chatted about bridesmaid dress colors with Ellie, sampled dishes with Alex, and figured out the seating chart with Mary.
On the third day, I spotted a recurring location in Alex's step tracker.
Every Thursday night, he always popped up at an apartment complex in the east part of town.
The place was called Maple Garden.
I looked up who owned a unit in that complex.
Ellie was the owner of Unit 1402, Building 7. She bought it eleven months ago, and the down payment was 200 grand.
Alex's year-end bonus last year was 240 grand.
He told me he only got 100 grand after taxes and insurance.
The extra 140 grand plus all those little charges he swiped from my card every month, added up to just enough for the down payment on that place.
I kept staring at those numbers on the screen, unable to look away.
Then I turned off my phone and washed my face.
In the mirror, I saw that my eyes were bone dry. Not a single tear in sight.
It was not that I wasn't hurting. Alex just wasn't worth it.
My tears weren't for people like him.
On the seventh day, I went to the Foster residence.
My goal was simple: to see what Mary really knew.
Before Mary retired, she was a department store manager, and she was as sharp as a tack.
She was the one who handled all of Alex's social stuff. She even picked out the dishes for our very first date.
She always said Alex was shy and needed her to back him up.
That afternoon, Mary was in the kitchen cutting up fruit while I was browsing through the photo albums on the coffee table.
"Mrs. Foster, do you think we should change the dessert table at the reception to a two-tier setup?" I asked.
"Sure, whatever you want," she replied.
Then I changed the subject. "By the way, Ellie said she wants to give a small speech at the wedding. What do you think?"
"Ellie?" Mary's knife paused.
"She's my best friend, after all," I said.
Mary didn't turn around and just kept slicing fruit. "Well, that's up to you."
There was a trace of discomfort in her voice.
I added, "Mrs. Foster, Ellie seems to be dating someone lately. Did you know?"
Mary's hand finally stopped.
She turned to face me, her smile forced. "How would I know? That's for you young folks to worry about."
Her right index finger traced the back of the knife.
I'd known Mary for three years. Whenever she did that, it meant she was nervous.
"Haley, the fruit's ready. Could you take it over?" Mary said, quickly changing the subject.
But the way she reacted told me everything I needed to know.
She knew about Alex's affair.