Chapter 3

Sitting in the driver's seat, I began searching.

His phone—Mario never left it behind, and I knew the password. I'd checked it before. It was clean as a new phone.

Social media—no suspicious chat records.

I opened the glove box. Besides documents and some miscellaneous items, there was nothing.

Had I really been overthinking?

Just as I was about to give up, I noticed the dash cam in the center console.

This car was one he'd just gotten last month. He'd complained to me that the functions were too complicated and he couldn't figure many of them out.

I pressed the play button, and the recorder began playing recent driving footage.

I fast-forwarded, looking for last Wednesday night's recording.

The footage showed Mario's car leaving the company garage, but the direction wasn't toward his home.

Mario drove to a mall in the west part of the city. On the top floor of that mall was a movie theater.

My heart rose to my throat.

In the recording, he parked the car and turned off the engine.

The screen went black, but the audio continued.

The car door opened, then closed.

A few seconds later, a woman's voice sounded, carrying laughter: "You're really punctual."

Then came Mario's voice: "Of course. For you, I'd brave fire and flood."

My hands gripped the steering wheel tightly, nausea rising in waves.

The woman's voice sounded again, with an affected tone of coyness: "Stop it, you smooth talker."

"Mario, when can we come here again?"

Mario's voice replied tenderly: "Once I take care of the engagement party, I'll take you out to play, okay?"

He'd used this same tone when confiding in me.

I turned off the audio and sat in the dark car, my whole body cold, my fingertips squeezing my phone so hard it felt hot.

Mario, is the love you claimed to have for me real or fake?

I don't know how long I sat there until my phone rang. It was Mario calling.

"Honey, are you asleep? Why haven't you replied to my messages?"

Ignoring the call, I put my phone on silent.

I needed to stay calm. This evidence wasn't nearly enough.

The photo was from online, without a clear face shot. In the audio, they hadn't mentioned what they were specifically going to do.

With Mario's cunning, he could easily claim he was just meeting an ordinary friend.

I needed to leave him with no room for excuses.

Back home, I opened my computer and found that movie theater's official website, checking last Wednesday night's screening schedule.

In the trending photo, the background showed a vague corner of a movie poster for a newly released sci-fi film.

But I remembered Mario saying he hated sci-fi movies, finding them childish and boring. Back then, when I wanted to drag him to see one, he'd refused.

Turned out, he just wouldn't watch them with me.

I cross-checked the time—the 7:30 PM showing.

Then I logged into Mario's banking app.

He'd given me all his passwords, cupping my face and saying seriously: "What's mine is yours. I'm completely open with you."

I'd been so moved by that trust I'd been a mess. Now, thinking back, it was just his extreme confidence in controlling me.

In the transaction records, I found a payment around 7 PM last Wednesday night.

It was at a Japanese restaurant, and the address was right next to that movie theater.

I opened that restaurant's app and went to the reviews section, scrolling through reviews from last Wednesday night page by page.

Finally, I saw an account with a gray cartoon character avatar that had posted a photo review at 9:30 PM that night.

"Great movie, and the Japanese food was delicious as always. Thank you, darling."

The post included nine photos—pictures of Japanese food, two movie tickets, and a photo of a man's hand.

That hand had distinct knuckles and was pouring tea.

On the ring finger was a ring. That ring—I couldn't be more familiar with it.