Shane keeps warning me that his friends will be arriving this week. I don’t understand why he keeps mentioning it. Is he trying to prepare me for something? Taralynn assured me I’m going to love them; although, she keeps referring to them as my friends. But I don’t remember them. And not anything more than the thought of a cheerleader comes to mind when Shane talks about Kylie.

Shane has a picture of her and himself with another guy that I learned was Shane’s best friend up until New Year’s Eve last year. Apparently, the guy, Trent, was killed. He was young too, only twenty-seven. Shane told me Kylie still isn’t dealing with his death. He thinks she’s avoiding it. But I can’t say anything to that. It’s not like I know what she’s going through or even remember the guy Shane tells me was one of my best friends too.

He showed me a few photos from our past. I couldn’t stomach many. Not because I don’t want to. I do, I really want to know more, but just the thought of knowing I’ve been deceived, the way I have, is soul crushing. Thinking about it makes my chest hurt too much. And I can see how badly Shane wants me to remember. Everything is heart-grabbing and heavy.

He’s going to be so pissed when he finds out what I’m doing—and where I’m at. I can already tell Shane’s a very passionate man. For the most part, he’s calm, but with me, it feels like there’s a beast underneath his skin waiting to jump out. He did say, I’m the only one that can get a rise out of him. For some reason, when he told me that it made me smile. And something inside wanted so badly to try to do just that.

That’s not why I’m sitting out front of my husband’s office, though, in the back seat of a cab.

Once a week I take Emersyn to a local church that offers a Mommy’s Day Out so I can have a few hours to myself. I usually write—something no one knows I do—but not today. Today I need to get things from my house, and I want to do it when my husband is nowhere near. The bank he runs is thirty minutes from our house, so I’m here to make sure he’s working before I go home.

His Lexus is parked on the curb, in front of the building, as it always is, in the vice president’s designated spot. At twenty-eight, he’s the VP of an investment banking company his father owns.

I’m about to tell the cab driver to take me to my house when I see him exit the glass doors. I quickly duck down in the back seat, not wanting him to see me.

“Lady, you okay back there?”

“Yeah. Just give me a sec, okay.” I ease back up when Blake doesn’t look my way. His attention is focused on the black Mercedes double-parked in front of his building. Another car honks, making me look at the car. More specifically at the driver of the car; a woman. A woman that looks vaguely familiar, but I’m not sure why. I can’t see all of her face; just her side profile.

Blake gets into the passenger side, and then they speed off in the opposite direction the cab is facing.

“Can you follow the black car that just went that way?” I ask, pointing my thumb behind us. He stares at me through the rearview mirror, looking annoyed, but he doesn’t say anything. Instead, he pulls out, doing a U-turn in the middle of the road. A slew of honks are geared our way.

Within a few minutes, less than ten, the car we’re following pulls up to the front of the Madison Hotel.

“I can’t stop here, lady.”

“Just a sec, okay.”

A man, dressed in all black, rounds the vehicle—the valet I’m sure. Blake steps out, as does the woman. It’s then I realize who she is. Courtney Harris. She’s his father’s executive assistant. Blake waits for her to walk to the other side of the car where he’s standing. When she reaches him, he pulls her to his side, and then he plants a kiss on her lips.

I’m stunned silent.

Is he really doing what I think he’s doing? What the . . .?

How long? I’ve only been gone for four days. In four days he’s found someone to bang?

Yeah. Right. All those times he shut me down about meeting for lunch. I bet this is what the bastard has been doing.

Cheating.

“Lady, come on.”

What a fucking pig.

I quickly snap a photo with the new cell phone Shane arranged for me to pick up from his carrier.

I have cash at home. I’m always stashing extra cash away for when I want to buy something I don’t want my husband to know about, and I plan on paying Shane back if I’m able to get my hands on it.

Blake places his hand at the small of her back as they enter the building.

“You can go,” I deadpan. I can’t believe my eyes. He’s been calling Shane’s phone almost nonstop demanding I come home. Threatening God knows what, because Shane won’t tell me, and all this time he’s off fucking some . . . holier-than-thou, uppity bitch I never liked to begin with.

Good riddance. I don’t love my husband, sure, but I’ve always been faithful. Even when it’s been hard. When he’s been difficult to deal with, I never once thought about cheating on him.

“You still have the address I gave you?”

I gave him my home address right after he pulled up to Blake’s work. I hadn’t planned on staying. I just wanted to make sure his car was there before going to our house.

“Yeah. That’s where I’m taking you, right?”

“Yes.”

He finally pulls off, and I’m left to my thoughts, wondering if she’s the only woman he’s cheated on me with. The thought sickens me, and not for the reasons they should. My stomach rolls at the thought of what he might’ve caught from someone. What he may have given me.

* * *

I had to let the cab driver leave. I ran up a forty-five-dollar fare by the time he pulled into the driveway of our home. When I dropped Shane off this morning, he left me with sixty dollars in cash. I’m praying I’ll be able to get inside with the spare key I have hidden for emergency situations. Blake doesn’t know about it, so I should be good.

I punch in our four-digit code on the garage keypad, and then the door starts to roll up with ease.

So far so good, but I don’t waste any time. I’m not stupid, and it wouldn’t surprise me if Blake doesn’t have notifications on his cell phone that tells him when the alarm has been unarmed. There have been too many times he’s made little comments about the times I’ve gotten home late from picking up Everly from school. That tells me he knows when I come and go. Logically there are two ways: the alarm and my car.

Shit. I really hope he doesn’t have something installed on my car. I plan to take it with me. In no way do I want to become any more of a burden on Shane than I already am. But I also don’t have a choice. It’s not like I can go to my parents’. They are the cause of this whole mess.

They basically sold me to someone like they were selling a used car. Lying in bed last night, that’s what I kept thinking over and over. How is what they did much different than human trafficking? I might not have been physically abused, but I was forced to marry a man. I didn’t know I was being forced, but even back then that’s what it felt like. My mother said over and over think about the baby you’re carrying and how she’ll be part of a broken home if you don’t marry and raise her with Blake.

Once the door is open enough that I can duck under, I do, and quickly jog over to Everly’s bicycle. I keep the spare key inside her empty water bottle that’s attached to the frame.

In less than a minute, I have the key, and I’m inside my house. The code worked, making me sigh out in relief.

I spot my purse sitting on the island. I snatch it up as I race down the hall and up the stairs. I hit the girls’ rooms first, throwing as many clothes as possible into Everly’s duffle bag and large tote that she keeps her old stuffed animals in. I grab her tennis shoes too.

When I picked the girls up from my parents Saturday night, she only had flip flops and her UGGS. She’s been wearing her boots to school, and complaining afterward because it’s been hot. I guess my nine-year-old hasn’t grasped our jacked-up weather in the South, yet.

Next, I grab most of Emersyn’s clothes, throwing them in with her sister’s. I’ll have to rewash everything to get the wrinkles out, but I don’t care. It beats taking too much time and chance running into Blake.

I quickly take the bags and my purse out to the garage, throwing everything but my purse into the trunk of my car. My purse, I place in the front driver’s seat for now, then head back inside.

The master bedroom is on the bottom floor, so I go there, grabbing the biggest suitcase I own from underneath the bed. I start tossing as many of my clothes inside without bothering to take anything off the hangers. I’d rather bring less than take too much time. I have no idea if Blake knows I’m here or not, and I would rather not find out.

I’m fast. It takes maybe five minutes with how fast I’m rushing. I don’t bother with my cosmetics. I can always buy more.

With what money, I have no idea. I’m not mooching off Shane, no matter how many times he tells me it’s not mooching. It is to me.

Once I load my suitcase into the trunk, I get into the driver’s seat. My keys should be in my purse, and after grabbing them from the side pocket, I plug it in, starting the engine to crank the car.

I feel like there is something I’m either forgetting, or that I need to do, but as I rack my brain, I have no idea what, so I put the vehicle in reverse, pulling out of the garage. Before I get to the end of the driveway, it dawns on me. My cell phone. Of course. I stomp on the breaks, and then I check the inside of my purse. Sure enough, it’s in there.

I huff. I don’t want to take it. I have a new one, and this one is connected to Blake. No matter what happens, I need a fresh start. I don’t know what road Shane and I will go down. I know he wants to be in our lives. He wants me. I’m not blind. And dammit, there is a part that feels something for him too. Sure, he’s attractive. Okay, he’s freaking hot. But besides that, it’s the electricity, the spark, the goose bumps I get when we’re in the same room. When he speaks, or when he looks at me it’s overwhelming and exhilarating at the same time. I don’t need him or anyone else telling me what we had was something more than just high school love. I feel it. I see it when I look into Shane’s eyes.

The question is, can we have it again? And is it something I want?

Only time will tell I guess. It isn’t like I have any business rushing into another relationship before I end the one I’m stuck in now.

I don’t feel guilty for being attracted to Shane. My cheating husband certainly isn’t having any problems sticking his dick in someone else.

Granted, I haven’t given him any in months, but that’s beside the point.

I roll down the window, and then toss the phone into the grass, not giving a shit. I’m done with this life.

Now I just have to find my old one again.