Chapter 1
My husband slapped me in front of everyone at his company party because I had just slapped his secretary. But when she smiled behind him, I knew I had walked into something much bigger than an affair.
The whole ballroom went silent.
My cheek burned as Michael lowered his hand.
“What the hell is wrong with you?” he hissed.
I looked past him at his secretary, Lauren.
She was holding her face where I had slapped her.
But she wasn’t crying.
She was smiling.
Thirty seconds earlier, I had caught her whispering into my husband’s ear with her hand resting on his chest.
When I asked her to step away from him, she laughed.
Then she leaned close and whispered, “You really have no idea, do you?”
That was when I lost control.
Now every executive, client, and employee in the room was staring at me like I was the crazy wife who had ruined the evening.
Michael grabbed my arm.
“Apologize to her.”
I pulled away.
“No.”
His jaw tightened.
“Sarah, apologize now.”
Lauren lowered her eyes and said softly, “It’s okay, Michael. She’s obviously under a lot of stress.”
That fake sweetness made my stomach turn.
“You called my house last week at midnight,” I said.
Michael’s face changed.
Lauren’s smile disappeared.
I had never told him about that call.
The woman on the phone had stayed silent for almost ten seconds before saying, “Ask your husband what happened in Denver.”
Then she hung up.
Michael leaned closer.
“You need to leave.”
“Why?”
“Because you’re embarrassing me.”
I laughed even though my eyes were burning.
“Me?”
Around us, people pretended not to listen.
Then Lauren stepped forward.
“Maybe this isn’t the place.”
I looked at her.
“Then tell me what Denver means.”
Michael went completely still.
Lauren looked at him.
That one glance told me everything.
They both knew.
My heart started pounding.
“What happened in Denver?”
Michael grabbed my purse from the table and shoved it toward me.
“We’re going home.”
“No. We’re not going anywhere until someone answers me.”
Then a man near the bar spoke.
“I think she deserves to know.”
Michael turned so fast he almost knocked over a chair.
The man was one of the company’s older partners, David Reynolds.
I had met him twice.
He looked pale.
“David,” Michael warned.
But David ignored him.
He walked toward me and held out his phone.
On the screen was a photo.
Michael.
Lauren.
A hotel hallway.
And between them was a woman I recognized immediately.
My younger sister, Emily.
My hands went numb.
Emily had died eleven months earlier in what police called an accidental fall from a hotel balcony in Denver.
I looked up at my husband.
May you like
He couldn’t meet my eyes.
Then David said quietly, “Sarah, your sister wasn’t alone that night.”
