Erase My Love, Forget His Face

Ellery POV: Brendan' s eyes, which had been filled with a performance of desperate relief, now lit up with a different kind of light. A greedy, possessive curiosity. "What' s that?" he asked, his voice shifting to a playful, intimate tone. He reached for the box. "Did you buy yourself something pretty? A present to make up for scaring your poor husband half to death?" I held the box tightly in my hand, out of his reach. A cold, vengeful idea began to form in my mind. "It' s for you," I said, my voice smooth as glass. His face broke into a wide, delighted grin. "For me? Baby, you didn' t have to." He was already imagining cufflinks, a new watch. Something expensive and validating. "I know," I said. "Can I open it?" he asked, practically bouncing on the balls of his feet like an eager child. "No," I said, the single word hanging in the air between us. "It' s a birthday present. You can open it on your birthday." His birthday. The 24th. The day I would be boarding a flight to a new life. The day the serum would arrive. The day Ellery Rich would cease to exist. This little black box would be my final message. My last testament. The tombstone of our marriage. The police, satisfied that this was just a dramatic marital spat, packed up and left with a few condescending remarks about how lucky Brendan was to have a wife who loved him so much she scared him. Brendan saw them off, playing the part of the doting, slightly overwhelmed husband to perfection. For the next two days, he was a shadow. He canceled all his meetings. He refused to leave my side. He cooked for me, walked with me on the beach, sat beside me on the couch while we watched movies we' d seen a dozen times. He was recreating the early days of our relationship, a frantic, desperate attempt to rewind time, to plaster over the gaping cracks in our foundation with a flimsy layer of manufactured nostalgia. For fleeting, terrifying moments, it almost worked. As he brushed the hair from my face, his touch gentle, I could almost forget the man whose hands had been on another woman' s body. As he laughed at a familiar joke, I could almost forget the sound of his moans in our guest room. But my phone was a constant, brutal reminder. It buzzed incessantly in my purse, a venomous snake I refused to touch. I knew who it was. Kiya. Her provocations had escalated. While Brendan was playing the perfect husband to my face, she was sending me a running commentary of their sordid history. Did you know we' ve been together for four years? It started right after you won the Pritzker. He said he needed someone who saw him, not just the husband of a famous architect. He' s so sweet. He says he loves you, but he needs me. He says your love is like a monument, beautiful but cold. Ours is a bonfire. I' m going to be the next Mrs. Wiggins, Ellery. You' re just a placeholder. An old, boring placeholder. Thanks for paying my tuition, by the way. It' s how I got to spend so much time at the firm… and with your husband. You really paid for your own replacement. How ironic is that? The messages were a torrent of poison, designed to strip away my dignity, to make me feel worthless and old. And then came the video. Brendan had gone to the store to get my favorite ice cream, another small, pointless gesture of his manufactured affection. I was alone in the living room. My phone buzzed. I glanced at the screen. A video file from Kiya. The thumbnail was a blurry shot of skin. I knew what it was. I knew it would be them, together. The logical part of my brain, the architect, calculated the file size, the runtime. Probably three to five minutes. Five minutes of him proving, in high definition, that everything we had was a lie. I felt a strange calm settle over me. This was it. The final piece of evidence I didn't even know I needed. My thumb hovered over the play button. Brendan would be back any minute. I pressed play. The video was shaky, clearly filmed by Kiya. They were in a hotel room, the one he' d claimed was for a "tech conference" last month. He was on top of her, his back muscles flexing, the same muscles I had traced with my fingers a thousand times. "Is she better than me in bed?" Kiya' s voice, breathy and goading from behind the camera. Brendan didn' t stop moving. He just grunted, "Don' t talk about her right now." "Why not? Afraid you' ll feel guilty?" He paused, lifting his head. He looked straight at the camera, straight at me. "Sex is sex, Kiya. Love is love. They' re separate things. I can fuck you and still love my wife." The clinical, detached way he said it, as if he were discussing a business merger, stole the air from my lungs. "So I' m just a fuck to you?" Kiya whined, her voice tilting into a manipulative pout. "You' re a very, very good fuck," he murmured, leaning down to kiss her. "The best." "Then give me more," she demanded. "I don' t want to be your secret anymore, Brendan. I want a title." He sighed, a long-suffering sound. "You can have anything you want. Money, cars, a house. Anything but a title. That belongs to her." "What if I want a baby?" she asked, her voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper. "Our baby." My heart stopped. This was a conversation I' d tried to have with him for years. He always put it off. "Not yet, El. The company' s in a critical phase." "Let' s just enjoy us for a little longer." Excuses. Always excuses. In the video, Brendan went still. He looked down at her, a strange expression on his face. Not anger. Not refusal. It was… consideration. "We' re not using anything, you know," Kiya purred, her hand sliding down his stomach, out of the frame. "It could happen anytime." He didn' t pull away. He didn' t say no. He just closed his eyes and leaned down, whispering something against her skin that the microphone didn' t catch. But I didn' t need to hear it. His silence, his complicity, was the answer. I clicked the phone off just as the front door opened. "Got the mint chocolate chip!" Brendan announced cheerfully, holding up a paper bag. He looked at my face, my bloodless lips, the tremor in my hands. "Whoa, El. You look like you' ve seen a ghost. What' s wrong?" I held up my phone. "Just watching a video. It was… unsettling." "Well, stop watching it," he said, taking the phone from my hand and placing it face down on the table. His casual dismissal, his complete lack of curiosity about what could have upset me so deeply, was the final confirmation. He didn't want to know. He was terrified of knowing. "You' re right," I said, my voice hollow. "I' ll never watch anything like it again."