Chapter 3

I didn't storm in and cause a scene.

Instead, I did something almost like self-punishment. I checked into the room right next door.

The walls were thin.

Or maybe they just didn't bother to keep quiet.

The sounds coming through the wall were unlike anything I'd ever heard from him. That kind of intensity, that abandon. With me, he was always gentle. Always restrained.

Chelsea's voice came through, thick with tears.

"Julian, three years ago you were furious at me for what I did. For leaving you out there in the water..."

"Tonight, I'm giving myself to you. Does that make it even?"

Whatever she said next was swallowed up by the sounds that followed.

I bit down on my lower lip until I tasted blood.

I pushed down every instinct screaming at me to act. I pulled out my voice recorder and saved everything.

Nausea clawed its way up my throat.

I pocketed the recorder and stumbled out of there.

I walked alone through the streets. Cold wind mixed with a light drizzle hit me full in the face.

My phone screen lit up. A message from Julian.

"Nora, this case is getting complicated. I'll be late. Get some rest. Don't wait up."

I tilted my head back.

I tried to hold the tears in, but my vision blurred anyway.

I had believed I was the luckiest woman alive.

The evidence in front of me had just slapped that belief clean off my face.

I don't remember how I made it home.

I picked up the wooden carving by the entryway and walked to the display shelf in the living room.

The whole shelf was lined with small female figures, carved in wood.

For three years, I'd seen them as proof of his love.

I used to be obsessed with wood carving.

So Julian had cleared his entire schedule to take classes with me.

He'd wrap his arms around me from behind, guide my hands, and carve stroke by stroke.

He said he wanted to capture every moment of me.

I walked to the centerpiece, the figure I loved most, a half-length portrait.

Something in my chest told me to move it.

I did.

There was a hidden compartment underneath.

I opened it, and my hands started shaking before I even fully understood what I was seeing.

Inside was an old photograph, yellowed at the edges.

A girl with a wild, defiant smile. Something melancholy in her eyes.

It was Chelsea Churchill. Before the surgery.

I held the photo up next to the carving.

The eyes. The expression. The shape of the face.

It wasn't me.

I was never the subject. I was just a reference point. A stand-in for what Chelsea used to look like.

That's when I heard the front door unlock.

Julian was home.

"Still awake? Were you scared being here alone without me?"

He came toward me, reached up out of habit to touch my hair.

I couldn't hold it together anymore.

I stepped back from his hand and threw the photograph at his face.

"So everything you did for me these past three years was a lie?"

"You were just looking at her through me?"

Julian glanced down at the photo. A flicker of annoyance crossed his eyes.

He bent down, picked it up, and brushed the dust off it carefully.

Not a trace of panic. No guilt. No shame.

"Nora, your place as my wife is permanent. That will never change."

"Chelsea is just something I need to work through. A fixation from when I was young. I need a little time to put it to rest."

I let out a cold laugh. "Put it to rest? In her bed?"

Julian looked up at me, eyes narrowing. "You followed me?"

He crossed one leg over the other.

"She has severe depression. I'm not going to stand by and watch someone fall apart. You of all people would understand that. You care about every stray cat and dog you come across. This is a human life."

Then his phone lit up on the table.

A voice message from Chelsea.

Julian didn't even flinch. He hit play on speaker.