Chapter 1 - THE WOMAN IN MY BED
The woman in my bed wasn’t my husband’s mistress.
She was his wife.
I found that out less than thirty seconds after I walked through my bedroom door.
“Ryan?”
My voice came out sharper than I meant it to.
He was standing beside the bed in nothing but a pair of jeans, frozen like somebody had hit pause on him. A dark-haired woman sat on my side of the mattress, clutching the sheet against her chest.
For one strange second, nobody moved.
Then Ryan said, “Claire, I can explain.”
I laughed.
Not because it was funny.
Because if I didn’t laugh, I was going to throw the lamp at his head.
“You can explain why there’s a naked woman in our bed?”
The woman looked at me.
She didn’t look guilty.
She looked furious.
That bothered me more.
“Wait,” she said. “You’re Claire?”
Ryan’s face went white.
I looked at him.
Then at her.
“What do you mean, ‘I’m Claire’?”
Ryan stepped forward.
“Natalie, don’t.”
She ignored him.
She reached down beside the bed and grabbed a leather purse.
My stomach dropped.
I thought she was reaching for a weapon.
Instead, she pulled out a folded document.
“Before he says another word,” she said, “you need to see this.”
Ryan moved fast.
Too fast.
“Natalie.”
She stepped away from him and shoved the paper into my hands.
My eyes landed on the heading.
CERTIFICATE OF MARRIAGE.
Ryan Cole.
Natalie Bennett Cole.
The date was twelve years earlier.
I stared at it.
Then I stared at her.
“This proves you were married,” I said.
“No.”
Her eyes stayed locked on mine.
“It proves we still are.”
The room went silent.
I heard the ceiling fan.
A dog barking three houses away.
My own heartbeat pounding behind my ears.
Ryan reached for the certificate.
“It’s complicated.”
Natalie snatched it back.
“We were never divorced.”
I turned toward him slowly.
“What?”
“Claire—”
“She filed,” Natalie said. “He told me the divorce was finalized three years ago. I found out yesterday it wasn’t.”
Ryan’s jaw tightened.
“Would you stop talking?”
I slapped him.
Hard.
The sound cracked through the room.
His head snapped sideways.
Then he grabbed my wrist.
That was his mistake.
Natalie swung her purse like a baseball bat.
It slammed into his shoulder.
“Take your hands off her!”
Ryan stumbled backward onto the bed.
I yanked my wrist free.
“What the hell is going on?” I screamed.
Ryan rubbed his shoulder.
“You two need to calm down.”
Natalie and I spoke at the exact same time.
“Shut up.”
For one ridiculous second, we looked at each other.
Then I noticed something on the floor.
A manila folder.
Papers had spilled out when Ryan fell.
One page had my name on it.
My full legal name.
Beside it was a signature.
My signature.
Except I had never signed it.
I bent down.
Ryan saw what I was looking at.
His entire expression changed.
“Claire, give me that.”
I picked it up.
HOME EQUITY LINE OF CREDIT.
$185,000.
My throat closed.
“What is this?”
He rushed toward me.
Natalie blocked him.
I grabbed another page.
Her name was on that one.
Another loan.
Another signature.
Natalie stared at it.
“Oh my God.”
Ryan said nothing.
That was when I understood.
The cheating wasn’t the worst thing he had done.
It wasn’t even close.
I pulled my phone from my pocket.
Ryan’s voice cracked.
“Claire, don’t.”
I dialed 911.
Natalie moved in front of the bedroom door.
Ryan stared at both of us.
“You’re seriously calling the cops on me?”
I looked directly into the face of the man I had slept beside for five years.
The man who kissed me every morning.
The man who knew how I took my coffee.
The man who had stood in front of two hundred people and promised to love me for the rest of his life.
“Yes,” I said. “I am.”
Ten minutes later, two police officers walked Ryan out of our house in handcuffs.
He kept looking back at me.
“Claire! Please!”
I didn’t move.
Natalie stood beside me.
Neither of us spoke until the patrol car disappeared.
Then one of the officers came back inside holding the loan papers.
He looked from Natalie to me.
“Ladies,” he said carefully, “I need to ask you something.”
My stomach tightened.
“What?”
He lifted the page.
May you like
“Which one of you actually owns this house?”
And suddenly, I realized I didn’t know.
