Chapter 1 - THE MORNING MY HUSBAND CHOSE ANOTHER WOMAN
He Flew to Miami With Another Woman While His Wife Was in Chemotherapy, and One Year Later He Couldn’t Look Away When ....
At 7:14 on a freezing February morning, Natalie Hayes stood in the doorway of her bedroom wearing one shoe, a wool coat over her pajamas, and the pale blue hospital bracelet she had forgotten to remove after yesterday’s blood work.
Her husband was packing swim trunks.
Not business clothes.
Not the charcoal suit he always wore to investor meetings.
Swim trunks.
Caleb folded them into a silver suitcase beside two linen shirts and the expensive sunglasses Natalie had given him for their tenth anniversary.
She stared at the suitcase.
“Where are you going?”
He did not look up.
“Miami.”
Natalie thought she had misheard him.
“My infusion is at nine.”
“I know.”
Three years earlier, Caleb Hayes had forgotten their anniversary and driven forty minutes through a thunderstorm to bring her a slice of lemon cake from the bakery where they had gone on their first date.
Now he zipped the suitcase.
Natalie rested one hand against the doorframe because the hallway had begun to tilt.
“You know?”
“I know your appointment is at nine.”
“And you’re going to Miami?”
Caleb finally looked at her.
He had already shaved. His hair was perfect. His white shirt was open at the collar. He smelled faintly of the cedar cologne she used to love.
“It’s been a brutal month, Nat.”
She almost laughed.
The sound never came.
A brutal month.
She had been diagnosed with lymphoma thirty-seven days earlier.
She had undergone surgery eighteen days earlier.
Her first chemotherapy infusion had left her vomiting until dawn.
Two nights ago she had stood in the shower holding clumps of her own hair while Caleb answered emails in bed.
But apparently the month had been brutal for him.
“Is this a business trip?”
His jaw tightened.
“Partly.”
“Who are you going with?”
The pause told her before the answer did.
Then the doorbell rang.
Natalie closed her eyes.
Caleb muttered something beneath his breath.
A moment later, a woman’s voice floated from the foyer.
“Caleb?”
Natalie knew that voice.
Mallory Price.
Thirty-two years old. Director of client relations at Hayes Logistics. Beautiful in the effortless way Natalie had once believed required no effort at all.
Mallory had been at their Christmas party in a silver dress.
She had stood too close to Caleb.
Natalie had noticed.
Then hated herself for noticing.
She walked toward the foyer.
Mallory was standing beside a cream-colored suitcase wearing white pants, a cropped cashmere sweater, and sunglasses pushed into her blond hair.
The February wind had pinkened her cheeks.
For one second, nobody spoke.
Mallory’s smile faltered.
“Oh. Natalie.”
Natalie looked at Caleb.
“How long?”
Caleb rubbed his forehead.
“Don’t do this.”
“Do what?”
“You’re exhausted. You’re sick. Everything feels bigger right now.”
That sentence hurt more than the truth.
Because it turned her pain into confusion.
Her eyes moved to Mallory’s suitcase.
“Are you sharing a hotel room?”
Mallory looked at the floor.
Caleb grabbed his coat.
“We’ll talk when I get back.”
Natalie stared at him.
“You’re leaving me for seven days on the morning of chemotherapy.”
“It isn’t like that.”
“What is it like?”
His silence answered.
She felt something inside her become very still.
No screaming.
No shattered glasses.
No dramatic slap.
Only stillness.
Caleb walked toward the door.
Natalie said, “My doctor told me I shouldn’t be alone tonight.”
He stopped.
For half a second, hope rose automatically.
Then he reached into his pocket and handed her a black credit card.
“Call a nurse.”
Natalie looked down at the card in her palm.
He kissed her forehead.
Actually kissed her forehead.
As if she were his elderly aunt.
“Try to rest.”
Then he walked out.
Mallory followed him.
The elevator doors closed.
Natalie remained in the foyer until the numbers above the elevator disappeared.
Only then did she look at the card.
She placed it carefully on the entry table.
Beside Caleb’s keys.
Beside their framed wedding photograph.
Then she went into the bathroom and threw up.
At 8:22, she called a car.
At 8:59, she walked into Franklin Oncology Center alone.
The nurse checking her blood pressure smiled gently.
“Someone joining you today?”
Natalie looked at the empty chair beside her.
“My husband had to travel.”
The lie came easily.
That frightened her.
At 10:16, medication began dripping into her vein.
At 11:40, her mouth tasted like metal.
At 1:05, her fingertips went numb.
At 2:13, an older woman two chairs away began snoring softly while her husband read a newspaper with one hand and held her sock-covered foot with the other.
Natalie turned toward the window.
Snow was beginning to fall.
Her phone vibrated.
For one insane second, she thought Caleb had changed his mind.
Instead, it was a photograph Mallory had posted online.
Ocean.
Palm trees.
Two glasses of champagne.
And in the corner of the photograph, Caleb’s hand.
His wedding ring was visible.
The caption read:
Needed this more than anyone knows.
Natalie stared at the words until they blurred.
Then she laughed.
A small, strange laugh.
The nurse hurried over.
“Are you okay?”
“No.”
The honesty surprised both of them.
Natalie covered her mouth.
“No. I’m actually not.”
At four-thirty, treatment ended.
Her legs trembled when she stood.
The nurse asked whether her ride had arrived.
Natalie checked her phone.
Nothing.
She had texted Caleb three hours earlier.
Treatment ends around four. I feel worse than last time. Can someone pick me up?
The message had been read.
No response.
“I can call you a cab,” the nurse offered.
Natalie nodded.
Then a man’s voice came from behind her.
“Natalie?”
She turned.
Ethan Cole stood near the doorway holding a paper coffee cup.
He was taller than she remembered, broad-shouldered beneath a dark wool coat, his brown hair touched with gray at the temples.
They had known each other for almost twelve years.
Ethan owned a regional freight company that had once worked closely with Hayes Logistics before Caleb decided Ethan was “too cautious” and ended the partnership.
Natalie had always liked him.
Caleb had always considered that suspicious.
“What are you doing here?” she asked.
“My sister had an appointment upstairs.”
His eyes moved toward the IV stand, then the empty chair beside Natalie.
He did not say poor you.
He did not ask where Caleb was.
He simply said, “Have you eaten?”
Natalie shook her head.
“Can you?”
“Probably not.”
“Okay.”
He nodded toward the hallway.
“Can you walk?”
“I think so.”
“Would you like me beside you or behind you?”
That question nearly broke her.
Not Can I help?
Not You need help.
Would you like me beside you or behind you?
“Beside.”
So he walked beside her.
Slowly.
When they reached the parking garage, Natalie stopped.
“I’m supposed to go home.”
Ethan waited.
Snow blew through the open level of the garage.
She stared at the black sedan waiting beyond the concrete column.
“I don’t want to.”
He did not ask why.......\
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