Chapter 31

Chapter Thirty-One

AINSLEY

I stared at my husband as he said the seven words I'd never, not in a million years, expected him to say. The words washed over me, coursing in and out of my ear like a heartbeat. I heard them over and over.

I've been cheating on you.

With Seth.

I've been cheating on you.

With Seth.

I've been cheating on you.

With Seth.

I couldn't speak. I stood up, walking away from him with one hand on my stomach, the other on my chest. I felt as though I'd been kicked square in my core.

"Ainsley, I—"

I whipped around to stare at him, cutting his sentence short. " Seth Seth? Glennon's husband? My best friend's husband? Are you serious? You can't be serious… Is this a joke?"

He winced as I doled out the questions, hanging his head. "I'm so sorry."

"Does Glennon know?"

"She just found out."

"So that's why…" I trailed off, looking around the room. It was as if the world I'd woken up in no longer existed. As if I'd been picked up and dropped into a new world where nothing I thought I knew was true. "How could you do this to me? I mean, are you like… Are you coming out to me right now? What is this, Peter? How could I not know you are gay? Are you gay? " Nothing made sense. "Seth?" I couldn't catch my breath.

"I'm not gay," he said, almost defensively. "I'm…well, I guess I'm bisexual. Seth's the only man I've ever been with. I've always been…interested, I guess, but Seth…I don't know. It was different with him. He was different."

"How can this be happening?" I sank down onto my knees on the floor, the questions flowing out of me. "Are you leaving me? Are you asking me for a divorce? Do you want to be with him? Does he want to be with you? Are you leaving us for each other?"

"No," he said, sinking down directly in front of me. He reached for my hands where they rested on my knees, but I jerked them away. "No. Ainsley, look at me." He placed his hands on either side of my cheeks, gently urging me to meet his eye. "I'm not leaving you. I love you. I love our family. I love our kids. With Seth, it was just…" He took a deep breath. "It's not an affair. It was a mistake. A stupid, stupid mistake."

"When did it happen?"

"A few months ago, the first time. And twice since then." He put his face in his hands. "I felt awful. I've wanted to tell you… It's been eating me up. And then when you suggested we see other people, I guess I thought maybe you'd be okay with it. And then Glennon found out and made me promise to tell you… I'm so sorry, Ainsley."

"So you weren't going to tell me if Glennon hadn't made you?"

"I would've!" he insisted, but he was clearly lying. "Just not in the middle of all of this." His face crinkled as he cried, silent tears streaming out of his eyes. As much as I felt anger and resentment toward him, I had to give him the freedom to tell me the truth.

"Are you sure you don't want to be with him? Are you sure you don't love him? I could never hate you for choosing to be honest with yourself. I'm hurt, don't get me wrong, but I don't want you to hide who you are if—"

"It's not," he cut me off, grabbing my hands. "It's not who I am. Who I am is your husband. The man who loves you more than life itself."

"Is Seth leaving Glennon for you?"

"I have no idea," he said, putting his head down again. "I don't think so. I've told him we can't be serious. I've told him I love you."

I tilted my head to the side, trying to process all I was being told. "She must be so devastated…"

"She is, but not for the reasons you think," he said, drawing my attention back to him.

"What does that mean?"

"She's worried about you—"

"I'm fine! She needs to worry about her own marriage…"

"Why do you think Glennon's always got her nose in our business, Ainsley? In our marriage? Why do you think she's always trying to fix our problems and make sure we're perfect?"

"Because she's my best friend."

He gave me a patronizing look, leaning forward so our faces were merely inches apart. "Because she doesn't have her own marriage to worry about."

"What are you talking about?"

"Seth's gay, Ainsley. A hundred percent gay. Never slept with a woman in his life."

"That's impossible—"

"It's not. Ask Glennon. Ask her, and she'll tell you the truth."

"But…I don't understand. Why would she marry him if that's the case? Why would she be leaving him now? Did she know when they got married? She had to if…"

"She's always known. It's why they don't have kids, why he's always away on business trips. Seth's family are devout Catholics. When he came out, they threatened to take him out of the will, take away his trust fund, if he didn't marry a woman."

"That's…awful," I said, feeling my anger dissipating. "Poor Seth… But I don't understand. If that's the case, why didn't Glennon tell me? Why would she agree to it in the first place?"

"I guess they're just good friends," he said. "You know Glennon cares about other people way too much. She's always the first to jump up and sacrifice herself for the greater good. She's always taking care of you, and the kids… Seth needed help, she was his best friend, and she helped him. From what Seth says, it was as simple as that. Plus, Glennon's been taken care of. He's not the only one benefiting from their arrangement. Seth was able to get her the best care when she was sick all that time. And he's been funding her nonprofit since it opened. It was a trade-off, and they've been making it work all these years."

I nodded. What he was saying made sense in a weird way, but I still felt like I was in an alternate reality. It all felt like it was some big joke. Like Glennon and Seth were going to jump out of the kitchen any minute, laughing about how hard I'd fallen for it.

How had I missed it? I'd seen them together so many times. How had I not picked up on the fact that they weren't… together in that way? I'd seen them kiss, hadn't I? I thought back, recalling several pecks on the cheek and forehead. Nothing more. Then again, who makes out in front of their friends? It wasn't the weirdest thing to be a bit private.

But Glennon wasn't private about anything else…

"So, if she knew he was gay, I guess I don't understand. Why is she leaving him now?"

"Because of you, Ainsley. Because he hurt you. Because I hurt you. If there's one thing she could never forgive, it's anyone hurting you."

I thought back to what she'd said on the phone, remembering her tears coming as she'd said she didn't want to lie to me or hurt me. Realization swept through me as every piece of the puzzle clicked into place. It was my turn to put my face in my hands, trying to pull myself together.

"Oh my God…" I whispered breathlessly. No other phrase seemed to fit the way I was feeling.

"She said you told her you'd leave me if I cheated on you," Peter whispered, touching my arm.

"That is what I said," I told him, nodding in my hands.

"Is that still the truth? Do you want to leave me?"

"I just…need time, Peter. You can't ask me that right now."

"Please, Ainsley. Please don't do this. I love you." I looked up, watching a tear drip off the end of his nose. "Please. This is it. This is our moment of total honesty. We get all our secrets out, and then we move on. We can do it. I know we can. We have to. I can't lose you."

I moved to stand up. "I can't, Peter. I can't do this right now. I need to go see Glennon. I need to be with her. I need to make sense of this all."

He reached for my hand. "Wait." His grip tightened.

"Let me go!" I cried, jerking it away from him at the exact moment I heard a knock on the door.

Both our eyes widened as we looked toward the sound. Peter walked past me, wiping his eyes and putting a hand up to keep me back as he pulled open the door. "Can I help you?" he asked.

I walked around him until I could see who was standing there, surprised to see the officers had come back. Maybe Peter had been right after all… With Illiana gone, would they start looking at us again? Maybe they'd never stopped.

"Are you Peter Green—" As Officer Chad recognized me, he stopped short. "Good evening, Mrs. Greenburg. Did we catch you at a bad time?"

I sniffled and ran a finger under my eyes. "No, of course not. Officers, this is my husband, Peter," I said, a lump of fear forming in my chest. "Please, come in."

They stepped over the threshold, but this time, they didn't sit down when I gestured that they should. Instead, Officer Chad nodded at Peter, then at me, and began to speak. "I'm sorry to bother you all. We won't be staying long. We came by because I'm afraid we have some unfortunate news…"

I squared my shoulders, bracing myself for whatever was coming.

"As you may have heard, Illiana De Luca has gone missing."

"We did hear, yeah," I confirmed when he paused. "It was on the news."

"Good. Okay, well, what I'm about to tell you hasn't been released to the public yet, but we wanted to give you a heads-up before it is." He sighed, looking around the room. "Are your children home?"

"They are, but they're in their rooms. Do I need to get them?" My heart fluttered at the thought. I didn't want to involve them. Were they going to arrest us? Would the kids need to go to CPS? I wrung my hands together in front of my waist.

"No, it's better that they're not here. They don't need to hear what I'm about to tell you. It's not…it's not the kind of news we like to give."

"I'm afraid I don't understand," I said. Beside me, Peter was being quiet, for which I was grateful. I had built a rapport with the officers, I could tell. They trusted me somewhat. They held eye contact with me whenever they spoke.

"Ma'am, there's no easy way to say this. We have reason to believe Stefan De Luca is a serial rapist."

I took a sharp breath, stepping backward, my knees nearly giving out under me. "He wh—"

"Inside his truck, we found a bag filled with several pairs of women's underwear. We're making an attempt to identify them, but we also found a rope that matches the ligature marks we've found on numerous victims over the past several years. It has a distinctive pattern of small, metal rings around it… In every case, the victim's underwear had been removed. We've believed for quite some time that the perpetrator had been collecting them."

"Collecting…" I bent down, trying to steady myself as I processed what they were telling us.

"I realize this is hard to hear, ma'am. We're only telling you because we wanted to be sure Officer De Luca didn't do anything inappropriate during your time together. We know that he's a fellow officer, but please don't think that will mean we won't prosecute him to the full extent of the law when we find him, or that we won't take your accusations seriously. I know you said he was kind to you on your date, but if you'd been lying for any reason, now's the time to tell us. It could mean the difference in saving a life."

I shook my head.

"No, he…he didn't. He wasn't… Um, he…he was the perfect gentleman."

The officers exchanged a glance and nodded. Officer Andrews said, "Then I'd say you were very lucky, ma'am." His tone was kind, but I couldn't bear to look at him.

I blinked rapidly, rubbing my eyes as my breathing grew irregular. I put a hand over my chest, squeezing my eyes shut as I tried to focus.

"And…and Illiana? Did he…did he hurt her?" I looked up at them.

If it were possible, Officer Chad's face grew more grim as he prepared to answer the question.

" We believe…" He seemed hesitant to say more, and I worried, briefly, that he wouldn't. "We believe Mrs. De Luca has been…involved in her husband's crimes. Whether or not she planned them or helped him carry them out, we aren't sure. When we asked Mrs. De Luca about the bag, she claimed not to know anything about it. But now, she's gone missing, too. We're very concerned that she may be on the run, but we can't be sure of anything right now."

"As we've said," Officer Andrews added, "it's an ongoing investigation, and this is all sensitive information, which is why we'd appreciate your discretion with what we're telling you. "

"Why are you telling us this, though? What have we got to do with any of it?" Peter asked, finding his voice.

It was Officer Andrews who answered. "Because we believe your wife was meant to be De Luca's next victim. Now, she may be perfectly safe, but we wanted to warn you that if either of them were to contact you, we'd like you to call us straight away. Don't talk to them, don't engage. Call us or, if you believe you're in immediate danger, say if they were to show up here again, call 911. Do you still have our number?"

I nodded. "Yes, of course."

"Good. We're going to have an officer patrol your area for the next few nights to be on the lookout, but you need to be vigilant as well. The De Lucas have done extensive research on you. They know where you work, where you live… From what we're discovering, they are very dangerous people. Do you understand what I'm saying?"

I nodded again, unable to speak.

"Do you have any questions for us? Anything else we should know?"

I shook my head as I felt Peter's arm slink around me. He rested his chin on the top of my head.

"Thank you, Officers."

The men nodded, making eye contact with him, then me.

"Take care now. And be safe." With that, they saw themselves out, leaving us in silence as what we'd been told sank in.

Peter spun me around after a moment, looking me in the eye.

"Did he try something with you?" I pulled myself from his grasp. "You need to tell me the truth."

"No, Peter, of course not. I would've told you."

"You swear it?"

"I swear," I told him.

"I'd never forgive myself if something happened to you."

"I was fine. He didn't try anything."

"I can't lose you, Ainsley. God, I don't know what I'd do if—"

"You won't," I promised. "We're in this together, right?"

"Together," he said, pulling me into his chest. "You and me."

I squeezed him tighter, feeling our hearts beating together. "But you can't lie to me anymore, Peter. No more secrets between us. I can't handle any more. Our marriage can't survive any more. We have to both agree."

"No more secrets," he said. "I promise you. No more secrets, no more lies. If we can survive what we've survived over these last few days, we can survive anything."

At his words, I pulled away, staring up at him.

"Are you sure?"

"I love you, Ainsley. I will fight for you every single day. I'm not letting you go. Not now, not ever."

"You swear it?" I asked, pinching the skin around my nails. "We can forgive each other for anything?"

"If you can forgive me for what I did, I will never let you go. I'm in this with you if you're in it with me." He kissed my lips. "We can be the people we were before. Is that what you want? Can you forgive me? Can we work through this together?"

I looked down, pinching my cuticle again. As I broke the skin, I looked down, staring as the blood began to pool. I watched the red dot as it grew, spilling out into the crevices of my thumb nail.

"Ainsley?" Peter said, and I got the impression he'd already said my name once. I'd been lost in my thoughts. "Can you forgive me?"

"I can," I said softly, chewing on my bottom lip as I swiped my bloody thumb onto my pants. "If you can forgive me."

The smile faded from his face. "Forgive you for what?"

"For what I'm about to tell you…" I whispered, my chin quivering. I wasn't sure I'd be able to form the words.

"What is it? What do you have to tell me?"

"You should sit," I said. "It's about Stefan. About why he died. About why I had to do it."

"Why you had to do what?"

I pressed my lips together, inhaling deeply through my nose. "I had no idea what I was doing. I didn't think it would actually work. I didn't know if I could pull it off. I mean, it's a relief, right? Knowing that we're going to get away with it. Knowing that we actually pulled it off and they don't suspect us. I'd been living with such guilt and worry and—"

"What are you talking about, Ainsley? You aren't making sense… I mean, sure, it's a relief that they don't think I killed him, but I wouldn't say we're off the hook just—"

"That's just it, Peter. That's what I'm trying to tell you."

"What are you trying to tell me?" he asked, letting a desperate, breathy sigh escape his throat.

"You didn't kill Stefan." I took another deep breath, stilling my shaking hands. "I did," I said. And then, I told him everything.