The rain doesn't let up all day. It follows me home, painting the windows in slow, weeping streaks. The city feels like it's mourning something. Maybe it's just me.
I curl up on the couch with a cup of tea I can barely touch. The envelope Nse gave me sits on the table again. Open. Exposed. Like me.
I tell myself not to look through it again.
But my hands betray me and I do just that.
I flip through the emails his fake names, the forged documents, the trail of deceit he threaded so delicately through my life. I pause on one page in particular. It's an email from a month before our wedding. The subject line: "Final Phase Plan."
My name is mentioned in the body like a target. Not a person. Not a woman. Not a human. Not even a pet.
Just a means to an end.
And yet… my chest aches.
Because I remember that time as the happiest I'd felt in years. I remember how he'd hold my hand in the car when he thought I was sleeping. How he once cooked pepper soup from scratch because I'd mentioned craving it in passing.
How do you reconcile that with this?
I don't know. But I know I have to try.
Later that night, I step into my walk-in closet not for clothes, but for silence. It's the one place he never really entered. He used to wait by the door, respectful. Or so I thought.
Now I wonder if even that was part of the con.
I sit on the padded bench, surrounded by all the designer labels that suddenly mean nothing.
I rest a hand on my stomach. The motion is unconscious, instinctive.
I haven't told anyone yet. Not even Gloria.
There's a life growing inside me.
A child I didn't plan for, from a man I never really knew.
And yet… I feel something more powerful than fear.
I feel fiercely protective.
Not just of the baby, but of the woman I was before this happened. The one who dared to open her heart, even if it cost her everything.
I whisper aloud, "You will not grow up defined by his lies. I'll make sure of that."
The words feel like a promise to both of us.
Just then, my phone vibrates. A text from an unknown number.
> "We need to talk. One last time."
I don't have to ask who it is.
I stare at the message, heart pounding, thumb hovering over the screen.
And in that moment, I realize something strange.
I'm not afraid of him not even a bit.
I know for a fact, that I'm afraid of what I'll feel when I see him again.