Chapter 4

I acted like nothing had happened and took my daughter down to the lobby to play with her blocks.

Bored, I opened my phone and saw the post the sister-in-law had put up five minutes earlier.

In the grid of photos, my husband, the one supposedly away on business, was sitting in a mall restaurant enjoying a fancy dinner with his mother, his sister, and a woman I didn't recognize.

The caption read:

"Thanks to my little brother, first time ever having a real fancy dinner. Four hundred and eighty-eight a head. So satisfying."

The woman's belly was already showing. That had to be Noreen Simmons, Tristan's mistress.

She sat between my mother-in-law and Tristan, arm hooked through the older woman's, leaning her head on her shoulder like a spoiled child.

My mother-in-law's face was creased with smiles, her mouth practically split from ear to ear.

I gave the sister-in-law's post a like. A second later, a message came in from Tristan:

"I took time off and came back. My mom's in the hospital, there's no way I'd leave her on her own. Don't read too much into it."

A thread of mockery slid through my eyes. I typed back, casual:

"Who's that woman?"

He replied:

"A friend of my sister's, works out here too. We just called her out to catch up, that's all."

I used to believe Tristan. For the sake of our little family, for the sake of climbing higher, most of his salary went to greasing connections and wining and dining contacts.

Only now did I understand. The reason he gave less and less for household expenses was that he was keeping another woman on the side.

His whole family knew. I was the only one kept in the dark.

I went on playing dumb, but a whole performance was already taking shape in my head.

All of my mother-in-law's test results were back, and the doctor said plainly that it was only mild heart ischemia,

a common minor issue in older adults. With a little care in daily life, it didn't need treatment at all.

But right there she went pale with fright, clutching her chest and crying out in pain.

"How is it not serious? I'm this old and I still haven't held a grandson. What if I just drop dead?"

"I don't care, it hurts! I want the best stent, an imported one! The expensive ones are the only ones that work!"

"If you won't get me the surgery, I'll take you to court!"

In the end the doctor couldn't win against her. The estimated surgery cost: a hundred thousand.

The day before the surgery, Tristan handed me the order:

"Go pay it."

Before I could even refuse, he raised an eyebrow, sizing me up, his voice full of displeasure.

"Lindsay already told me you've got a hundred thousand in savings. Delia, you've really been hiding it deep, quietly squirreling away that much on the side."

I lifted my eyes and kept my voice level.

"That money is the backup for me and Daisy. Not a cent of it gets touched."

The words were barely out before the sister-in-law blew up beside us, pitching her voice higher to lay into me.

"Delia, do you have any conscience at all? My mom's lying in a hospital bed waiting for surgery and you're worrying about your little private stash? You're too selfish, too cold-blooded!"

I raised my eyes to her.

"I'm selfish? Fine, you want me to pay, then the medical bill gets split evenly. Fifty thousand per family. You pay, I pay."

The sister-in-law choked for a second, then said coldly:

"I don't have money."

"Is it that you don't have money, or that you don't want to pay for your own mother?"

"All right, all right, I won't take advantage of you. Let these lottery tickets count as my fifty thousand of the medical bill."

Lottery tickets to cover a medical bill? It was so absurd I actually laughed.

I let that go and kept asking.

"After Mom's surgery, who's taking care of her?"

Tristan and the sister-in-law answered in the same breath:

"You are, obviously."

I looked at the sister-in-law with mockery.

"Didn't you say that once I paid you back for your plane ticket, you wouldn't make me worry about Mom being in the hospital?"

The sister-in-law didn't miss a beat.

"I already spent a whole day with Mom, isn't that enough? Waiting on your in-laws is a daughter-in-law's duty in the first place!"

I turned to Tristan.

"You think so too?"

Tristan nodded hard.

"My sister's right."

The whole family had their accounting worked out nicely. Not one of them would part with a cent, and the labor got dumped on me as a matter of course.

A worthless scrap of paper to wipe out fifty thousand of debt, and I'd be left to cover everything else.

I suddenly smiled, and there was no warmth in it.

"Fine. Whatever you say. Only the bank's closed now, and a large sum needs me to go in tomorrow and raise the limit before I can withdraw it."

The moment they heard that, both of them lit up, smiling in satisfaction.

Early the next morning, Tristan messaged me.

"Did you get the money out? Mom's gone into surgery. I just fronted twenty thousand, hurry up and pull the money and pay me back!"

I let out a cold laugh and switched off my phone.

There was no hundred thousand for the surgery. But I hoped the two million in debt would give him a nice surprise.