I enlarged the image, my fingers trembling uncontrollably. I scanned the crowd in the background. It wasn’t just an elopement. Trevor’s entire family was there. His cousins, the aunts who critiqued my cooking, the uncles who asked me for stock tips—they were all there, raising champagne glasses, laughing, celebrating.
They knew.
They had all known.
While I sat in this glass tower paying the mortgage on the sprawling mansion in Connecticut, while I paid the lease on Trevor’s imported Porsche, while I funded Denise’s cosmetic surgeries, they had flown to Bali to celebrate his second marriage.Marriage counseling
The betrayal wasn’t just a knife in the back; it was a firing squad.
I didn’t cry. I think I was too shock-frozen for tears. Instead, a cold, metallic clarity washed over me. I dialed Denise.
She answered on the second ring, her voice smooth, cultured, and utterly devoid of guilt.
“Brianna,” she said, the name tasting like something sour in her mouth. “I suppose you have seen the photographs. You always were a snoop.”
“A snoop?” I repeated, my voice terrifyingly steady. “Denise, I am looking at evidence of bigamy. Trevor is legally married to me.”
Denise laughed softly, a sound like ice clinking in a glass. “Oh, Brianna, don’t be so provincial. You always think money and laws can control everything. You never understood the Miles spirit. You never gave my son a child. You never gave him warmth; you only gave him checks. Kaitlyn is pregnant. She is giving him a legacy. Do not stand in their way.”
