Chapter 3

I drove myself to a 24-hour clinic. The fluorescent lights were harsh, making the world seem stark and ugly. The burn on my arm was bad, a nasty red patch already blistering.

The nurse who treated me was kind. She clucked her tongue as she cleaned the wound.

"That's a nasty one," she said. "Your wife must be worried sick."

"She had an early meeting," I lied, the words tasting like ash. "She couldn't come."

The nurse gave me a sympathetic look. She didn't believe me, but she was too professional to say so.

As she was wrapping my arm in gauze, I heard them. Their voices drifted in from the hallway. Eleanor and Hudson. They must have brought him here for his "terrible burn."

"It's just a little red mark, Hud," Eleanor was saying, her tone a mix of exasperation and affection. "You're such a baby."

"But it hurts, Ellie-bear," he whined. "Kiss it and make it better."

Ellie-bear. A pet name. In ten years, she had never called me anything but Jefferson or Jeff. Never a term of endearment. Not once.

The burn on my arm was nothing compared to the searing pain that went through me then. I was a fool. A complete, utter fool. I had built my life on the foundation of a woman's gratitude, mistaking it for a palace of love. It was just a shack, and the walls were crumbling.

I didn't deserve her love. That was the cold, hard truth. I wasn't from her world. I wasn't made of the same material.

I couldn't face them. I mumbled my thanks to the nurse, paid in cash, and fled the clinic, my arm throbbing, my heart in pieces.

When I got home, Eleanor was waiting for me, her arms crossed, her face a mask of anger.

"Where have you been?" she demanded.

"The clinic," I said, holding up my bandaged arm.

Her eyes flickered to the gauze, and for a split second, I saw something-a flicker of guilt, maybe. It was gone as quickly as it appeared.

"Hudson's arm was barely red," I said, the bitterness sharp in my voice. "But you rushed him to the hospital."

"Stop it, Jefferson!" she snapped. "You're just throwing a tantrum. Hudson is sensitive! He's not like you. He's important to me, and he's important to my career. You need to understand that and be gracious."

She was telling me to accept her affair. To be a good, understanding husband while she slept with another man. To put her needs, her career, her lover, before my own dignity.

My eyes stung, but I refused to cry in front of her.

I was looking at the woman I loved, the woman I had given everything for, and I was finally seeing her. Cold. Calculating. Selfish. She wasn't the angel I had imagined. She was just a politician.

"Soon," I whispered, so quietly I wasn't sure if I'd said it aloud. "Soon, I'll be free."

"What was that?" she asked, distracted.

"Nothing."

She sighed, the anger draining away, replaced by a performative weariness. "Look, I'm sorry. Let's go to the beach house tomorrow. Just the two of us. We can relax."

The next day at the beach, the "two of us" included Hudson.

He and Eleanor were splashing in the waves, laughing, acting like a couple on their honeymoon. I sat on the sand, a book in my lap that I couldn't read. I didn't know how to swim, a fact Eleanor knew well. It was another way to exclude me, to leave me on the sidelines of their perfect life.

They were a matched set. Golden, beautiful, and cruel.

Eleanor got a call and walked up the beach to take it, leaving me alone with him. Hudson waded out of the water, water streaming from his perfectly sculpted body.

"Feeling left out, Byrd?" he sneered, dropping onto the sand next to me. "Don't worry. I'll teach you how to swim."

Before I could react, he grabbed me. He was surprisingly strong. He dragged me into the water, ignoring my struggles.

"Relax," he hissed in my ear. "It's easy."

Then he shoved my head under the water.

Panic seized me. Water filled my nose, my mouth. My lungs burned. I thrashed wildly, but his hand was like a vise on the back of my neck. The world went dark and silent.

Just when I thought I was going to die, he pulled me up. I coughed and sputtered, gasping for air.

He was laughing. "See? Not so hard."

He shoved me under again. The burning, the panic, the darkness. He was toying with me. Drowning me slowly.

He pulled me up again, his face inches from mine. "Do you really think she cares if you live or die?" he whispered, his voice full of venom. "She's relieved. You're a burden she can finally unload."

A part of me, a stupid, stubborn part, refused to believe him. She couldn't be that cruel. She couldn't.

"Let's find out," Hudson said, as if reading my mind. He smiled, a truly evil smile. "Let's just wait and see."

He held me there, my head just above the churning water, as we waited for Eleanor to finish her call.