Page 4 of Trail of Betrayal
My name.
The corridor tilts. I step back, dizzy, hands shaking so violently I press them to my stomach to hide it. My chest burns; breathing feels optional.
I wait—five seconds, maybe ten—for the door to open. It doesn’t. Just their tangled breathing, matching my own.
I walk away before I can cry, each step measured, mechanical. The hallway stretches, ventilation humming a cruel soundtrack.
Back in my office, I shut the door and lean against it. My skin is hot and cold. The city outside glows. I stare until my eyes sting.
This is not love. Lawrence doesn’t cheat because he’s in love. He’s addicted to the risk—the tightrope of forbidden things. He likes knowing he could get caught. If I didn’t hate him, I might almost admire the precision.
I think about my mother with her vodka tonic and the same warning:You’ll spend so much time looking for the complicated answer, you’ll never see the simple one.I used to think she was dramatic. Not tonight.
Time of death: 9:31 p.m. The minute I stop pretending this can be fixed with a conversation.
I boot the laptop. The login screen spits cold blue across my face. Fingers flex, then type: bullet points, timelines, patterns.Spreadsheet 1: Patterns of Deceit.Dates. Times. Alibis. Locationpings. Archived Slack threads. Receipts. I flag every “working late,” cross-reference his location sharing from six weeks ago—a hotel ping near the office, the Black Dog—and pull a Yelp snap with Isabella’s reflection in the background.
I drop in KPIs—client rosters, campaign credits, sudden dips in CTR, an A/B test that tanked under his name. Each cell steadies me. My heartbreak renders in conditional formatting: deceit = TRUE → action = INEVITABLE.
Halfway through the second sheet, my anger hardens into something sharper. Not rage, but strategy. I could confront him, let him spin stories. I could scream. I could play the wounded party. None of that fits.
I start with small things: itemized campaign sabotage, stolen credit, clients quietly rerouted. Then bigger: confidential docs, access logs, ethical breaches. I know where the bodies are buried—because I buried most of them.
By the time I’m done, the city outside is black and empty. I save the file, close the laptop, and let the silence settle.
As they say, never mix business with pleasure.
Chapter 3
Idon’t sleep, not really, but I lie to myself about it and keep my morning routine unchanged. Espresso, shower, makeup applied in thirty precise strokes. I choose a women’s power suit with a sharper cut than usual, the jacket tailored so tight it might hold me together by force of will. My reflection in the elevator’s chrome is an ice sculpture of someone far more stable than I feel.
Beads of condensation still cling to the office windows when I arrive, forty minutes before anyone else. The space is eerily silent, save for the digital thrum of the security panel as I key myself in. I could use the quiet for one more pass at the pitch, but my mind loops over last night’s evidence file instead, all the ways I could have missed it, all the ways I still don’t want to believe.
By 8:10 a.m., the open office fills with the familiar click of heels and the mechanical clatter of sit-stand desks adjusting. I spot Isabella’s arrival, her entrance as seamless as a magazine ad. Her hair is perfect, her posture carved from marble, laptop slung in one hand like a trophy. She doesn’t look at me, not even a flicker, and the lack of tells feels almost insulting.
At 8:22 a.m., Elise, a work friend, materializes at the far end of the corridor, a vision of control in a navy sheath dress and tortoiseshell glasses. She’s carrying three phones and an insulated mug that probably contains half her caloric intake for the day. I catch her eye, nod once, and she matches my pace instantly, falling into step beside me as if we’ve been rehearsing for weeks.
We walk the length of the office without exchanging a word. At the corner conference room, the one with frosted glass that does a laughable job of hiding its occupants, I stop and hold the door open for her. Elise hesitates for a split second, reading my face, then ducks inside. I follow, let the door click shut, and for the first time since yesterday, I exhale.
“Trouble sleeping?” Elise asks, setting her mug down.
“More like insomnia by design.” I sink into the chair, arms folded tight. The conference table gleams too bright, and in the reflection, my hands tremble.
Elise arches a brow. “Let me guess. Tomorrow’s pitch is imploding, and you’re running on caffeine and spite.”
I almost smile. “You’re half right.”
“Which half?”
“The one where everything’s going to shit.”
She chuckles, pushing her glasses up. “Welcome to corporate America, darling. Learn to compartmentalize or start packing.”
It should sound like a joke. It doesn’t. The words settle between us, dry and real. I twist my watch once, twice, the metal biting my wrist.
“I need to ask you something,” I say finally.
Her tone shifts softer. “What’s wrong?”
