A man answered her—his voice calm, unashamed. “I did what I had to do. I want Delilah. That’s all that matters.”
Lucinda gasped. “Delilah? After she walked out on you five years ago? You faked your own death for the woman who abandoned you—and left the one who stayed? What is wrong with you?”
My vision blurred.
Delilah wasn’t just his lost love. She was my best friend. The girl who had left town chasing dreams, leaving Nathaniel broken. I was the one who stood beside him when he hit rock bottom, the one who helped him rebuild. Somewhere along the way, care turned into closeness, and closeness into marriage. Or so I believed.
“I’m not crazy,” he replied. “This is what love feels like. Eleanor was only ever filling a gap. I never loved her. When Delilah came back last year, everything changed. She’s pregnant now. So I disappeared. And now I’ll stay near Eleanor as Harold. It’s the only way.”
I felt as if the floor had vanished beneath my feet.
My husband was alive.
My child had been stolen.
And I was nothing more than a placeholder in the story of his life.