I'd been ready to divorce him. But then, out of nowhere, he was diagnosed with leukemia.
The very night of his diagnosis, Kathy took off with tens of millions of his money and fled the country.
For the sake of the twenty-some years we'd known each other, I chose to stay and take care of Louis. When the donor match came back positive, I donated my stem cells.
I nursed him through everything for two years. Changed his bedpans, cleaned up after him, held him together. It took that long before his condition was finally under control and he could be discharged.
The day he left the hospital, he swore to me with every ounce of conviction he had. Said I was the only woman he'd ever love. Said he'd never stray again.
And then, at that hotel, he slipped out of our bed in the middle of the night and went to Kathy's room.
Back then, I let him fool me. I believed him when he said nothing had happened between them.
Now I knew better. From that night until now, they'd been carrying on behind my back. God only knew how many times.
How else had Kathy gotten pregnant? And why else would Louis be so devoted to a woman who'd abandoned him when he was dying?
I dragged myself back onto the hospital bed.
The pain from the wound was unbearable. I blacked out almost immediately.
I was jolted awake by my phone buzzing with notifications.
Kathy had sent a video.
In the footage, the woman was sitting in our bathtub. Louis was patiently feeding her fruit salad, then running his hands over her shoulders in a massage that left nothing to the imagination.
"Daphne, your husband was worried I might get depressed during my pregnancy, so he invited me over to your place as a guest. You don't mind, do you?"
I didn't reply. Not a single word. I just saved the video in silence.
A few minutes later, another message came through. This time, a photo.
It was my mother's roses. The ones she'd planted before she died.
I'd kept them alive on the balcony. Whenever I missed her, I'd go out there and sit with them, letting the sight of those blooms bring her back to me for just a moment.
"These flowers are so ugly. I went ahead and pulled them out for you."
My chest seized.
I fired off a message immediately:
"No! Don't touch them!"
I threw myself out of bed, dragging my broken body through the discharge paperwork as fast as I could.
I called Louis on the way home. Over and over. More than a dozen times.
He didn't pick up once.
I unlocked the front door and found Kathy standing there with a smug look on her face, still holding a single rose in her hand.
"Who told you to touch my flowers? What the hell is wrong with you?"
I was out of my mind with rage. I stormed up and slapped her across the face.
I raised my hand to do it again, but Louis caught my wrist and shoved me hard. I went sprawling to the floor.
The back of my skull cracked against the wall with a dull, sickening thud.
Kathy wiped the smile off her face in an instant. Her voice turned thin and trembling.
"Daphne, I was just trying to help you prune the flowers. Why are you so hostile toward me?"
"Louis and I are really just friends now. That's all we are. Please stop being so jealous, okay?"
Louis held her in his arms and looked down at me, his eyes cold and flat.
"Daphne, do you have to act like such a vicious shrew? You're disgusting."
I fought through the splitting pain in my head and pulled myself to my feet. I walked toward the balcony.
When I saw that every last rose was gone, something inside me snapped.
I grabbed the pruning shears and went looking for Kathy.
Louis stepped in front of me, blocking my path.
"Get out of my way! She destroyed the roses my mother left me. I'll kill her!"
Kathy dabbed at her tears, but in the space where Louis couldn't see, she flashed me a taunting little smile.
I knocked Louis's hand aside, lunging for that woman, ready to cut that lying mouth to ribbons.
A large hand seized a fistful of my hair and slammed me face-down onto the cold glass coffee table.
"They're just flowers, Daphne. If you lay a finger on Kathy, I will personally make sure you end up in prison."
Louis's voice was colder than I'd ever heard it.
I looked up at the man pinning me down, and all I felt was that I was staring at a stranger.
