I tapped the encrypted folder labeled Sundays.
Scott lunged across the dining table. His palm slapped hard against the smart screen, turning the display pitch black. The force of his hand rattled the crystal wine glasses.
"Why does a harmless chat need a separate password, Scott?" Ben asked.
Scott stared at the dark glass under his hand, his jaw clamped shut. He offered no explanation. His silence answered the question for him.
I did not wait for him to find his voice. I bypassed the console entirely, unlocking my own phone. As the co-administrator of our home server, my credentials overrode his manual lock. The screen loaded instantly. Six hundred and twelve messages populated my display, sorted chronologically.
"Ben, send the kids home," Paige pleaded, her voice cracking as she stepped away from the table. "We shouldn't do this here."
"They are upstairs with noise-canceling headphones on," Ben replied, his tone flat. "I am not building you a private interrogation room."
I scrolled to the very top of the thread. Two years ago.
"Talking to you makes me feel seen," I read aloud, quoting Paige's exact text from a Sunday night.
I scrolled down three months later.
"When the kids are older, we can rearrange our lives," I read. "That was your reply, Scott."
Scott pulled his hand away from the blank console. "Hannah, you are taking lines out of context."
I kept scrolling. My thumb stopped on a block of data from eighteen months ago. A continuous call log.
"One seventeen in the morning," I said, looking directly at Paige. "A ninety-minute phone call. You told me he was helping you draft the charity gala proposal that night."
Paige crossed her arms over her chest, shrinking back.
I remembered that specific morning. Ben had questioned the late-night notifications on her phone. I had stood right here in this dining room and defended her. I had looked Ben in the eye and told him Paige would never lie to me. My trust had been the perfect cover, and I had handed it to them myself.
"Why did you use Hannah as a shield?" Ben asked Paige.
Paige wiped a tear from her cheek, glaring at her husband. "You haven't looked at me in years, Ben. You froze me out of our marriage. Scott just filled the empty space you left behind."
Scott pointed a finger at me across the table. "And you treat this house like a second studio. You never stop working. We were lonely, Hannah."
"You used my money to save your career," I said. "And you used my friendship to hide your affair."
A crash echoed from the wooden staircase.
Chloe stood on the landing. Shards of a broken water glass scattered around her bare feet, water seeping into the oak floorboards.
"Did you really discuss where we would live?" Chloe asked.
Scott rushed toward the stairs, extending both arms. "Sweetie, let me explain."
Chloe took a step backward. Her heel narrowly missed a jagged piece of glass. She shrank against the wall, pulling away from her father. The lie about protecting the kids had already failed.
"We never touched," Paige cried out, stepping toward Ben. "No kisses. No hotels. We didn't do anything physical."
Scott dropped his arms as Chloe retreated further up the stairs. "We were just talking through possibilities. Trying to figure out a more honest future for everyone."
"Honest?" I asked. "You secretly planned out houses, step-parents, and weekend custody schedules behind our backs, and you call that honest?"
Neither of them answered.
Ben reached into his pocket, pulled out his phone, and placed it flat on the mahogany table.
"We each keep a read-only copy of this drive," Ben said, looking at me. "We both hire lawyers tomorrow morning. And we do not use the kids as messengers."
"I agree," I said. "And no one deletes the parts that make them look bad."
Scott let out a dry, bitter laugh. "Look at you two. The victims, already forming an alliance."
Paige stared at Ben. He stood close to my chair, his shoulder hovering near mine.
I grabbed the wooden frame of my chair and dragged it half a step away from Ben. I refused to let Scott spin a new narrative, and I refused to let shared trauma push me into leaning on another man.
I opened my email application, attached the raw archive file, and typed in Maya Brooks. She handled all the legal contracts for my studio.
I hit send.
My phone buzzed a minute later. Maya confirmed receipt. The original timestamps were now locked in her legal server.
Scott's posture shifted. The defensive guilt vanished from his face, replaced by a cold, hard stare.
"You copied our private data without consent," Scott said, his voice dropping the gentle tone entirely. "Delete it, Hannah. Now. Before midnight."
I walked past him toward the hallway. "No one is choosing parents tonight. You are sleeping in the study."
Ben grabbed Paige's coat from the rack by the door and tossed it to her. "Let's go, Paige."
I did not wait to watch them leave. I walked up the stairs, checked on the kids in their rooms, and stepped into the master bedroom. I pushed the door shut and turned the deadbolt. The heavy brass lock clicked into place. For the first time in our marriage, Scott was locked out of our shared space.
My phone screen flared bright in the dark room. A system alert popped up over my lock screen.
Remote wipe requested at 11:42 p.m.
The request originated from Scott's device. He was trying to erase the home server from the study.
I pressed reject.
A warning text flashed across the screen. Three failed attempts will freeze the administrator account for thirty days.
Another alert pinged immediately. The second wipe request.
Heavy footsteps stopped right outside my bedroom door.
"Cancel your lawyer's access before twelve," Scott said through the wood. "Or I tell the kids you chose to give this family to the courts."
