The first thing I noticed wasn’t her face. It was her hand, bare, trembling slightly under the flickering light of our garage in downtown Chicago.
No ring, no indentation, nothing. She froze when she saw me sitting in the driver’s seat, engine off, just watching.
No ring, no indentation, nothing. She froze when she saw me sitting in the driver’s seat, engine off, just watching.
“Oh, hey,” she said too quickly, tucking her hair behind her ear. “You’re home early.” That’s when it hit me. My wife had walked in without her wedding ring, and in the next 10 minutes, she gave me five different excuses. And not one of them made sense.
I didn’t say anything at first, just stepped out of the car slowly. “Where’s your ring, Lauren?” She blinked.
“Oh, I took it off at work. My fingers were swelling.” I looked at her hand again. No redness, no mark. Something wasn’t right.
We walked into our apartment on West Lake Street in silence. She tossed her bag down, avoiding eye contact. The second excuse came before I even asked. “I actually left it in my desk drawer. You know, safety.” I nodded, calm, too calm.
“Funny,” I said, “you told me last week your office got broken into.” Her lips tightened. Pause. Third excuse. “Okay, I didn’t leave it there. I, uh, dropped it at the gym locker room.”
Now my chest felt tight. Three answers in under a minute. That’s when suspicion stopped being a feeling and became a decision. That night, she fell asleep fast, too fast. I didn’t.
Her phone was on the nightstand, screen lighting up every few minutes. I waited.
At 2:14 a.m., it buzzed again. A name popped up: Derek office. I opened the message.
“You left in a rush. Everything okay? You forgot something at the hotel.” My stomach dropped.