The Tenth Lie Was Mine

My fiancé always had a convenient excuse for his betrayals.

Nine times, I found proof of another woman. Nine times, someone I loved explained it away.

So I planted the tenth piece of evidence myself: a tube of red lipstick, tucked between the seats of my fiancé's car.

Hale didn't even blink when I held it up. He called my brother and my best friend and put them on speaker.

Jesse said Rory must have dropped it. Rory laughed and told me I was spiraling again. Both of them swore Hale would never cheat on me.

They didn't know I'd hidden a tracker in Hale's car weeks ago.

An hour later, I stood outside a house. Through the glass, I watched Hale kiss another woman at a party for the son she'd given him.

Jesse and Rory were in there too, toasting the happy family.

I'd been replaced, and the only person they'd bothered to hide it from was me.

Fine. They could keep their lies. I was done.

...

Once the call ended, Hale rubbed his eyes like a man at the end of a double shift.

"Happy now? Wren, if you're going to keep doing this, maybe we should rethink the wedding."

"Let's cancel it," I interrupted, my voice dead flat.

Hale looked over. I kept my eyes on the road.

The pearl choker in his glovebox had been the first. His mother said she'd left it there after a hospital foundation luncheon.

Then came two ticket stubs from a Broadway show I'd never seen. His chief resident, Dr. Pruitt, claimed they were from his own date night.

A hair tie. A dinner receipt for two. Every time, someone had an answer ready before I finished the question.

By the ninth time, I stopped believing in coincidences. That was when I bought the lipstick.

"I'll call the Bellport Harbor Inn tomorrow," I continued. "You can tell your mother."

Hale hit the brakes so hard the seatbelt cut into my collarbone.

"Are you out of your mind?"

"Your own brother just told you the truth, and you still don't believe him? You need to talk to someone, Wren. Seriously. Without trust, we don't have anything."

Just then, his phone buzzed on the dash.

He glanced at it, and his whole face changed. The anger drained away. What replaced it was gentle, almost tender.

I hadn't seen him look like that in months. Not at me.

He hit the lock release.

"Something came up at the hospital. The house is a mile back. Walk it off and think about what you just accused me of. We'll forget this happened."

I got out. He was gone before the door fully shut, leaving me alone on the highway.

I didn't walk to the house. I opened the app linked to the small tag I'd taped under his back seat three weeks earlier and called a cab.

I paid the driver and walked up the gravel. The ocean side of the house was all glass, lit up like a lantern. Nobody inside was looking out.

I knew almost everyone. Two members of the hospital board. Dr. Pruitt. Hale's mother, rocking a baby in a blanket.

A banner hung over the fireplace: WELCOME HOME, BABY CORBIN.

And in the middle of it all, Lila Thayer.

She wore the pearl choker. Her hair was pulled back with the velvet tie I'd found in Hale's suit pocket last month.

Seeing her face, the fragile glass of my composure shattered.

Five weeks ago, she was admitted to Ashby Point Medical Center for dehydration while I was covering her floor.

When I placed her IV, a little blood backed up into the line. It happens. It's nothing.

Yet, Lila screamed, and her private security guard shoved me so hard I went straight into a supply cart, fracturing two bones in my right hand, the one I operate with.

The board put me on leave the next morning, pending review of "the patient complaint."

At the time, Hale promised he'd fight it. Jesse promised to sue the guard and his company.

Now Jesse was topping off Lila's champagne and laughing at something she said.

Rory stood by the kitchen island chatting with Pruitt. The night I got hurt, she'd sat on my couch holding ice to my hand, swearing whoever did this would pay.

Then Hale came through the front door, and the whole room turned toward him.

"Finally!" Pruitt called. "You're late, Chief. You owe the new mom big time."

Hale crossed the room, slid his arm around Lila's waist, and kissed her. Everyone cheered.

Heat climbed my face and spread through my whole body.

For five weeks, I'd blamed a stranger's overreaction for wrecking my career.

But it was never an accident.

The complaint, the leave, the review—they'd turned a complication into an excuse to push me out of the hospital. Out of the way of this.

My phone buzzed. An email from Pacific Crest Trauma Center in Oregon, the program I'd applied to after the suspension, when I couldn't stand being home anymore.

[Dr. Marrick, we're pleased to confirm your appointment. Please report for onboarding in three days.]

I read it. The heat left me, and something colder settled in its place.

Three days. Then Hale Corbin would just be someone I used to know.

My stomach turned. I stepped back and started down the drive, wanting nothing but the dark and the wind off the water.

Behind me, the door slid open.

"Dr. Marrick?" Lila's voice was soft and sweet.

"Did you come for the toast? It's for my son."