Chapter 3 - The Hidden Envelope
The sound of police sirens wailed in the distance, growing louder by the second.
I was standing in my kitchen, staring at a hotel receipt that proved my paralyzed wife had booked the room for my affair.
None of this made any logical sense.
I reached for the white envelope sitting on top of the pile of evidence.
It was the envelope Lauren had left for me before she disappeared.
I tore it open with shaking fingers.
Inside was a single sheet of lined paper covered in her neat, familiar handwriting.
"Dear Marcus," the letter began.
"I knew you were leaving me the moment you started looking at me with pity instead of love."
"I knew about your secret trips, your late nights, and the woman who made you feel alive."
"But you are so incredibly stupid, Marcus."
"You actually believed a beautiful stranger approached you at a bar by pure coincidence."
I felt the air get sucked entirely out of my lungs.
"Olivia does not love you," Lauren's letter continued.
"Olivia is an actress I hired to keep you distracted while I finalized my exit strategy."
"I needed you out of the house for exactly ten days."
"Thank you for being so predictable and selfish."
"By the time you read this, your bank accounts will be completely empty."
"Your car has been reported stolen, and your fingerprints are on the weapon in the bedroom."
"Do not bother looking for me."
"I am finally walking away from this miserable life."
I read the word walking over and over again.
Lauren had been paralyzed for four months.
The doctors said she would never regain mobility on her left side.
I rushed back into the living room and stared at her empty wheelchair.
I dropped to my knees and inspected the footrests of the chair.
They were completely covered in a thick layer of undisturbed dust.
Lauren had not used this wheelchair in weeks.
The front door burst open as two uniformed police officers rushed into my house with their hands on their weapons.
David pointed directly at me from the hallway.
May you like
"Arrest him," David yelled to the officers.
"He murdered my sister to run away with his mistress."
