Chapter 2 - “SHE’S MY WIFE”“Sir, please sit down.”
The flight attendant put herself between Ryan and the business-class aisle.
“My wife is back there.”
Chloe's face changed.
Not dramatically.
Just enough.
Her eyes sharpened.
The flight attendant glanced from Ryan to me and back again.
“I thought Mrs. Hale was—”
“Don't,” Ryan snapped.
Every nearby passenger was watching now.
I unfastened my seat belt slowly.
Ryan had spent eleven years telling me I reacted too emotionally whenever I challenged him.
Tonight, I intended to disappoint him.
I walked forward.
“Hello, Ryan.”
His mouth opened.
“Evie, what are you doing here?”
Interesting question.
I looked around the aircraft.
“Flying?”
“That's not what I meant.”
“I know.”
Chloe remained seated.
She looked more irritated than embarrassed.
That surprised me.
A mistress caught with someone else's husband usually expected chaos.
Chloe looked like a woman whose travel plans had been inconvenienced.
Ryan touched my elbow.
I pulled away.
“Don't.”
“Evelyn, this isn't what it looks like.”
Several passengers actually laughed.
A gray-haired man across the aisle muttered, “Buddy, you might want to retire that sentence.”
Ryan ignored him.
“Chloe and I are traveling for work.”
“To Portland?”
His face tightened.
“What?”
“You texted me that you were boarding for Portland.”
Chloe looked at him.
I watched the realization move between them.
Ryan said, “Plans changed.”
“Funny. Mine didn't. Denver. Emergency client meeting. Apparently your plans changed so dramatically you developed another wife.”
The flight attendant looked horrified.
Chloe stood.
She was wearing a pale pink dress beneath her coat.
Not office clothes.
Not business-travel clothes.
A diamond glittered on her left hand.
My eyes went to it.
So did everyone else's.
Ryan saw me notice.
“It's not what you think.”
I almost admired his commitment.
“Which part? The diamond, the cuddling, or the airline employees calling your secretary Mrs. Hale?”
Chloe finally spoke.
“You shouldn't do this here.”
I looked at her.
Her voice was calm.
Too calm.
“You're right,” I said. “I should probably wait until we land to discover how long you've been impersonating me.”
“I never impersonated you.”
“Then why are they calling you Mrs. Hale?”
She hesitated.
Ryan cut in.
“Enough.”
The command in his voice was familiar.
It worked in boardrooms.
It had once worked on me.
Not anymore.
The captain announced that we were preparing for departure.
The flight attendant pointed toward our seats.
“All of you need to sit down now.”
I returned to business class.
Ryan reluctantly sat beside Chloe.
As the aircraft accelerated down the runway, I looked out the window and tried to make sense of eleven years.
Ryan and I had met when Hale Dynamics was barely more than a rented office and six employees.
My father had given us the original seed investment.
I had built operations.
Ryan had built sales.
Together, we'd turned a struggling aviation-components company into a business valued at more than $80 million.
People assumed Ryan owned it because his surname was on the building.
They were wrong.
My father's trust controlled 41 percent.
I personally controlled another 11 percent.
Ryan owned 29.
The rest belonged to employees and outside investors.
Ryan was CEO.
I was chief operating officer.
And because our marriage had always seemed stable, we'd never worried much about separating personal and corporate power.
That now felt catastrophically stupid.
Once the seat-belt light went off, Ryan came back.
He crouched beside my seat.
“Can we speak privately?”
“We're inside an airplane.”
“The galley.”
“No.”
His jaw flexed.
“Evelyn.”
“Ryan.”
“Whatever you think you saw—”
“I saw you.”
“Chloe and I—”
“Are sleeping together?”
People nearby grew very quiet.
Ryan lowered his voice.
“Please.”
“Answer.”
He looked toward first class.
“Yes.”
The word hurt more than I expected.
Eleven years reduced to one syllable.
“How long?”
“It's complicated.”
“How long?”
“About fourteen months.”
I stared at him.
Fourteen months.
Last Christmas.
Our anniversary.
My surgery in February.
The night he sat beside my hospital bed and promised I was the only person in the world he couldn't live without.
Fourteen months.
“Why does the airline call her your wife?”
Ryan rubbed his forehead.
“We sometimes book travel together. It was easier.”
“Easier to tell strangers she's your wife?”
“It got us upgrades.”
I laughed.
He looked offended by the sound.
“You destroyed an eleven-year marriage for airline upgrades?”
“Stop twisting everything.”
There he was.
My Ryan.
When the facts were ugly, my interpretation became the problem.
I leaned closer.
“Who is the beneficiary of my insurance policy?”
His face went still.
That answered more than words could.
“Evelyn—”
“Who?”
“Where did you hear about that?”
“Martin.”
Something like fury flashed through his eyes.
“You called Martin?”
“Yes.”
“What did you tell him?”
“Enough.”
Ryan stood.
“Undo it.”
“Undo what?”
“Whatever you did to the accounts.”
“No.”
“You don't understand what's happening.”
“Then explain Cedar Crown.”
He went pale.
For the first time since I'd known him, Ryan Hale had nothing to say.
He returned to first class.
Five minutes later, Chloe came back instead.
She slid into the empty seat beside me without asking.
Her perfume smelled expensive and familiar.
I'd smelled it on Ryan's jackets.
“So,” she said, “you found Cedar Crown.”
I looked at her.
“Shouldn't you be comforting your husband?”
She gave me a strange smile.
“You really think I'm the problem.”
“You're sleeping with my husband.”
“That's true.”
The casual admission landed like a slap.
“But I'm not the person you should be afraid of.”
“I don't frighten easily.”
“You should start.”
She glanced toward the front of the cabin.
“Ryan lied to both of us.”
I stared at her.
She lowered her voice.
“He told me your marriage was over two years ago.”
“You didn't notice we lived together?”
“He said it was temporary for the company.”
“You wore a ring.”
Her jaw tightened.
“He gave it to me eight months ago.”
Something shifted.
This wasn't absolution.
Chloe knew enough to know better.
But the confidence I'd mistaken for arrogance was cracking.
“What exactly did he tell you?” I asked.
“That you were divorcing quietly. That public disclosure would damage the company before the merger.”
“What merger?”
She stared at me.
“You don't know?”
A cold sensation moved through my chest.
“No.”
Chloe looked genuinely alarmed now.
“He's selling Hale Dynamics.”
I stopped breathing.
“He can't.”
“He says he can.”
“He doesn't control enough shares.”
“He will after Friday.”
“What happens Friday?”
Her eyes flicked toward Ryan.
“He said your voting rights would transfer.”
“Under what circumstances?”
“I don't know.”
“Chloe.”
“I swear.”
My mind went back to Martin's unfinished sentence.
The insurance policy.
The changed beneficiary.
The secret transfers.
Friday.
I suddenly remembered something else.
Two weeks earlier, Ryan had insisted I fly to Denver personally.
He'd arranged the meeting.
Not the client.
Ryan had even suggested the flight.
Flight 405.
I pulled up the itinerary.
Then looked at Chloe.
“Why are you going to Denver?”
She swallowed.
“Ryan said we were finalizing the sale.”
“What sale?”
“Cedar Crown is buying Hale Dynamics.”
I felt cold all over.
“Who owns Cedar Crown?”
“I thought you knew.”
“Who?”
Chloe stared straight at me.
“You do.”
For several seconds, all I heard was the engines.
“That isn't possible.”
“He showed me documents. Cedar Crown Holdings is registered through a Nevada trust with your name attached.”
I understood.
Not everything.
But enough.
Someone had built a paper trail making it appear that I controlled the shell company receiving millions from Hale Dynamics.
If regulators found it, the fraud would point at me.
And if I died?
Ryan would become the grieving widower whose dishonest wife had secretly looted the company.
A bell chimed.
The captain's voice came overhead.
“Ladies and gentlemen, we've been informed of severe storms over Denver. We'll be making an unscheduled landing in Omaha.”
Ryan looked back from first class.
He didn't look relieved.
He looked terrified.
Chloe noticed.
“Why does that scare him?” I whispered.
She stared at Ryan.
May you like
Then at me.
“Because,” she said, “we weren't supposed to land before Denver.”
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