She went home furious.
Caleb had been the person she called.
“You were crying,” Caleb said.
“You said Katherine ruined you.”
“I felt ruined.”
“You said she hated you.”
“I said horrible things that night.”
“You told me she wanted your position.”
Beatrice hesitated.
“That wasn’t true.”
Caleb stumbled backward until his legs touched the bed.
Grace remembered those months now.
Caleb had become quieter.
Whenever Katherine visited, he watched her strangely.
Grace had assumed work was exhausting him.
All that time, he had been building a case against the woman he claimed to love.
“Why didn’t you correct him?” Grace asked Beatrice.
Beatrice’s voice broke.
“Because I was ashamed.
And because once Caleb started defending me, it felt easier to let him.”
“Easier?” Grace repeated.
“He kept saying Katherine would eventually show what kind of person she was.
I should have stopped him.
I know that.
But I thought he meant he was going to confront her, or break up with her.
I didn’t know he was planning this.”
Katherine looked at Caleb.
“How long?”
He did not answer.
“How long have you been planning to punish me?”
Caleb sat slowly on the edge of the untouched bed.
“After Beatrice lost the job.”
Katherine’s expression emptied.
“That was fourteen months ago.”
Grace felt the number like a physical blow.
Fourteen months of dinners.
Birthdays.
Sunday lunches.
Wedding planning.
Caleb standing beside Katherine while she tried dresses, chose flowers, mailed invitations and discussed the future.
Fourteen months during which his mother had watched them and believed she was seeing love.
“You could have asked me,” Katherine said.
Caleb stared at the floor.
“I thought you would lie.”
“So instead you proposed to me?”
He flinched.
Katherine walked back into the room and picked up the thick folder from the dresser.
“What is this?”
Caleb looked at it.
“Nothing.”
“It was important enough to put beside a recorder on our wedding night.”
She opened it.
Inside were printed emails, photographs from social media, copies of old workplace messages, and pages of notes in Caleb’s handwriting.
Dates had been circled.
Sentences had been underlined.
Ordinary moments from Katherine’s life had been arranged to look suspicious.
