Deconstructed(14)

“You need proof that’s admissible in court. Pictures.”

“I don’t want to go to court. I want to confront him myself. I want him to know I know.”

“No, you don’t.” Ruby delivered this with an adamant pointer finger.

“Who are you? Where have you been hiding the real Ruby all this time?”

She gave me a smile. “Yeah, so I guess I’m cautious around people I don’t know, especially women like you.”

“Women like me?”

She made a flat line with her mouth. “Women who have money and security. Women who wear expensive clothes and talk about things like cotillion and debutantes.”

“I’m not like that.”

The corners of her mouth lifted. “I know. I mean, you talk about that stuff, but I know you’re not shallow. And earlier when I saw you crying—”

“You saw me?” I hadn’t meant to cry, but Scott had sent me flowers. He never sent me flowers, and because I had read that stupid “Thirty Signs He’s Cheating On You” article, I knew that sending me flowers wasn’t a sweet gesture. It was guilt and another nail in the coffin of our marriage.

“Yeah, and seeing you cry over that asshole pissed me off. That’s why I came with you. Because you need help.” She twisted her dark hair around her finger and narrowed her eyes. “But the first thing you have to be is smart about how you handle this.”

Irritation blindsided me. “How am I not being smart? I’ve sat on this for days. Do you know how hard it is to lie beside a man you know is screwing another woman and not say anything?” My words escalated as I spoke.

Ruby’s eyes flashed sympathy. “I get it, Cricket.”

“No, you don’t,” I said, sadness edging in on my anger. But I didn’t want to be sad. I liked the edginess the deep anger brought me, along with a burning determination that made me want to do something proactive, something that said I wasn’t going to sit back and accept being cheated on. My mother’s inherited coolness dissipated as emotion washed over me. “I’m not sticking my head in the sand or taking any shit from Scott.”

Ruby’s eyes widened when I opened the car door. “Wait, where are you going?”

I slammed the car door. “I’m going”—I leaned over and grabbed the bag that held the professional digital camera Scott had bought for our trip to Alaska last summer—“to get proof, admissible or not.”

“Cricket, wait,” Ruby said, but it was too late. I strode down the sidewalk, slipping quickly along the oleander bushes lining the next drive, hoping no looky-loo out to walk his fluffball would see me. A dog barked in the backyard next to Stephanie’s house. I muttered “Crap” under my breath and jumped in a bush. A sharp branch raked my cheek.

“Shit,” I breathed, slapping a hand to the scrape.

What was I doing? I wasn’t even sure Scott was at Stephanie’s. He had left the house an hour before, saying he needed to have drinks with a client and talk about some potential deal. He could be actually doing that, and not the horizontal mambo with the tennis coach.

A piece of shrubbery tangled in my ponytail. I pushed it away, slipping my hood over my head like I should have done when I exited the car. Sweat rolled down my back as I realized I was actually hiding in the neighbors’ bushes—trespassing at that—so I could catch my husband cheating. Who had I become? Better yet, what had Scott made me?

I poked my head out and looked around at the sleepy neighborhood turning in for the night, porch lights glowing against the inky sky as cicadas sang a lullaby. The street looked pure Americana, with its manicured lawns and 1920s cottages, like it couldn’t be part of something so tawdry as adultery. Inside me determination awakened, wrapping itself around sheer bravado.

Who was I?

A woman who frickin’ deserved the truth. And there was only one way to get that—see if Scott’s truck was parked in the carport.

So I moved quickly, skirting the brick-lined flower bed of Stephanie’s next-door neighbor before peeling off and darting toward the latched fence.

Just as I lifted the latch, I heard a door open in the distance.

“Whew,” I breathed, ducking into Stephanie’s backyard, pulling the latch closed. My heart thumped in my ears as my camera pack bumped against the wooden slats.

“Oh crap,” I whispered, groping for the camera to stop the thunking.

I pressed myself to the rough wood, squeezing my eyes shut, praying I didn’t get caught trespassing. I heard a whistle and then a door slam. If my powers of deduction were correct, it had come from the house behind Stephanie’s. My sigh caught against the fence just as a set of teeth sank into my ankle.

“Ahh.” I kicked, shaking the small furball latched on to my ankle with the tenacity of a seed tick. One strong jerk and the dog flew off. The pooch yelped, scrabbled to its feet, and came back for more. High-pitched barks erupted as the five-pound Yorkie launched itself at me again.

“Get!” I hissed, swatting a hand at the beast.

The thing obviously wasn’t open to reason. It kept bouncing at me, yipping, growling, and baring tiny teeth. If I hadn’t been so panicked, I might have stopped to admire the defense the dog was mounting. I might even think it was cute.

But its teeth were razors, and the barking was way . . . too . . . much.