Sandpiper Way (Cedar Cove #8)(48)

Her face soured with skepticism and doubt. “Every husband who’s cheating swears he’s being faithful.” She spoke with open sarcasm. “Shall I bring out the Bible so you can swear on it?”

“Emily, please…”

“You think I don’t know the signs? Well, I’ve got them memorized and frankly, the evidence damns you.”

She sounded so knowledgeable that her unwavering certainty struck him dumb.

“You think I’m naive and stupid, don’t you?” she demanded, eyes narrowed. “I’ve read articles on the subject. All wives know. This kind of betrayal is too deep, too fundamental not to feel it, not to recognize it on a gut level. Some women choose to ignore the signs, but on a subconscious level each one knows.”

“I…”

“They say the wife’s the last to find out. Wrong. We’re the first.”

“Emily, if you’d listen—”

“No. It’s your turn to listen to me. Do you honestly believe I didn’t notice those two and three nights a week you were late? It got to be like clockwork. How stupid do you think I am?”

“It was three nights.”

“So you’re admitting an affair!”

“No.” He had a hard time getting in even one-word responses. He decided just to let her vent. When she’d finished, he’d explain.

“I didn’t think so. You’re going to try and talk your way out of this. But I won’t pretend any longer, Dave. If you want a divorce, you can have one. I’m through.”

Nothing could have shocked him more. “I don’t want a divorce! If you’d give me a chance, I could—”

She cut him off yet again. “Of course you don’t want a divorce. It wouldn’t look good on your pastoral résumé to say you’re a divorced father of two, now, would it?”

“Emily, stop! This is crazy.”

Tossing aside the covers, she rose onto her knees. “I’m not going to stop! There’s a lot of anger stored up inside me. I’m ready to explode with it. How dare you embarrass me in front of my family and friends! Even my mother said she thought something wasn’t right.”

“You talked to your mother about this?” It was all he could do not to groan out loud.

“Does that surprise you?”

It did, and it humiliated him even further. “You shared your suspicions with your mother and not with me?” That hurt. It hurt more than the fact that she’d brought her doubts to his mother-in-law.

“At first, I didn’t want to know,” Emily said. “No wife cares to admit that her husband’s involved with someone else. According to the articles I read, that’s common.”

“Emily,” he began forcefully. “I’m saying it again, and it’s the truth. I am not having an affair.”

She rolled her eyes toward the ceiling, her arms still crossed, blocking him out. “Right,” she muttered with more than a hint of sarcasm.

“I took a part-time job.”

Her arms fell to her sides as she studied him, her eyes puzzled. Confused. Dave met her gaze full on, not flinching.

“A…job?” she asked after a moment.

“I’m working at First National Bank as a security guard after hours, three nights a week.” He’d considered it the perfect solution. He was inside the building ninety-nine percent of the time, so no one saw him. Very occasionally, he filled in for someone else, like the afternoon he’d gone to Olivia’s house. Normally, though, he did swing shift, from four to ten. Not much was asked of him, other than to watch a series of television monitors. It was a position created after a series of break-ins in the area. He didn’t carry a gun, just a radio.

Emily’s mouth sagged open as she weighed the viability of his explanation.

Dave could see her wondering whether to believe him, wondering whether this was another lie, like so many others.

“Why…why would you do that?” she asked in a quavering voice.

This was the most difficult part of his confession. Before he could explain, she came up with her own reasoning.

“Are you a gambler, Dave?”

Dave was beginning to get irritated. “How can you ask me something like that?” Despite his best efforts, he couldn’t keep the anguish out of his voice. “Don’t you know me at all, Em? Have I destroyed everything because I wanted you to have this house you love so much?”

In the blink of an eye, her expression went from suspicion to shock. “The…house?”

“It was a financial stretch when we signed the papers.”

“But I thought…I assumed…”

“And I let you,” Dave said, not allowing her to finish. He was the one to blame. Little did he realize at the time that he’d set them up for financial ruin. Emily had wanted the house and Dave wanted her to have it. He handled all the finances, paid the bills. Every month he gave Emily a budget and she did a masterful job of keeping their living expenses within it.

“Do you mean to say we can’t afford this house?” she asked.

His heart in his throat, Dave lowered his head, unable to meet her eyes. “The mortgage broker managed to get the payments within reach, with the understanding that they’d increase every six months.” As it was, their budget had been strained to the breaking point and then, six months out, the mortgage company had hit him with the first increase.