Chapter Two — The Secret
I barely slept.
By morning, I had convinced myself that there had to be an explanation.
There had to be.
Bradley wasn't perfect, but he wasn't cruel. At least, that was what I had always told myself.
When he finally came home, I was sitting at the kitchen table.
He stopped when he saw me.
“Stacy?”
I slid his phone across the table.
His face changed instantly.
“What is this?”
“You tell me.”
He picked up the phone and stared at the message.
Then he looked at me.
“Where did you get this?”
“Does that matter?”
His silence answered me.
I stood.
“Bradley, what happened three years ago?”
He looked away.
“It's complicated.”
I laughed bitterly.
“Everything with your mother is complicated.”
He walked toward me.
“Please. Just listen.”
“No. You listen.”
My voice trembled.
“I have spent our entire marriage feeling like I'm competing with your mother for a place in your life. Every time she called, you ran. Every time she complained, you blamed me. Every time she wanted something, my feelings became less important.”
His eyes softened.
“Stacy…”
“And now I find out there is some document with both our names on it that existed before we even met?”
Bradley sat down.
“My mother made me sign something.”
“What?”
“A financial agreement.”
I frowned.
“What kind of agreement?”
He swallowed.
“She owned the company I worked for. She told me that if I wanted to inherit it, I had to agree to certain conditions.”
“What conditions?”
He didn't answer.
My heart began pounding.
“Bradley.”
He finally looked at me.
“She made me promise that I would never allow my wife to control the family business.”
I stared at him.
“That was it?”
“No.”
His voice cracked.
“There was another condition.”
Before he could continue, the front door opened.
His mother walked inside.
She looked directly at me.
“Enough secrets,” she said.
Bradley stood.
“Mom, why are you here?”
She ignored him.
Then she placed another document on the table.
“I think Stacy deserves to know why I never wanted you to marry my son.”
I looked down.
My blood ran cold.
Because beneath the legal language was one handwritten sentence.
“If Stacy discovers what Bradley did before their wedding, she will leave him.”
I looked at Bradley.
“What did you do?”
He closed his eyes.
And whispered,
“Something I thought I was protecting you from.”
