Chapter 4

The attacks grew bolder. Chloe started to test the boundaries, confident in my supposed helplessness.

One afternoon, she was over for her customary "visit," her tone laced with that sickeningly sweet pity.

"You know," she began, her voice casual, "I was talking to a friend at the dance company the other day. They were saying how Louis Dubois was looking for a new principal for the Paris season."

My breath caught in my throat, but I kept my face perfectly still.

"He had someone in mind, apparently," Chloe continued, her eyes, I knew, fixed on my face, searching for a reaction. "Someone really special. But then she had... well, an unfortunate accident. Such a tragedy. Of course, the company had to move on. They couldn' t wait. I heard they found someone else, someone absolutely brilliant."

She was talking about me. She was telling me, in her cruel, roundabout way, that my dream job, the one Mark had convinced me to pass on, was gone forever. She was telling me I had been replaced.

A cold, sickening suspicion began to form in my mind. It wasn't just about Mark' s affection anymore. This felt different. Deeper. It was a professional attack. How would Chloe know such specific details? Unless... unless she or Mark were involved.

The suspicion solidified into certainty a few days later.

I was resting on the sofa in the living room, feigning sleep. I heard the front door open and close softly. It was Mark, home early. He must have thought I was deeply asleep. A few moments later, I heard the door again, even quieter this time. Chloe.

I kept my breathing slow and even, my eyes closed. I heard them whispering in the foyer.

Then, they came into the living room. I felt the couch dip as Mark sat down near my feet. Through my eyelashes, I saw him reach out and pull Chloe onto his lap.

He kissed her.

It wasn' t a frantic, secret kiss. It was slow, tender, and deeply familiar. It was the way he used to kiss me. A wave of nausea rolled through me. This was not a new, reckless affair. This was a relationship. A long-standing one.

I lay there, a silent, unseen witness to my own life' s destruction.

That was the moment my passive waiting turned into active warfare. I needed more than just the knowledge of their affair. I needed proof. Cold, hard, undeniable evidence that would destroy them both.

My new "hobby" of listening to audiobooks provided the perfect cover. I would sit in Mark' s home office for hours, headphones on, the robotic voice of the screen reader playing softly from my phone speaker. Anyone walking by would see a blind woman trying to pass the time.

But my eyes were wide open, and my fingers were flying across his keyboard.

His password was pathetically easy. My birthday. The irony was so bitter it almost made me laugh.

I started with his emails. It didn't take long to find what I was looking for. A folder, labeled "AVA_CAREER."

My heart pounded against my ribs as I clicked it open.

Inside was a history of my professional life for the past three years, all curated by my loving, supportive husband. There were emails from the Royal Ballet in London, from the New York City Ballet, from companies in Berlin and Tokyo. All of them expressing firm interest, offering auditions, some even offering contracts outright.

And for every offer, there was a reply from Mark' s account.

"Thank you for your generous offer. Unfortunately, Ava is not looking to relocate at this time. Her place is here with me."

"Ava has decided to take a step back from the demands of a principal role to focus on our life together."

"We appreciate your interest, but Ava and I have decided that her health and well-being are best served by her staying close to home."

Lie after lie after lie. He hadn't just discouraged me. He had actively, secretly, and systematically sabotaged my career. He had clipped my wings while telling me he was the wind that would help me fly. He didn't want a partner. He wanted a beautiful pet in a gilded cage.

And then I saw the emails with Chloe. They went back years. Her subtle suggestions, her "concerns" about my ambition.

"Mark, I' m worried about Ava. She' s pushing herself too hard. Maybe you should tell that London director she' s not available."

"Did you see the offer from New York? The schedule is brutal. It would be terrible for her. You should protect her from that."

It was all there. A conspiracy of two, dismantling my dreams piece by piece, all under the guise of love and protection.

I leaned back in his expensive leather chair, the glow of the monitor illuminating a truth more horrific than I could have ever imagined. The affair was a betrayal of my heart. This... this was a betrayal of my soul.

The man I had trusted with my life had been actively destroying it. The stepsister I had tried to love had been my secret enemy.

The last bit of hope, the tiny flicker that maybe, just maybe, some part of our life had been real, was extinguished. There was nothing left but ash. I sat there in the silent office, surrounded by the evidence of my own foolishness, and a cold, profound despair settled over me. It was a grief so deep it felt like death. Ava Hayes was dead. Mark and Chloe had killed her.

And from her ashes, Summer Reed was about to rise.