Female Novel
Chapter 7
Chapter 7 Looking for Evidence
I had almost finished preparing the food when Matthew returned with our daughter. Ava ran in,exclaiming in her sweet and childish voice, “Mommy, I’m back! Daddy picked me up!”
Her adorable voice brought tears to my eyes, but I suppressed my emotions. “I got you somepineapples. They’re your favorite, right?”
“Oh! Mommy, you’re the best! I can’t wait to eat them” She ran out and headed to Matthew, saying,“Daddy, I want to eat pineapples!”
“You can have a small piece for now. You can have more after dinner, okay?” Matthew washed hishands and took a small piece to hand to our eager little girl. Then he squeezed into the tiny kitchen andhugged me from behind. “Why did you make so much food?”
I felt terrible because this once-happy family of three was now on the verge of collapsing.
“You just came back from a business trip. You must be tired.” I forced a smile and asked, “Were youbusy today?”
He hummed a reply, and my heart immediately sank. I playfully nudged him with my elbow. “Set thetable and get ready for dinner.”
His intimate attempts made me sick. I wondered if he thought of the other woman whenever he heldme. When I finished cooking, I smiled and asked, “Do you want a drink? It’s been a while, and I want aglass of wine.”
Mathew looked at me questioningly. “Why do you suddenly want to drink?”
“No reason. Are you still going out?” I asked as I turned to get the wine. “Since I made so many dishes,we need to celebrate.”
I felt my heart shattering into a million pieces as I spoke. I knew Matthew couldn’t handle alcohol well,so I poured him a little to avoid arousing suspicion. Then I poured myself half a glass and toasted withhim.
Once we started drinking, we became excited and talkative. I pretended to be in high spirits as Ireminisced about our college days, starting the business, and our current life. I seemed so happy.
Matthew noticed how cheerful I was and poured himself another glass of wine while reminding me notto drink too much. Ultimately, he drank more than he could handle. He was drunk when I helped himonto the bed.
Afterward, I washed up and put Ava to bed before beginning my mission. My heart was pounding as itwas my first time looking through his things in so many years. I finally realized how foolish I was to trusthim.
I searched through his pockets and bag but found nothing valuable.
Finally, I found his phone, but it had a fingerprint lock. I quietly approached him, trying to grab his hand,but he suddenly turned and caught me, staring at me with unfocused eyes. My heart was about to jumpout of my chest.
“I need water,” he slurred at me.
I ran out to pour him a glass of water and fed it to him. Then he collapsed back onto the bed, fastasleep. I unlocked and looked through his phone but found no suspicious names in the call history. Irecognized most of them, and it seemed like very few were female, so I ruled them out.
Then I checked his WhatsApp only to realize he hadn’t been messaging many people. I opened theconversation of the first contact and saw the message from the day he returned.novelbin
“Did she find out?”
It was just those four words with no additional information. It didn’t seem like Matthew hadn’t deletedanything, either. I clicked on the woman’s profile picture and wanted to see her posts, but there werenone.
I couldn’t find any clues about who the sender was. It seemed like this person was cautious. Matthewtold me it was Melanie, but I needed to verify it.
His photo albums included pictures of Ava and me and two of Melanie. Besides that, his phone wasclean. I even scanned the phone with an app, but nothing suspicious was there too. I tossed and turnedthat night, wondering how there could be no traces.
I figured the woman wasn’t someone from the company or the building. Otherwise, the receptionistwouldn’t have called her “Mrs. Murphy.”
I wondered who that other woman was or if I’d ever interacted with her.