Marlene Cole, who has always been a reliable nanny, has called me three times in a row out of panic today.

"I got bad news for you, Mr. Spence! The security guard of the kindergarten refuses to let Erin into the kindergarten!

"He claims that the name on the student ID is wrong! The ID belongs to a little girl named Jodie! It's not Erin's ID at all!"

I look up from the spreadsheet I'm holding, a frown already gracing my features.

"Marlene, wasn't Harper the one who gave you the ID last night?"

Marlene sounds like she's about to burst into tears from panic.

"She did! But the scanner shows that Jodie Holmes is the ID owner! The security guard says that we've gotten the wrong ID, so now he's interrogating me!"

That's odd.

Half a year ago, I've pulled a few strings just so I can enroll my daughter, Erin Spence, into Starry Kindergarten, known as the most prestigious kindergarten in the city. In fact, I have to sponsor the kindergarten 300 thousand dollars in order to secure a slot for Erin.

Over the month, my wife, Harper Gilmore, has always been the one driving Erin to school every day. Today, Harper claims that she can't take Erin to school because she needs to pull overtime shifts at her company, so she has instructed Marlene to do so.

But how is it possible that Erin's student ID now shows another name when it's Marlene's turn to take her to the kindergarten?

I calmed the nanny, Marlene Cole, down and told her to wait at the entrance with my daughter, Erin Spence. After grabbing my keys, I headed straight for the kindergarten.

At the gates of Starry Kindergarten, I took the student ID from Marlene and tapped it against the scanner.

With a beeping sound, the scanner announced, "Class 1A, Jodie Holmes."

A young girl's face flashed onto the screen. She looked incredibly familiar, but I couldn't quite place her.

An inexplicable sense of unease settled in my gut.

I dialed my wife, Harper Gilmore's number.

It rang for a long time before she finally picked up. The background was noisy.

"Hello, darling? Is everything okay? I'm just about to head into a meeting." Her voice was as gentle as ever.

"Honey, did you leave the wrong student ID at the foyer last night? Marlene tried to scan it, and it came up as a kid named Jodie Holmes," I asked, keeping my tone casual.

There was a sharp pause on the other end, then came a forced chuckle. "Oh… that. I gave a colleague a lift home yesterday. His daughter's card must have fallen out in the car, and I picked the wrong one up by mistake."

Her voice was filled with self-blame. "Just have Marlene take Erin home for the day. I'll go to the school office tomorrow and get a replacement made."

"It's fine. Don't worry about finding it. A replacement is only a few bucks," I said calmly.

"No!" Harper's voice spiked, sudden and jarring.

Realizing she had overreacted, she immediately softened her tone and said patiently, "I mean, the administration there is a nightmare. To get a new card, they require birth certificates and charge a fee. It's a total headache.

"I'll do a thorough search of the car tomorrow. I'm sure it's in there somewhere. You've got enough on your plate, darling. Don't stress over the small stuff."

Since Harper put it that way, I didn't push it. I took Marlene and Erin back home.

But once we were back, the unease wouldn't leave me. I pulled out my digital tablet.

Harper had a habit of syncing her dashcam footage to our shared cloud drive.

I pulled up the recording from yesterday morning.

The video showed Harper loading Erin into the car, but then she pulled over in front of an old neighborhood.

A well-dressed man leading a girl approached the passenger side. "Thanks for the ride again, Harper," the man said softly.

"It's nothing."

Smiling, Harper patted the girl's head. "Jodie, be a good girl at school today, okay?"

"I will! Thanks, Mommy!" the girl chirped.

Mommy?

As I stared at the screen, my blood ran cold. That single word hit me like a hammer to the temple, leaving my mind reeling and my thoughts in chaos.

Harper cheated on me? She even had an illegitimate daughter?

Shaking, I turned off the digital tablet. I couldn't bring myself to watch another second of the dashcam footage. My mind was filled with the image of the girl calling Harper "Mommy".

At 10:00 pm, Harper finally came home, looking exhausted. The moment she kicked off her shoes, I slammed the digital tablet onto the coffee table.

The screen was frozen on the exact frame where the girl was calling her "Mommy".

"Care to explain, Harper? Who is this child, and why is she calling you Mommy?" I kept my eyes locked on hers, searching for the slightest flicker of guilt.

She stiffened the moment she saw the screen. But then, to my surprise, her face softened into a look of weary, bitter resignation.

She walked over, took my hand, and took a seat beside me without a hint of hesitation. "Darling, you've misunderstood. That man is Caleb Holmes. He used to work under me in my old department. His wife died in a car accident two years ago. It's just been him and his daughter. It's heartbreaking."

She sighed, her eyes shimmering with what looked like sincerity. "The kids at school tease her for not having a mother. She's become so withdrawn and insecure. Caleb was desperate, so he begged me a dozen times to occasionally step in and play the part to give her a little confidence.

"She's the same age as Erin, and I thought they might be good playmates. I just felt sorry for them. I wanted to tell you, but I was afraid you'd take it the wrong way.

"As for the student ID, Jodie was just being playful when I dropped them off. She must have swapped it with Erin's by mistake."

Her explanation was seamless, delivered with such earnestness that I felt the tension begin to bleed out of me.

Harper had always been the charitable type, always donating to causes or helping out those in need.

Was I so burnt out from work that I'd turned paranoid?

I pulled my hand back and softened my voice. "Just promise me you'll let me know about stuff like this next time. I don't want other kids calling my wife 'Mommy'."

"You're absolutely right, darling. I'm so sorry. I swear, I'll keep my distance from them from now on. No more unnecessary acts of charity!"

Sensing that I believed her, Harper immediately leaned in and kissed me. "I'm going to take a shower. I'm exhausted."

As she walked toward the bathroom, I let out a deep sigh.

It seemed like it was just a misunderstanding.

I got up to hang up the suit she had left on the couch. Just then, her phone lit up on the coffee table.

A text notification popped up on the lock screen. It was from Sunflower Daycare. "Hello, Ms. Gilmore. This is a reminder that the monthly meal fee of 80 dollars for your daughter, Erin Spence, is now overdue. Please settle the balance as soon as possible to ensure there is no disruption to her meals tomorrow."

The faint smile on my face froze.

Erin was supposed to be at Starry Kindergarten, an elite school that cost over 100 thousand dollars a year, where the children ate meals prepared by expensive nutritionists from abroad.

Why on earth was she enrolled at some no-name daycare?

A wave of uncontrollable panic and rage surged through me.

I pulled up the dashcam app again and played the rest of the footage from that morning.

On the screen, Harper drove Jodie straight to the grand gates of Starry Kindergarten.

"Go on in, Jodie. Make sure to say hi to your teacher." Harper draped Erin's platinum-tier school ID around the girl's neck.

Then, she turned the car into a dilapidated alley a block away and pulled up in front of a place called Sunflower Daycare. The front gate was covered in rust.

When Harper turned around, the warmth on her face was gone, replaced by sharp impatience. "Erin Spence, get out. I'll pick you up tonight. And remember, don't you dare tell your dad about any of this."

Clutching her backpack, my four-year-old daughter looked timidly at the dark entrance of the daycare and whispered, "Mommy, I don't want to go in there. It smells bad, and the food is yucky—"

"Shut up! I won't spoil you! Get in there now!" Harper snapped.

Erin flinched, tears welling in her eyes.

She shakily pushed the door open and walked into that crumbling yard all by herself.

As I watched Erin's small, helpless back, I squeezed my fists until my knuckles turned white. I had to fight the urge to smash the digital tablet screen. How could Harper do this?

Erin was born premature. Her health had always been fragile. For the first three years of her life, I never let her out of my sight. And Harper dared to throw her into a place like that? This was her own flesh and blood!

I took a deep breath to force myself to stay calm.

Suddenly, an exclamation mark flashed on the screen, showing that the video file was missing.

Harper had deleted it.

That malicious woman!

Not only was she cheating, but she was using the money I earned to provide for her secret child while dumping my biological daughter in the slums.

Hearing the water running in the bathroom, I wanted nothing more than to storm in and drag her out.

But I held back.

Confronting her now would only tip her off, giving her time to hide assets or destroy more evidence.

I wasn't going to let this shameless couple get off that easy.

For the next few days, I lived a double life.

By day, I went to work as usual. I even managed to react calmly to Harper's fake displays of affection despite feeling disgusted.

Behind the scenes, I hired the best private investigator in the city to dig into Caleb's background.

I spent nights pulling every financial statement and chat log Harper had from the last few years. I even paid a specialist to recover the deleted dashcam footage.

In less than three days, a thick report landed in my inbox.

Reading through it, I let out a cold, hollow laugh.

At the very top was a DNA test result that proved that Jodie was Harper's biological daughter.

I suddenly remembered the year before we got married, when Harper insisted on going abroad for a study program and forbade me from visiting. She must have given birth then.

No wonder Jodie looked familiar. She was the spitting image of Harper as a child.

The next file made my blood boil even hotter.

It was an enrollment transfer agreement from Starry Kindergarten, and my name was boldly signed at the bottom!

Harper must have used my fingerprint while I was asleep and forged my signature to hand over a 300-thousand-dollar placement to Jodie.

But it didn't stop there. I discovered that over the last two years, Harper had siphoned nearly two million dollars from our accounts under the guise of "bad investments" and "business networking".

Every single cent of that money had gone toward a down payment on a luxury apartment for Caleb in the city center.

I backed up every piece of evidence and called my lawyer, Aiden Chapman.

"Mr. Chapman, I need a divorce agreement drafted. I want her to leave with absolutely nothing. And prepare a lawsuit. I'm suing her for embezzlement, marital asset transfer, and document forgery."