And the note on the file read,

“I'll always be your safety net.”

I stared at the screen. I don't know how long I sat there.

From the day Sean and I married until now, I had run the household for him, cared for his parents, smoothed over every tangle with the relatives.

Even I had nearly forgotten I was once a pilot.

A tear dropped onto the back of my hand, and I lifted it to wipe the wetness away.

So it turned out he wasn't incapable of tenderness. He'd just never once thought to catch me when I fell.

I closed the file, shut the laptop, and drove straight to the company.

“Mr. Fox, I heard the foreign airlines are short-staffed. Are they still looking for pilots?”

“I'm hoping you'll give me a chance. I want to fly international routes.”

Joshua Fox's eyes lit up.

“Delilah, you handled that accident so well back then. All these years you never once brought up flying again, so I assumed you'd given it up.”

“If you're willing to go, then it's not too late to start over now.”

Back home, I started packing.

This house meant nothing to me anymore.

The only thing I wanted to take with me was the memories of Cassie.

In all my years married to Sean, the one thing I never regretted was giving birth to Cassie.

She had been such a good girl from the start. On her first day of preschool, worried I'd fret over her, she'd asked her teacher to take a whole batch of photos to send me.

Later she grew up, school kept her busier and busier, and the photos grew far fewer.

Last year for her birthday, we'd planned to go skiing as a family.

But Sean said he had a tough case to fight and no time.

Cassie wrapped her arms around my neck and kissed me, comforting me,

“Mommy, it's okay. Daddy's not coming, but Cassie has you, and that's enough.”

I held her and said yes, and up on the mountain we took so many photos.

In them, Cassie was so vivid, so lovely. Afterward I saved every one of those photos onto a USB drive.

But when I pulled open the drawer, I found the box that held the USB drive empty.

Remembering that Sean had come in here earlier, I was about to reach out to him.

Then I saw a video Myra had posted on her feed.

“Sweetheart, this USB drive has so much space, plenty of room for lots of the baby's photos!”

“Later we'll put all my prenatal chart and ultrasound scans on it too. I even booked a maternity photo shoot, so we'll save those negatives on it as well.”

So Sean had gone to the hospital to keep Myra company.

In the video, Myra leaned against Sean's shoulder, pointing at the screen and smiling like a newlywed wife eager for the child on the way.

But I recognized it at once: the USB drive they were using was the very one I'd used to store Cassie's photos.

When I reached the hospital, I saw Sean peeling shrimp for Myra.

Sean had a severe shellfish allergy.

At every family gathering, he'd wave the nanny over in disgust to take the whole plate of shrimp away.

When I was pregnant and craving it, I ordered a plate of spicy shrimp.

He watched me finish it, said nothing, and then in the middle of the night walked out of the house with his briefcase in hand.

He told me he had a flight to catch that night.

So it turned out that, from start to finish, it had always been different.

Myra saw me and shrank back under the covers in fright, explaining pitifully,

“Delilah, I'm on an IV, it's hard to manage, so Sean was just helping me. Please don't blame him.”

“Sweetheart, Delilah just can't do without you. See? She came all this way.”

“Besides, she's got nothing to her name now. If you weren't taking care of her, how could she wear such nice clothes, live in that gorgeous penthouse? Chasing after you this fast—she really is a parasite vine.”

“I could never drape myself over a man and feed off him like that. So all I can do is carry everything on my own!”

Sean tucked the edge of the blanket down around her, his eyes full of tenderness.

“Yes. No one's stronger than you, Myra.”

Sean looked over at me, and there was nothing in his eyes but helplessness.

"Lila, since you're already here, drop all that talk about divorce."

"You drive home first. Myra's pregnancy is unstable and she needs to stay in for a few days. I'll be here at the hospital looking after her."

Watching the two of them, all I felt was nausea.

Playing brother and sister, while carrying on an affair, and a pregnancy.

I looked at Myra, my voice cutting.

"Myra, you've got the nerve to seduce a man, so why did you also make my husband steal my USB drive?"

"What is this, your special talent? Being a professional mistress?"

The two nurses pushing open the ward door stared at Myra, aghast.

"So you two aren't married. Then isn't it inappropriate for this gentleman to be staying overnight..."

"And I actually thought they were a devoted couple. I even praised him for knowing how to take care of his wife. Turns out he brought his pregnant mistress to the hospital?"

Myra froze on the spot, her eyes flooding with tears in an instant.

The two nurses hurriedly swapped in the new IV bottle and left the ward with their tray.

Myra immediately threw herself into Sean's arms, sobbing until she couldn't speak.

"Sean, Lila is humiliating me on purpose!"

"I only kept that USB because it had a lot of storage. I wanted to make more records of the baby, that's all. You bought her so many USB drives, why does she have to curse at me like this?"

"Those two are my new coworkers. I just started at this hospital. How is everyone going to talk about me behind my back now?"

Sean patted her back gently, the flame in his eyes flaring up.

"Lila, I'm the one who gave the drive to Myra. What are you losing your temper at her for? These things are everywhere. Do you have to blow it so far out of proportion?"

"Besides, the pictures on it were blurry and ugly anyway. Keeping them was a waste. Just take new ones later, problem solved."

"It's not case files. How important could it be?"

Sean's words came off completely indifferent, his gaze contemptuous.

Beyond furious, I struck at his face, my accusation almost a cry of despair.

"Important, of course it's important! I can never take another picture of Cassie again!"

"When you were with your precious sister showing off her ultrasound scan in the family group chat, ignoring my calls and telling me to leave the group, Cassie was already gone!"

Sean shoved Myra away and suddenly stood up, staring at me, dumbfounded.

"How is that possible? How could Cassie..."

Before Sean could finish, Myra suddenly rolled off the hospital bed.

"Lila, how could you push me?"

"It's just a USB drive. I'll buy one myself. Here, take it back!"

She scrambled up off the floor and flung the drive from the cabinet. It landed in the trash can in the corner.

"How could Cassie be gone? I saw her outside the preschool just yesterday!"

"A woman like you, cursing your own daughter over jealousy. You'd love to strap a monitor on your husband, wouldn't you? How low can you get!"

The trash can was full of filth.

Fluid dripping from a discarded syringe fell onto the drive. Not a single one of the pictures Cassie left behind was left.

The rage and pain twisting together in my chest nearly swallowed me whole.

I walked to the bedside and seized Myra by the collar.

My other hand rose to strike her across the face.

Then someone gripped my wrist, and Sean shoved me away.

My forehead cracked against the cabinet, the sound landing heavy in the silent ward.

I pressed a hand to my forehead and got to my feet, blood seeping down between my fingers, staring at Sean in shock.

My condition startled him, and he looked back at me, thrown.

But the moment his eyes landed on the IV needle feeding blood back into Myra, the surprise in them drained away, leaving only disgust and judgment.

"Delilah, what gives you the right to hit Myra? What did she say that was wrong? How did you turn into this, spinning lie after lie, consumed by jealousy, without a shred of the diligence and kindness you had back when you were a pilot?"

"You even used Cassie's death to blackmail me. Don't forget, you've still got a child in your belly. Can't you act like a mother at all?"

"Apologize, or crawl back home. Your choice!"

I dug out the USB drive and left the hospital. Outside, rain came down in sheets, and I had no choice but to walk all the way home.

Water had gotten into the drive in my palm. Back home, I dried it off and plugged it into the computer again.

It was the only way I had left to remember Cassie.

But now, there was nothing. The drive was blank.

I stared at the screen for a long time.

Before I walked away, I ought to make Sean understand exactly who had been lying all along.

At dawn, a sharp sting jolted me awake.

I opened my eyes to see Sean dabbing the blood at the corner of my forehead with a cotton swab.

He looked at me with tender concern.

"Does it hurt a lot?"

"I'm sorry, I lost control today. But Myra didn't do anything wrong."

"You're her sister-in-law. How could you talk about her like that in front of outsiders? Her body was never as strong as yours. It wasn't easy for her to get pregnant."

I pushed his hand away.

"What are you trying to say?"

There was a flicker of expectation in Sean's eyes as he looked at me.

"Her birthday's tomorrow. She's planning to treat all her colleagues to dinner. I want you to come with me."

"You'll apologize to her. Just say you were under a lot of mental strain, that you misread the situation and misunderstood her, and that everything else you said was made up."

"Aren't you on good terms with your boss? While you're at it, arrange for your company's employee health checks to be done at Myra's hospital."

A wave of nausea spread through my whole body. I forced down my anger and pressed him.

"Sean, are you sure you want to do this?"

He set the swab down, his tone even.

"Myra's emotionally fragile right now. If you're going to apologize, you need to show some sincerity. Think of it as a gift from both of us to her and the baby."

"Didn't Cassie always want a family portrait? Once this is over, we'll go take one right away."

I stared at that familiar face for a long while, but I could no longer find the man he used to be.

After a moment, I answered.

"Fine. I'll do it."

Sean bent down to kiss me, but his private ringtone cut him off.

I rolled over and looked out the window. Sean pushed the door open and hurried out.

Not long after, my phone started buzzing with one text after another.

"Delilah, don't you ever get tired?"

"Leaning on the fact that you're pregnant, playing the victim to make him pity you. You think Sean still cares about you? If it weren't for the Sawyer seed in your belly, he'd have thrown you out ages ago!"

"Oh, and by the way, you probably don't know this. He even booked a custom world tour for me and the baby."

I stared at the words on the screen, gripping the phone tight.

Once, I would have blown up at Sean and demanded the truth.

But now, all I felt was how pathetic Myra was.

I called her directly.

"So what? My child is the one every Sawyer acknowledges. Do you really think Sean's parents would let a foundling's child by Sean set foot in that house?"

"If word got out about you and Sean, how do you think the Sawyers would see you? Would Sean still want you then?"

Myra went silent for a long time. I let out a scoff.

"So you should understand. As long as I have two children tying Sean to me, he'll never leave me."

"He likes to run around out there? Fine, let him have his fun. But there will never be a day when his wife isn't in his eyes."