Claustrophobia closes in, stifling me, and my breathing quickens as I hear footsteps coming from the hallway, getting closer and closer. “Martha?” Lainey calls quietly. Her voice alone stabs at my skin.
And then she appears, and my heart stops in my chest. Her already drained face loses the lasts drops of blood that were supplying color to her cheeks, and she stutters to a shocked stop. “Tyler,” she whispers, locking eyes with me. Since the second I stormed out of Sal’s office, all I wanted to do was see her. Make her face me. Force answers I deserve from her. But now she’s before me, I want to run away from her before she does any more damage. However weary she looks, though, she’s still the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.
I look away, unable to withstand the crushing feelings she spikes and of which I have no control over. Get my answers and go. Just get my answers and go.
“What are you doing here?” She lets her bag fall the small distance to the floor by her feet.
“Was it all a lie?” I ask, part of me desperate for her to say no, but the sensible part willing her to tell me yes. Yes, it was a lie. It would make hating her so much easier.
“You know it wasn’t a lie,” she says quietly.
My teeth clench and my heart hurts more, making me wish she’d answered otherwise. “Why, Lainey? Why’d you do this?”
“Tyler—”
“No,” I shout, darting my angry eyes to her face and forcing myself to look at her, if only so she can see the hurt in my eyes. “I fell in love with you. Everything about you. All of you. Just like the other fucking suckers you’ve enticed into your fucked-up clutches and screwed over.” I stagger back, dizzy with rage.
“It’s not like that.” She looks away like the coward I know she is, avoiding me. “I tried to stay away from you. You have to believe me. I didn’t want to hurt you.”
“Well, you failed miserably, Lainey.” I march over to her, pissed off she won’t look at me. “Look what you’ve done. Does it make you happy?” When she looks up reluctantly, her welling eyes don’t touch me. “Does your twisted mind relish in it?”
She snaps, shoving me back. “No,” she yells. “I don’t relish in it. It kills me. I hate myself for hurting the one man I never wanted to fucking hurt.” She hits my arm. “You were real, Tyler. Of everything in my life, you were real. Not a job. Not a fucking contract to fulfill.” Her arm swings out again to hit me as tears burst from her eyes, but I block her, knocking her aim out.
“A job?” I ask, homing in on that part of her screaming fit. “A contract?”
“Yes.” She pushes her way past me, running into the kitchen. I go after her, prepared to pin her down to get the information I need. I watch as she fetches a glass and fills it with water, downing it all before slamming it down on the counter. Her shoulders rise and fall on erratic breaths, her hands bracing themselves on the edge of the worktop. “I help women,” she murmurs to the wall before her.
“Help women do what?” I’m so fucking confused.
She turns to face me, swallowing. “I help them to expose their cheating husbands.”
I draw a blank, my eyes dropping and darting across the floor. “I don’t understand.”
“Women pay me to supply evidence against their unfaithful husbands. I lure them in, get the pictures of them cheating with me, and pass them to the wives.”
My head snaps up fast, sending a shockwave down my neck. “You’re a honeytrap?” I ask, things slowly starting to fall into place.
She nods, dropping her head in shame. “There. Now you know.”
My mind is whizzing, and I stagger over to a bar stool and sit, my legs wobbling. “And Sal?”
“Moya hired me,” she tells me.
My mouth falls open, stunned. “Moya hired you to trap Sal?” That’s crazy. Why would she do that?
“She said the best way to get close was to work for him, since he is practically married to his job.” She shrugs lamely.
I don’t believe this. It’s absurd. Moya paying someone to fuck Sal? “Does she suspect he’s been unfaithful before?”
She shakes her head. “She said things had changed at home. That he wasn’t the same anymore and she was worried he was going elsewhere.”
My stare is rooted to the worktop, my mind trying to make sense of this. “He’s not the same because the poor bloke is run ragged at home and working his fingers to the bone at work.” It’s not fair that Moya’s done this to him, especially when he’s so stressed and vulnerable. Sal’s never cheated before. I just know it, so who’s to say any of the other men Lainey’s charmed into bed have? They might be like Sal. Stressed and caught at a weak moment. And then plagued by guilt. What Lainey does is immoral. Plain wrong. “Don’t you have a conscience?” I look up at her. “All the marriages you’re ruining.”
“I’m exposing cheating arseholes. That’s all.”
“Sal’s not a cheating arsehole.” The poor bloke thinks Moya doesn’t know about his indiscretion with Lainey. He’s in pieces, battling guilt, and worrying that Moya might find out, when she probably already knows.
“I know he’s not.” Lainey walks over and tentatively takes a seat next to me. “All of my clients, the wives, know their husbands are cheating or have cheated, but they just didn’t have the proof. Women need that. The proof. It’s like confirmation that they’re not going crazy.”
Moya’s words come back to me. I feel like I’m turning into an irrational psycho.
Fucking hell, what is this mess I’m in? “You kissed him,” I grate.
“I was supposed to do a lot more than that, but I couldn’t.” Her hand comes across and takes mine. “I couldn’t do it, Tyler, because all I could think of was you. I took the job to get closer to Sal. But I liked it there. I liked you. After Sal and I—”
“Don’t say it, Lainey.” I want to vomit.
“I couldn’t go through with it. And I could see Sal was horrified by what happened. Riddled with guilt and regret. So I told Moya he didn’t take the bait. And I promised Sal I wouldn’t say a word. I just wanted to keep my job, Ty.”
“How honorable of you.”
She exhales, and silence falls as endless questions run amok in my mind.
“And the woman who turned up at the office today and gave you that stinger of a slap?” The evidence is still there, though the angry mark has settled. “She said you met her husband last night. Did you? When you told me you were seeing your sister?”
“Yes, I told you. He’s been hounding me for months. I did what she wanted me to do. I got her the pictures she needed to prove he was unfaithful, but they decided to try and fix their marriage. Then he started contacting me, telling me he was in love with me.”
I huff a little. I know how that feels. Poor fucker. “And your previous job?”
“The MP?” she questions, and I nod. “Another one of the fallen.”
“Fallen?” I’m confused, but I quickly figure it out. “Fallen in love with you. His wife hired you, too?” It’s all flowing now, all the lies and deceit and the web she weaves. The web she’s dragged me into.