Step one complete.
Over breakfast, Ethan was all charm. He talked about our future, our plans, completely oblivious to the fact that I was memorizing every word, filing them away for later. I played the role of the adoring wife to perfection—every laugh, every affectionate glance delivered flawlessly.
He had no idea the foundation beneath him was already crumbling.
Halfway through our meal, his phone buzzed again. He glanced at it, smirked, and set it down without responding.
“Liam wants to grab drinks later,” he said.
I tilted my head, feigning curiosity. “You two really are close, huh?”
Ethan grinned. “Always have been. He’s like a brother to me.”
I forced a laugh. “More than me?”
Ethan chuckled, reaching across the table to squeeze my hand. “Different kind of bond.”
That was all I needed to hear.
I finished my coffee, setting my cup down with a quiet clink. “You should go,” I said, keeping my voice light. “Celebrate.”
Ethan leaned back in his chair, watching me. “You’re okay with that?”
I nodded. “Of course. You should enjoy yourself.”
He didn’t need to know I had already set things in motion.
That night, as Ethan and Liam clinked their glasses together, reveling in their misplaced confidence, I was making phone calls. I had information—real, damaging information—and it was about to see the light of day.
Liam had a lot of skeletons. Ethan had even more. And soon they would both realize just how dangerous it was to underestimate me.
As I closed my laptop, I allowed myself a small smile. They thought I was a fool. They had no idea.
By the time they figured it out, it would be too late.
I watched the night unfold through my phone screen, scrolling through the images Liam had just posted. There they were—Ethan and Liam, drinks in hand, laughing like kings in a world that had never once told them no. They looked so at ease, so confident in their control over everything.
Including me.
A slow smile played on my lips. Confidence was a dangerous thing. It made people blind. It made them underestimate the quiet ones—the observers, the people who listened instead of spoke.
Ethan had spent years believing I was just his shadow—someone who followed, someone who adored, someone who would never dare disrupt the perfect little kingdom he had built for himself.
He was wrong.
I leaned back on the hotel bed, my fingers tightening around my phone as I read the messages between Ethan and Liam—ones I had pulled from Ethan’s cloud earlier that evening.
They were careless. So painfully careless.
The same man who had once whispered sweet promises into my ear was now laughing at me in texts, calling me predictable, easy to manipulate. Liam, of course, encouraged it, as if my feelings were nothing more than an afterthought.
“She’s too in love to ever leave.”
That was what Ethan had written just two weeks before our wedding.
I closed my eyes for a moment, inhaling deeply. Anger was tempting, but I needed to be smarter than that. Reckless revenge would do nothing but make me look foolish. If I was going to do this, I had to do it right.
And that meant taking everything from Ethan, piece by piece—the same way he had slowly taken my trust and turned it into a joke.
The first crack had already formed with the small transfers I had made earlier that morning, but I needed more. Something bigger. Something that would shake him to his core.
I opened a private folder on my phone and clicked on a video I had saved months ago—something I had nearly forgotten about. It was an old clip of Liam at a party, stumbling through a drunken rant about how Ethan wasn’t nearly as loyal to me as I believed.
At the time, I had brushed it off as another one of his mean-spirited jabs. Now, it was evidence.
I watched the video again, memorizing the slurred words.
“Ethan? Oh, please. That guy could charm the teeth off a wolf. You think he’s faithful? I’ve literally seen him leave bars with other girls. But hey—let’s not tell his little princess, huh? She’s too perfect to ruin with the truth.”
Perfect.
That was the word Liam had always used to describe me—but never as a compliment. It was an insult, a way to remind me that I believed in things they saw as weaknesses: love, loyalty, honesty.
I exhaled sharply.
This wasn’t just about making Ethan feel the sting of betrayal. This was about making both of them realize that the girl they had spent years underestimating was done playing their game.
Ethan’s phone buzzed on the nightstand. He had left it there, assuming I wouldn’t dare look at it.
I did.
A message from an unknown number flashed across the screen.
“Hope you made it back safe. Last night was fun 
”
The breath left my lungs in a slow, controlled exhale. My fingers tightened around the device, but my face remained expressionless.
So it wasn’t just in the past.
He was still doing it—still lying, still pretending.
I placed the phone back exactly as it was and walked to the hotel bathroom, turning on the faucet to mask the sound of my breathing. The rage threatened to bubble over, but I swallowed it down, forcing my mind to focus.
Ethan thought I was blind. Liam thought I was weak.
