Seven Years, A Four-Year Lie

The first clue my life was a lie was a moan from the guest room. My husband of seven years wasn't in our bed. He was with my intern.

I discovered my husband, Brendan, was having a four-year affair with Kiya-the talented girl I was mentoring and personally paying tuition for.

The next morning, she sat at our breakfast table in his shirt while he made us pancakes. He lied to my face, promising he'd never love another, just before I learned she was pregnant with his child-a child he'd always refused to have with me.

The two people I trusted most in the world had conspired to destroy me. The pain wasn't something I could live with; it was an annihilation of my entire world.

So I made a call to a neuroscientist about his experimental, irreversible procedure. I didn't want revenge. I wanted to erase every memory of my husband and become his first test subject.

Chapter 1

Ellery POV:

The first clue that my life was a lie came not as a shout, but as a muffled moan from the guest room down the hall.

I blinked my eyes open, the digital clock on my nightstand glowing a soft, mocking 2:14 AM. The space beside me in our king-sized bed was cold. Empty. Brendan wasn' t there.

A knot of unease tightened in my stomach. He' d been working late for months, his tech empire demanding more and more of his time, but he always, always came to bed. Even if it was just to kiss my forehead and whisper that he was heading back to his home office, he always checked on me first.

I sat up, the silk sheet pooling around my waist. The house was still, wrapped in the deep silence of our secluded cliffside property. And then I heard it again. A low, feminine giggle, quickly shushed.

My heart hammered against my ribs, a frantic, trapped bird. It couldn' t be. Not in my house. Not in our home.

I slid out of bed, my bare feet silent on the cool hardwood floor. I didn' t turn on the lights. I moved like a ghost through the familiar shadows of the life I thought we had built. The hallway was a long, dark tunnel leading to a truth I wasn' t sure I could face.

As I drew closer to the guest room door, the voices became clearer. His voice, deep and familiar, a voice that had once saved my life and had promised to love me forever. And another voice. A younger voice, breathy and eager.

"Brendan, stop," she whispered, but her tone was playful, encouraging. "She' ll hear us."

My blood ran cold. She. I was she. The obstacle. The afterthought in my own home.

"She' s a heavy sleeper," Brendan murmured back, his voice thick with a desire I hadn' t heard in months. "Besides, she' s exhausted. She was in the studio all day."

The casual way he spoke