CHAPTER 5

NALANI

“This is the ladies room. You’re in the wrong place,” I rush out, and the man lifts his hand in a show of surrender, a charming smile appearing in his face. He stops a few feet away from me on noticing my instant panic, but that doesn’t get me to relax.

“I know. I’m sorry.” He pulls out a white handkerchief from the inside of his fitted suit and stretches it to me. “I saw you outside, and I just wanted to make sure you were okay.”

I huff, turning to the sink to fish for toilet papers because I am not accepting this stranger’s offering.

The last thing I want is for Daniel to get wind that I was alone in a bathroom with a man, accepting things behind his back, to add to how mad he already is at me.

“I am okay,” I state, facing the mirror, yet, the man still speaks.

“Why did you let those people treat you like that? I watched you all night, and I saw through everything that happened. If you need help…”

I don’t know why or how I snap. “I don’t know who you think you are or what you know, but stay out of my business. I don’t need saving, so get out.”

The man seems taken aback, not that I care, but thankfully, he heeds to my warning, and he steps away.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean any harm by it.”

He leaves his white handkerchief by the bathroom counter before he leaves me alone, and I’m by myself again.

It takes a lot of will to hold myself from breaking down into tears, but I tell myself that it was a misunderstanding, and even though Daniel could have handled things much better, he had a right to be angry.

Already feeling sour, I decide to head home instead of going back in there to party and watch Daniel smile hand in hand with Gwen.

I call a cab and go through the back of the office, and I head home.

All through the night, sleep evades me like a cure for a terminal illness, and that is because after our fight, Daniel doesn’t come home. When I wake up after a fruitless night, I spend all day thinking.

The only times when Daniel has failed to come home, he always lets me know that he’s either working overtime or away on a business trip, but I know that last night was not one of those days, for many reasons.

I try calling him throughout the day, but it always goes straight to voicemail.

If today wasn’t so important, I would have let Daniel come around in his own time, but it was.

The party at the office yesterday was just a formal show of good faith, but there was still one last hurdle to cross for this cooperation to be sealed. As CEO, Daniel was going to host a final private dinner with the director of the new partner company, Mr Keith Pierre, this evening, at our home, and while I was taking care of arrangements and bullet talking points, Daniel was supposed to be here to deliver the speech and keep up a pleasant conversation to entertain the director, Mr Keith.

It was almost time for the dinner, and he still wasn’t picking up his phone.

“Daniel, where the heck are you?” I whisper to myself, looking over the table I set for the three of us.

Shooting him a quick text, I apologize for yesterday.

[If this was about last night, I’m sorry, Daniel. We still have the private dinner with the new company’s director, and you’re nowhere to be found. Please, call me.]

My text goes through, and minutes after Daniel reads it, I still don’t get a response.

[STOP!]

That’s the single worded message I finally receive.

“Is he serious?”

I try another text, but this time, it doesn’t go through at all, because a red circle stays dancing beside it.

Frowning, I call, and instead of getting the automated voicemail message, it says the number is unavailable.

Realization sets in.

“He blocked me!?”

My eyes widen in surprise, but mostly, in panic, because our guest should be here any minute now and I have no idea how to handle it.

Out of options, I decide to call the one person who should have an idea of where Daniel is, against my will.

I call Gwen, hoping that she’ll pick up, and she does…on the first ring. But she immediately requests to switch the call to a FaceTime, and I reluctantly accept it.

At first, I see nothing, but after a few seconds of ruffling, Gwen sets her phone down beside her, in a way that it captures her upper body, along with the head of another on her chest…bare chest.

I slap a hand to my mouth, realizing that she’s naked, but I shake my head in denial. Regardless of how familiar it looks, that head has to belong to someone else. Not Daniel.

Tears rush to my eyes, held back by a thin barrier, when Gwen’s sultry voice starts. “Tell me again how much you enjoyed my body today, baby.”

I feel my ears start to ring as Daniel’s voice filters through the speaker, saying explicit things that he has never said to me before in response to Gwen.

She smiles, locking eyes with me through the camera, and I feel the barrier in front of my eyes break as tears slide down my cheeks, uncontrollably.

“And what are we going to do about that excuse of a wife of yours?” Her voice changes into that of a baby as she continues to manipulate the room.

“Don’t worry, I’m only using her for the time being. She can’t take a hint, but soon, I’ll leave her alone and be all yours. Would you like to visit Europe with me? We can spend weeks, months…whatever you want,” Daniel says, and the rest of his words blur out as I turn the phone off, disconnecting the call.

Daniel did not only lie to me about so many things for so long, but he manipulated me, and betrayed my trust in the worst way possible…something unforgivable.

I feel my heart break into a million tiny pieces, physically painful, and the bones in my legs turn to liquid, unable to hold me up anymore.

But before I can fall to the ground and break down completely, the doorbell rings.