Chapter 1 - The Mark of a Traitor
I stood frozen by the edge of the crystal blue water,
the screams of happy children fading into a dull roar in my ears.
My daughter,
my innocent Chloe,
was still pointing her small finger at the woman who had helped raise me.
The sun was blinding,
reflecting off the surface of the pool,
but nothing was as bright as the ink I saw on Eleanor’s skin.
It wasn't just a random design,
or a floral pattern that any woman might choose.
Hidden beneath the side of her navy swimsuit,
partially revealed as the fabric stretched and shifted,
was a tattoo I knew by heart.
It was a hyper-realistic image of a human eye,
and inside the pupil,
the letter 'J' was etched in elegant,
flowing script.
My breath hitched in my chest,
feeling like a physical weight was pressing down on my lungs.
Julian had that exact same tattoo on his own ribs,
placed there three years ago on our anniversary.
He had told me it was my eye,
a symbol that he would always be looking out for me,
and that the 'J' stood for our shared life.
But looking at Eleanor,
I realized the eye on her body didn't belong to me.
It was his eye,
Julian’s piercing blue gaze,
permanently marked onto my stepmother’s flesh.
"Eleanor,"
I whispered,
my voice cracking like dry parchment.
"Turn around."
She didn't move,
her hand clutching the towel with such force her knuckles turned white.
"Turn around right now!"
I screamed,
the sound tearing through the festive atmosphere of the party.
The music stopped,
someone turned off the speaker,
and the only sound left was the splashing of a few kids who didn't understand the gravity of the moment.
Julian was motionless by the grill,
the smoke from the charcoal rising around him like a funeral pyre.
He looked like a ghost,
his skin a sickly shade of grey,
his eyes darting toward the gate as if calculating a path for escape.
"Is that him?"
I asked,
walking slowly toward the pool steps.
"Is that my husband's mark on your body?"
Eleanor finally turned,
her face a mask of calculated coldness that replaced her initial shock.
She didn't try to hide it anymore,
dropping the towel as if the secret was too heavy to carry.
There it was,
in the harsh light of the afternoon sun.
Julian's eye,
staring back at me from the side of the woman my father had loved.
"Mommy, why is Daddy on her?"
Chloe asked,
her voice small and trembling as she hugged my leg.
I couldn't answer her,
because my world was currently shattering into a million jagged pieces.
I looked at Julian,
the man I had slept next to for six years,
the man I thought was my soulmate.
He dropped the tongs,
the clatter of metal against stone sounding like a gavel bringing a sentence down.
He didn't deny it,
he didn't make an excuse,
he just looked at Eleanor with a terrifying sense of longing that made me want to vomit.
The betrayal wasn't just a moment,
it was a physical presence in the yard,
choking the air out of the summer day.
"How long?"
I managed to choke out,
staring at them both.
Eleanor stepped out of the water,
the droplets running down her skin and over the tattoo.
"Longer than you've been married, Sarah,"
she said,
May you like
her voice devoid of any guilt.
The nightmare had only just begun.
