Adrian
The message arrived on a weekday afternoon, buried between updates from council security and a memo from the estate staff.
I hadn’t expected anything unusual—my life lately was a predictable cycle of work, guilt, and distance—but the moment I saw the unknown number flash across my screen, a tightening sensation gripped my chest.
I shouldn’t have opened it. I knew better. Anonymous messages rarely carried anything useful. But curiosity had become a disease in me, a quiet ache that refused to fade.
I tapped the notification.
“Your wife is not as faithful as you believe.”
Six simple words.
Six words that froze the air in my lungs.
For a full minute I just stared at the message, unable to move, unable to breathe properly. My first instinct was anger—hot, immediate, irrational. Someone was trying to provoke me.
Someone wanted to shake me, destabilize me. I deleted political threats weekly, endured veiled warnings from rivals, ignored gossip designed to undermine my marriage.
But this—this was different.
This was personal.
This was targeted.
I exhaled sharply and muttered under my breath, “What kind of pathetic tactic is this?”
Still, the words clung to me.
“Not as faithful as you believe.”
I scoffed into the empty office, as if the sound alone could banish doubt. “Impossible,” I whispered. “It’s absurd. Serafina would never—”
But my voice betrayed me. It wavered, thin and uncertain.
A knot formed in my throat. I leaned back in my chair, rubbing a hand across my jaw. “Someone is trying to manipulate me,” I insisted quietly, as if saying it aloud would make it truth. “Someone wants me distracted. Weak. Paranoid.”
My phone buzzed again.
A second message.
“Look closer. She hides more than you think.”
My pulse skipped painfully. The air in the office thickened. Suddenly the room felt too small, the walls too close, the silence too loud.
I slammed my phone face-down on the desk. “Enough.”
I stood abruptly, pacing the room as adrenaline surged through my veins. I knew how this game worked. Political enemies used personal insecurities to destabilize alliances. They whispered lies until the lies became doubts. And doubts became fractures.
But Serafina? Serafina—the woman who commanded rooms with her presence, whose loyalty was a fortress, who carried our family with iron strength? She would not betray me. She couldn’t. She was too honorable. Too principled. Too committed to the life we built.
Wasn’t she?
My jaw tightened.
A memory surfaced—her distant expression at breakfast, the way she’d withdrawn her hand when I flinched, the way her eyes had held a kind of restrained sorrow.
Another memory followed—her late nights at the study, the excuses, the moments she slipped away with a quietness that felt… off.
“No,” I said sharply, shaking my head. “She’s overwhelmed. She has responsibilities. That’s all.”
But the seed had already been planted.
Paranoia sprouted like a crack in glass.
Look closer.
I picked up my phone, rereading the messages despite knowing better. My mind began assembling patterns where previously I had seen nothing. Every subtle change in her behavior over the last few weeks… the distance between us… the exhaustion in her eyes… the hesitation in her words… the way she had touched me gently, carefully, as though afraid of breaking something fragile between us.
A sickening thought twisted through me: Was she pulling away… because she felt guilty?
I slammed the idea down immediately. “No. She would tell me. She always tells me.”
But did she?
Lately, Serafina had been locked behind a composure I couldn’t penetrate. When she smiled, it didn’t quite reach her eyes. When she spoke, her tone carried weight I didn’t understand. When I asked if she was all right, she offered polished reassurances that felt too smooth, too practiced.
And she had secrets—everyone did in our world—but lately hers felt unreachable.
The office door opened quietly.
“Adrian?” Serafina’s voice drifted in—soft, warm, familiar. The sound that once grounded me now made my heart lurch with an emotion I didn’t want to name.
I turned, masking everything behind a neutral smile. “Everything all right?”
She stepped inside, closing the door gently behind her. “I was going to ask you the same. You left breakfast early. I didn’t see you at lunch. And you look…” She paused, searching my face. “Troubled.”
I forced a laugh, casual, dismissive. “Just work. Nothing unusual.”
Her brow furrowed. “That’s what you always say lately.”
“It’s true,” I replied, stepping past her to gather a stack of documents. I needed something to do with my hands, something that made me appear composed. “There’s nothing to worry about.”
“Adrian,” she said softly, blocking my path by placing one hand gently on the documents, preventing me from moving. “Look at me.”
I hesitated.
When our eyes met, hers searched me with an intensity that made the paranoia twist deeper. I saw worry. Concern. Fatigue.
But guilt?
I couldn’t tell.
“Tell me what’s going on,” she urged. “You’re pulling away. You barely sleep, you barely talk to me. If something is wrong—”
“Nothing is wrong,” I snapped, louder than intended.
She recoiled slightly, hurt flickering across her face before she hid it with practiced grace. “All right,” she whispered, stepping back. “If you say so.”
The space between us widened like a wound.
She left quietly.
She always left quietly now.
When the door closed, I sank into my chair, running both hands over my face. “What am I doing?” I whispered. “Why am I even letting this get to me?”
Because I was losing control.
Losing her.
Losing myself.
I picked up the phone again. The messages waited, taunting me, poisoning me.
“Your wife is not as faithful as you believe.”
I exhaled shakily. “Who sent this?”
I typed a response—
Who is this? Tell me what you know.
I hovered over the send button.
Then deleted the draft.
No. I wouldn’t give them the satisfaction.
I threw the phone aside, but even without looking at it, the words continued scraping against the inside of my skull.
Serafina. Faithful. Not faithful. Look closer.
I leaned forward, burying my face in my hands. My stomach churned. My heart pounded. My thoughts spiraled.
“I trust her,” I whispered. “I trust her.”
But the crack had already formed.
And once a crack appears—
it spreads.