DISCOVERY

ONE

PENELOPE

"When exactly are you going to give birth to a child, Penelope?"

My chest tightened.

I turned away from the stove to take a look at my husband, Duke.

He pushed his breakfast plate away from him with disgust on his face.

“Didn't you hear me?” He demanded after a soft tsk sound.

I said nothing.

Only watching him.

He had that look on his face.

The one where his eyes were somewhere far away instead of right there.

One that had nothing to do with me.

I took a deep breath.

"Duke, I thought we have been through this already?" I asked quietly.

He leaned back in his chair.

"Have we?" He asked.

I watched as he curled his brows.

"Haven't we?" I inquired.

"You tell me Penelope," he added.

His arms folded across his chest.

I swallowed in preparation for exactly what I knew would follow next.

"Nothing has changed, Penelope. It's been two years—two years and still nothing."

I set down the spatula.

"I am trying, Duke," I started to say in a shaky voice. "You know for a fact I am."

His voice was flat when he spoke.

"Trying is not enough."

I let out a soft sigh.

He hadn't always been like this.

I wondered when exactly he changed.

A year ago?

Six months?

I couldn't tell.

The details were all blurry in my head.

"Penelope."

There was a small pause.

In that time I realized I have begun to hate the way he called my name.

Something I didn't do two years ago.

He leaned forward.

"My father built everything that I have now for a good reason."

Not like I doubted that.

"There has to be someone I can pass all of it on to when the time is right for that you know?" He continued to explain.

"You will Duke. There's still time. The doctors said I shou—"

He cut me off immediately.

"I need an heir, not your excuses."

My eyes widened.

The sentences landed on me with the weight of a freight truck.

My brain instantly froze like I was a machine that had stopped working properly.

"Give me a child soon Penelope or you will have yourself to blame," he said.

Something started to rise in me.

"So what am I to you now?" I asked. "Just someone who has failed a job?"

He shook his head slowly.

"I did not say that," he snapped before he abruptly stood to his feet.

The sound of the chair dragging against the tiles infuriated me more than he did.

"You did not have to."

He said nary a word to me.

My eyes followed as he grabbed his jacket from the back of the chair.

"I have a meeting in thirty minutes. We will talk later," he added as he pushed his arms into the sleeves without as much as a glance at me.

My brows furrowed.

"You always say that."

But he was already walking out.

The front door closed behind him and the whole apartment became quiet.

I stood there for a moment after he was gone and let the silence calm me.

My breath which had initially quickened from the rising anger started to quell.

And when I was better, I went forward and began to clear the table of the uneaten breakfast I had painstakingly made him.

The minute anger left in me was evident in the way I stacked the plates.

I carried them to the sink before I began to wipe down the table slowly.

The napkin in my hand was moving from one end to the other when I saw it.

His phone.

The device he had left behind was sitting face down near the edge of the table.

I was about to ignore it when it started to vibrate against the formica table.

My hands began to reach for it but my common sense dissuaded me.

I had no reason to see anything.

My attention returned to the napkin and it began moving over the table.

It was clean now.

But, I was still angry, and I needed an outlet for all of which was simmering in me.

When I was done, I finally picked up the device to put it aside for him.

The screen lit up on its own.

[Tally Bear: 2 new messages]

I should have put it down.

I knew that.

I stood there and told myself to put it down and go finish washing the dishes.

But my hand did not move.

Tally Bear.

For some reason that name caused every one of my six senses to activate.

My gut feeling was never wrong.

I pressed the home button.

His screen lock was a six digit code.

I typed in our wedding anniversary without even thinking about it.

The phone opened.

My fingers scrolled to the messages app and I took a deep breath and exhaled before I opened the thread.

[Good morning baby. I miss you already. Last night was everything.]

Who on earth was this Tally Bear?

I held the phone, standing there, contemplating whether to put it away.

After all, it was better if whatever was in that chat never came to light.

But Curiosity? It ate away at me like a snail chewing on a layer of cabbage.

I couldn't hold back.

And so I scrolled up, going through the thread which was rather long.

The messages in the chat went back to two three months, maybe even longer.

The participants, Duke and Tally bear, were easy with each other and comfortable.

It was like two people who had known each other a long time and had nothing to hide.

A strange feeling began to spread through my chest as I read the love messages.

My husband was cheating.

The realization washed over me hard and brought an indescribable feeling.

Not pain exactly—mayhap that numbness in the moment before pain eventually arrives.

My jaw fell open with each word that my eyes consumed on the screen.

Tears slowly began to blur my sight as I started to put the phone away.

It vibrated in my hands.

Another message.

I wiped the tears away from my eyes and looked down at the message.

It was a video this time.

My thumb hovered over it and I hesitated for a minute before I pressed play.

The room was dim in the video but I could see everything clearly enough.

I recognised Duke's shoulders first before I even heard his voice—low and lazy.

It was the same voice he used to use with me when our marriage had been good.

My jaw fell as the camera angle shifted, moving lower to show him on the bed.

He was naked, spread out on the bed like a prize.

His dick was hard and waiting.

The camera stilled.

It dawned on me that it had possibly mounted on a tripod or a selfie stick for a purpose.

And then, the person behind the camera came into view, climbing into bed.

Her back view was all I saw.

She had dark hair and she was laughing softly at something he had said.

"You want me to ride that dick mister, don't you?" She asked, palming Duke's cock.

That voice struck me as familiar.

"What else would we be here for, hmm?" He asked, a soft groan leaving his lips.

"Say please and I'll sit on it."

"Please," he implored her.

My ears stood at the word.

Duke, my husband of two years, was begging for sex like a simp.

The world began to revolve before my very eyes.

My tight grip on the edge of the formica table was the only thing keeping me steady against all of the odds.

"Finished man," she teased him.

He chuckled lightly.

"Who wouldn't be for you?"

She raised her body and settled on his cock.

"Fuckkkkkkk," Duke moaned deeply as her pussy swallowed his cock easily.

"Oh, we fit so well together, don't we?" She purred and turned towards the camera.

A gasp left my lips.

I knew her face.

It was Thalia.

Marcus's widow.

His late best friend's wife.

The same woman Duke had held in his hands while she cried at her husband's funeral fourteen months ago.

"Ride me baby," Duke growled as he gripped her ass hard, lifting her high and bringing her down against his cock.

"Yesssss..."

Both moaned like starved sluts.

Dogs in heat.

My heart started to constrict inside of my chest, threatening to cave in under the emotional pressure.

I watched them go at it until I could not stomach any bit of it anymore.

My fingers swiped out of the video as the tear started to cascade down my cheeks.

A new message came in right after.

[Don't you miss this?]

I read it twice.

My hands were shaking like a brown leaf in autumn as I put the phone down.

Then I slowly lowered my trembling body into one of the chairs before I fell.

And I was quick to understand something that would change every single thing.

The dates in every one of those messages did not even start after the funeral.

Whatever this thing was, it had started way before her husband had died.

Long before I had ever dreamed of walking down the aisle with Duke.

And even before me.