HIS SECRET BARGAIN

The Proof

“Your husband is sleeping with my wife.”

The words hit me harder than a slap. Water sprayed from my mouth onto the tablecloth. I stared at the man sitting across from me, certain I had heard wrong.

Xavier Kane did not look like a man who joked.

“Excuse me?” My voice came out thin.

He leaned back in his chair, gray eyes flat. “Nathan and Lila. Eight months.”

I laughed. It sounded broken even to me. “That’s impossible. Nathan would never—”

“He did.”

“No.” I shook my head hard. “Lila is my best friend. She cried at my wedding. She calls me every day. Nathan loves me. You’re wrong.”

Xavier didn’t argue. He just watched me with that same cold, tired expression. Like he had already accepted something I refused to believe.

“I said the same thing about Lila,” he said quietly. “Three months ago I still believed her.”

My chest tightened. Lila. The woman who had been my sister in everything but blood. The one who held my hand through every fight with Nathan and told me I was lucky.

“This is a mistake,” I said. “People make up stories all the time. Maybe you’re angry at her and—”

“Sit down, Aria.”

I hadn’t realized I was standing. My chair scraped loudly against the floor. Something in his voice made me sink back into the seat.

He slid his phone across the table.

I didn’t want to look. My fingers trembled as I reached for it anyway.

The screen showed a dark booth in a private club. Dim lights. Two people who should never have been that close. Nathan’s hand was on the back of Lila’s neck. Her head was tilted up toward him the way she only ever looked at me when she was laughing.

I shoved the phone away. “That could be anyone.”

“Scroll.”

I didn’t want to. I scrolled.

Another photo. Clearer. Nathan’s face. Lila’s mouth open against his. The timestamp was from last week. The week Nathan told me he was stuck in Chicago on business. The week he video-called me every night and whispered that he missed me.

My stomach turned.

Xavier spoke again, voice low. “He’s taking her to Rosewood Resort tomorrow. Booked the entire east wing for four days. She told me she’s visiting her mother.”

I stared at the tablecloth. The water stain from my mouth was spreading.

“How long have you known?” I asked.

“Long enough.”

“And you waited until now to tell me?”

“I needed proof you couldn’t argue with.”

Silence stretched between us. The restaurant suddenly felt too quiet, too bright. I could hear my own pulse in my ears.

“What do you want from me?” My voice sounded strange. Distant.

Xavier’s eyes met mine. For the first time something other than ice showed there. Rage. The same rage that was currently burning a hole through my chest.

“I want to hurt them,” he said simply. “And I think you do too.”

I laughed again, but it came out closer to a sob. “What are you suggesting? We expose them? Post the pictures? Ruin their reputations?”

“No.” He leaned forward. “Something better.”

I waited.

“An affair,” he said. “Real. Ours. No limits. We give them exactly what they’ve been giving us.”

The words hung in the air like smoke.

I should have stood up. I should have walked out and called Nathan and demanded answers. Instead I sat there staring at the man who had just ripped my life apart and offered me a match to burn the rest of it.

“You’re serious.”

“I don’t joke about things like this.”

“And then what? We just… sleep together until they find out?”

“Until they feel a fraction of what we’ve felt.” His voice stayed calm. Almost gentle. That somehow made it worse. “No feelings. No strings. Just revenge.”

My throat felt tight. “Why me?”

“Because you’re the only other person who understands.” He paused. “And because when they find out their perfect spouses have been fucking each other behind their backs, I want them to know we were doing the same.”

I looked down at my hands. They were shaking.

Eight months.

Eight months of Nathan kissing my forehead and telling me I was his everything.

Eight months of Lila sending me good morning texts and calling me her person.

Something inside me went very quiet and very cold.

“When?” I asked.

Xavier’s eyes darkened. “Tonight. If you’re ready.”

I wasn’t ready. I wasn’t anything except hollow and furious and strangely calm.

I pushed the phone back toward him. “Send me the address for Rosewood. I want to see it myself first.”

He nodded once. “I’ll pick you up at five tomorrow.”

“I can drive myself.”

“No.” The word was soft but final. “We do this together.”

I stood up. My legs felt unsteady. Xavier rose too, taller than I remembered, blocking some of the light from the window.

“Aria.”

I looked at him.

“Once we start,” he said, “there’s no going back. Are you sure?”

I thought about Nathan’s soft voice that morning. The way he had smiled when he said he would miss me. The way Lila had hugged me last week and whispered that she was so happy for us.

I met Xavier’s eyes and nodded.

“I’m sure.”

He studied my face for a long second. Then he reached out and brushed a strand of hair behind my ear. The touch was brief, almost careful, but it sent a shock straight down my spine.

“Good,” he murmured. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

I walked out of the restaurant without looking back.

The city noise hit me like a wall. People moved past me, talking, laughing, living normal lives. I stood on the sidewalk and tried to remember how to breathe.

My phone buzzed in my purse. A message from Nathan.

Nathan: Landing in Chicago now. Miss you already, baby. Call me when you can.

I stared at the screen until the words blurred.

Then I typed back.

Aria: Miss you too. Fly safe.

I hit send, slipped the phone away, and started walking.

Tomorrow I would see the truth with my own eyes.

Tomorrow I would decide how far I was willing to go.

But tonight, for the first time in eight months, I already knew one thing with absolute clarity.

Nathan and Lila had taken something from me.

Xavier Kane was offering me a way to take it back.

And God help me…

I wanted it.