The betrayal

Rudela,

As he promised, Kyle took his parents to his younger brother’s apartment. I had braced myself for shouting and blame, certain they would accuse me of driving them out. Instead, to my complete surprise, my mother-in-law seemed eager to go.

Before they left, my father-in-law walked over and looked straight into my eyes. “Everything you have done for this family, I am grateful for.”

The words caught me off guard. I opened my mouth, but nothing came out before he turned and left the house. Worry settled heavy in my chest. I had always made sure he took his medicine on time. Without me there, who would watch over him?

A week passed. Their absence left a quiet hollow inside me, yet the freedom that filled the empty space felt almost dizzying. Kyle was home more. We cooked side by side, laughed without lowering our voices, and moved through the small rooms as if they finally belonged to us alone.

He started coming back earlier each day, arms full of things I had never imagined owning.

“Here,” he said one evening, holding out a silk scarf. “I saw one of my coworkers wearing something like it. Thought it would suit you.”

I touched the soft fabric. It was clearly expensive. “It’s beautiful. But why buy something this costly? We still have debts from your parents’ medical bills.”

Kyle stroked my cheek, then gently pinched the soft skin. “Can’t you stop worrying about debts for once and think about yourself? We’re getting richer by the day. A bigger house is only a matter of time.”

Heat rose in my face. “You and that big mouth of yours. We should be thinking about children. I can’t wait to be pregnant. Our kids won’t ever have to worry about money or empty plates.”

He leaned in and pecked my cheek. “All right. Next month when the salary comes in, you can handle the plans.”

I smiled and wrapped my arms around him, holding on tightly. In that moment I felt truly blessed.

Later, after a late-night snack, Kyle stood and stretched. “I’m going to take a quick shower. I have an early meeting tomorrow.”

“Really? Why didn’t you tell me sooner?” I rose as well.

“You worry about me too much. It’s time you started taking care of yourself.”

I nodded with a small smile. “Okay, boss. My turn to be lazy.”

" My wife's kiss is the sweetest." He winked at me while unlocking the bathroom door.

“By the way, I’m turning on the hotspot. My data package runs out tonight.” I said, yawning big.

“Sure. I’ll get you proper Wi-Fi next month.”

“Looking forward to it, sugar daddy,” I teased, blowing him a quick kiss before picking up his phone.

He made a gesture of catching the kiss and pressed it on his left chest. I chuckled softly shaking my head. He was more dramatic than anyone.

Kyle had two phones—one personal, one for work. In the years when money was scarce we had shared everything, even devices. Taking his phone to watch something felt no different from borrowing a glass.

I settled on the floor, my favorite spot in the cramped apartment, and unlocked the screen to switch on the hotspot. While I waited for my own phone to connect, my eyes drifted to the work phone lying nearby. It must have been linked somehow, because within seconds it began vibrating so hard the hair on my arms lifted.

“Is it going to break?” I whispered. “Why is it shaking like that?”

“I don’t know,” my wolf, Farah, answered, just as uneasy as I was.

We had always treated our phones carefully. Even a slight warmth could make me nervous. The constant buzzing sent a jolt of panic through me. Without thinking about boundaries, we had never needed them, I picked it up and unlocked the screen.

He had a very bad habit of having the same password for everything. So I didn't need to worry about unlocking it.

My chest tightened. I half expected a cracked screen or some expensive repair bill of two or three hundred dollars. What I found instead stopped me cold.

Hundreds of messages filled the screen, most of them congratulations about a promotion.

I narrowed my eyes. I had never gone to college, but I had been a strong student in high school and had tutored children to help pay our fees. Kyle had only just joined the company in an entry-level position. How could he already be promoted?

Curious, I opened the group chat with his coworkers and managers. Nearly fifty messages scrolled past.

“Congratulations, Team Leader. You’re one of the youngest managers in our branch.”

“Team Leader, you’re a millionaire now. When are you treating us?”

I stared at the words. Millionaire. Team leader. Youngest manager. They repeated in my head until my thoughts went blank, as if someone had thrown acid behind my eyes.

I kept searching, needing proof that what I was reading could not be real. I opened the email app. Thousands of messages waited, business correspondence from different packs, different languages, stretching back almost four years. He had been working since he was twenty-two, long before his father’s surgery, long before his brother’s loan, long before I had worked myself to exhaustion to help pay those debts.

A high ringing started in my ears. My body trembled, yet my fingers kept moving. They stopped on a family group chat I had never seen. I opened it. The latest message was from his youngest brother:

“Bruh, I want this car for my birthday. Just fifty thousand. You better get it for me. Otherwise I am going to report you”

A broken laugh slipped out of me. So everyone had known. Every single one of them. And still I had lived like dirt, counting every scrap of food.

I grabbed my own phone and took pictures of everything. Then I checked the mobile banking app.

The phone slipped from my hands and hit the floor when the balance appeared. Two million.

I did not laugh. I didn't even know how to cry. Something simply stopped inside me, the way an engine cools after running too long and too hard. The force that had pushed me through every hungry night and every long shift finally went quiet.

I drew a slow breath, picked up the phone, and set it neatly back where it had been. I could not think yet. It felt like waking inside a nightmare, and I needed to face what I felt before I could do anything else.