Chapter 1

Chloe's POV

Tristan Lane’s clear, innocent voice was not loud, but it carried far enough for everyone to hear. The moment they noticed me watching, they hurriedly let go of each other’s hands.

Micheal Lane walked over, scooped Tristan into his arms, and pinched his cheek.

“What are you talking about? I just went to work. I didn’t want to wake your mommy.”

My sister, Camellia Hales, followed behind him, twisting his ear hard as she warned him, “If you ever dare betray Chloe with another woman, I’ll kill you myself!”

The familiar laughter gently swept away the doubts that had begun to take root in my heart. How could it be possible?

Camellia and Micheal had never gotten along growing up. She was obsessed with protecting her little sister, and he was obsessed with his wife. They were constantly fighting over who got to spend more time with me.

These were the two people who valued me more than their own lives. How could they ever betray me?

However, when I looked at Tristan’s serious little face and remembered what I had seen beneath that table, a chill crept through me. I stepped forward instinctively and straightened Micheal’s collar, then my fingers froze for a moment.

A faint trace of perfume lingered on him. It was the exact perfume I had given Camellia yesterday. Caught on the collar at the back of his neck was half a lipstick mark.

My hand moved. I reached into his pants pocket and pulled out a lipstick. “Whose is this?”

Micheal’s face went pale, and his eyes flicked toward Camellia.

Camellia calmly took the lipstick from my hand and slipped it into her purse. “It’s mine. I asked him to hold onto it for me and forgot to take it back.”

Her tone was perfectly natural, just like all those times she covered for Micheal back then.

Whenever I asked whose hair was on his suit, Camellia would say, “I must’ve gotten it on him by accident.”

Whenever I asked about the scratches on his back, she would laugh and joke, “I scratched him when we got into a fight.”

I had always believed her. I even joked once, “If it weren’t for you, I’d probably think Micheal was cheating on me.”

Camellia responded by kicking him in the leg. “He wouldn’t dare, not in a million years.”

Still, what if the woman he was cheating with was Camellia? What if all those explanations had been nothing more than excuses to hide their affair?

The chill turned bone-deep, surging through every inch of my body.

I stared at Camellia. She looked startled, and her voice suddenly became uncertain. “Chloe, you don’t believe me?”

I neither nodded nor shook my head. I simply picked up Tristan in my arms. “I’m taking Tristan upstairs to change.”

I could feel two pairs of eyes locked onto my back behind me.

What Camellia and Micheal did not know was that the lipstick was mine. I had casually slipped it into his pocket last night and forgotten to take it out.

Now, it had become the evidence that would expose their betrayal and every lie they had ever told me.