In revenge, I became his brother's secret lover. Until his out-of-control kiss...-1

Perfect on Paper
My name is Sarah, thirty-two, a strategist at a mid-sized company. My husband David, thirty-four, is a project manager. To everyone else, we’re textbook "model couple." Our marriage resembles a well-rehearsed performance. Our social feeds overflowed with photos: holiday bouquets from him, or dinners I painstakingly prepared that he rarely came home to eat. But behind closed doors, silence often reigned, broken only by our separate breaths.
He’d bury himself in his phone; I’d vanish into my tablet. Conversation shrank to "I’m traveling tomorrow" or "Property fee’s paid." Intimacy became a scheduled routine, devoid of warmth, feeling more like an obligation. We maintained all the expected decorum. Only, that decorum was like ornate wrapping paper, meticulously concealing an empty box within. Sometimes I wondered if we were just jointly sustaining an illusion of "happiness," until even we started to believe it.

The Password
David’s phone always had a passcode. He called it a professional habit—project managers deal with important clients, chat logs full of trade secrets, leaks would be disastrous. The explanation seemed airtight, so I trusted it. After years of calm seas, suspicion seemed unwarranted. But gradually, that phone became an invisible wall.

He arrived home later, sometimes carrying a strange, cloying perfume scent, brushed off as "inevitable at business dinners." Late at night, the screen would glow beneath his pillow; he’d jolt awake instantly, turning away to murmur "Yeah," "Got it," "Busy" in hushed tones. Calls home always ended with "The project’s tight, sleep without me." The exhaustion sounded real, yet laced with a deliberate impatience. I suppressed my doubts repeatedly, insisting trust was key. Yet that nagging unease persisted, like stubborn bubbles rising relentlessly from the depths. Staring at his darkened screen, the smooth black surface reflected my own bewildered face. What separated us now felt far deeper than a six-digit code.