“F*ck you, Marcus. I hope you rot.”
I hit send.
Then my best friend looked over my shoulder and whispered, “Lena… that is not Marcus’s number.”
That was how the worst night of my life got worse.
Or better.
Honestly, I’m still not sure.
My name is Lena Carter. I was twenty-nine, living in a one-bedroom apartment on Manhattan’s East Side, working a normal marketing job, paying an abnormal mortgage, and dating Marcus Bell for seven years.
Until Tuesday, I thought I knew him.
Then I found another woman in his phone.
Not literally.
That probably would have been easier.
I came home carrying orange chicken and fried rice because Marcus loved the cheap place around the corner. The paper bag was warm against my palm, and the bottom had already begun soaking through with sauce.
His shirt was hanging over our bedroom chair.
There was perfume on the collar.
Sweet.
Floral.
Definitely not mine.
“Marcus?”
“In the shower, babe.”
Water ran behind the bathroom door while he massacred a Stevie Wonder song.
His phone sat unlocked on the dresser.
Marcus never used a passcode.
That should tell you everything about his confidence.
I picked it up.
A message banner was sitting there.
BRIANA ❤️
My stomach tightened.
I opened it.
Hotel pictures.
Messages.
Plans.
Then one photograph.
Marcus, shirtless beneath white hotel sheets, wearing that stupid crooked grin I had loved since I was twenty-two.
Timestamp: Tuesday, 8:46 p.m.
Tuesday.
The day my mother had been admitted to Johns Hopkins in Baltimore after she stopped breathing properly.
I had spent fourteen hours in a plastic chair beside her hospital bed, holding her hand while machines breathed and beeped around us.
Marcus had told me he was trapped at work.
He had promised to come.
He never did.
The shower stopped.
I put his phone exactly where I found it.
Then I walked into the kitchen and placed both palms against the granite.
The takeout bag leaked orange sauce onto the counter.
“Smells good,” Marcus said behind me.
I stared at the stain spreading across the paper.
“Who’s Briana?”
Silence.
Three seconds.
I counted.
“Who?”
“The woman you were sleeping with Tuesday while my mother had a breathing tube down her throat.”
His face changed.
Not guilt.
Calculation.
That hurt worse.
“You went through my phone?”
I laughed.
Actually laughed.
“You’re leading with privacy?”
“Lena, listen—”
“Get out.”
“Come on.”
“Get. Out.”
Then came the performance.
Denial first.
It wasn’t what I thought.
Then minimizing.
It had only happened a few times.
Then alcohol.
Then stress.
And finally, the masterpiece.
“We haven’t exactly been close lately.”
That sentence saved me.
Because suddenly I stopped crying.
I looked at him.
Really looked.
This man had eaten Thanksgiving turkey at my mother’s table.
He had stood beside me at my college graduation.
He had helped carry my father’s coffin out of church.
And now he was explaining that my failure to entertain him sufficiently had somehow forced his pants off in Midtown.
Something inside me became very quiet.
“The apartment is mine,” I said.
Technically, both our names had been on the original lease years earlier, but I had purchased the unit eighteen months ago after my grandmother left me money.
Marcus never bothered reading the deed.
He just enjoyed telling people, “We bought a place.”
That detail mattered later.
He packed a duffel bag.
His laptop.
Three shirts.
Two pairs of pants.
The anniversary watch I had bought him.
Then he tried to kiss my forehead.
I stepped back.
The elevator doors closed at 9:37 p.m.
At 9:45, Jessica Nguyen arrived carrying tequila, frozen dumplings, and enough rage for both of us.
Jess had known me since seventh grade.
She had hated Marcus since Thanksgiving 2022, when he insulted my mother’s sweet potato casserole and called it “ethnic confusion.”
My mother was born in Maryland.
The recipe came from Southern Living.
Marcus wasn’t bright.
Three shots later, I was crying.
Five shots later, Jess was making fun of Marcus’s receding hairline.
Seven shots later, I wanted blood.
Verbally.
Mostly.
“I need to text him.”
“No.”
“Jess.”
“You are tequila with legs right now.”
“I just need to type it.”
“You can type it. You cannot send it.”
I promised.
Then I wrote every ugly thing I had swallowed for years.
You’re a coward.
You’re a liar.
You abandoned me when I needed you.
I hope every woman after me recognizes you faster than I did.
F*ck you, Marcus.
I hope you rot.
My thumb slipped.
Sent.
Jess leaned over.
“Oh, God.”
“What?”
“That’s not Marcus.”
I stared at the number.
Ten unfamiliar digits.
“Great.”
I dropped my forehead onto the kitchen counter.
“I just verbally murdered a dentist in Queens.”
Then the phone buzzed.
You have a beautiful rhythm when you’re angry. I assume this wasn’t meant for me.
Jess stopped smiling.
“That’s weird.”
I typed:
Wrong number. Sorry. Please ignore me.
Three seconds.
I don’t forget much, Lena.
My skin went cold.
I hadn’t given him my name.
Jess grabbed my wrist.
“Block him.”
Instead, because tequila destroys survival instincts, I typed:
How do you know my name?
The answer came immediately.
We met three weeks ago at Ambrosia on 52nd Street. You bumped into me after arguing with a man.
I remembered.
Marcus had gotten drunk at dinner and mocked my dress.
I had rushed toward the exit and collided with a tall stranger wearing a dark overcoat.
Gray eyes.
Controlled expression.
Quiet voice.
He had steadied me by the elbow and said, “Messy nights are sometimes the honest ones.”
Then Marcus had pulled me away.
My phone buzzed again.
I’m going to tell you something that may frighten you. Marcus Bell is currently in a parking garage on 41st Street with the woman from his phone. He has been drinking. He will come to your apartment tonight. Do not open the door.
Jess read the message.
Then looked at me.
“Who the hell is this?”
I couldn’t answer.
At 12:24 a.m., Marcus started pounding on my door.
Exactly thirty-seven minutes later.
“Lena! Open up!”
Jess yanked me away from the hallway.
Marcus sounded drunk.
Then angry.
Then entitled.
“You don’t get to lock me out of my own home!”
My phone buzzed.
Stay away from the door. Someone is coming.
“What does it say?” Jess whispered.
Before I answered, Marcus stopped yelling.
Two heavy footsteps approached from farther down the hall.
A calm male voice said, “Mr. Bell, we’re going to walk you downstairs.”
“Who the hell are you?”
“People asking politely.”
There was a brief scuffle.
A grunt.
Then Marcus suddenly sounded considerably more sober.
“Okay. Fine. I’m leaving.”
The elevator dinged.
Silence.
My phone buzzed again.
He’s gone. Lock your door. Sleep.
My fingers shook as I finally typed the question I should have asked much earlier.
Who are you?
The answer took almost a minute.
Adrien Voss.
Jess opened my laptop.
Thirty seconds later, she turned it toward me.
There he was.
Gray eyes.
Dark coat.
The same face from Ambrosia.
Adrien Voss.
Thirty-five years old.
Founder of Voss Import Holdings.
His legitimate businesses included shipping, luxury construction, restaurants, and private security.
The less legitimate rumors occupied another hundred search results.
Federal investigations.
Political donations.
A father killed outside a Manhattan club twelve years earlier.
Organized-crime allegations no prosecutor had ever managed to prove.
One article called him Manhattan’s quietest dangerous man.
I stared at the screen.
Then my phone.
Then Jess.
“I accidentally texted ‘f*ck you’ to a mafia boss.”
“Apparently.”
My phone buzzed one final time.
And Lena? Change your locks tomorrow. Marcus copied your building key six months ago.
I stopped breathing.
Marcus had told me he lost that key.
Six months ago.
He claimed it had fallen through a subway grate.
I suddenly remembered him returning home that evening.
No frustration.
No annoyance.
Just an easy smile.
“I’ll get another made tomorrow.”
Except he hadn’t lost it.
He had copied it.
“Jess.”
She was already standing.
“What?”
I looked toward the bedroom.
The room where Marcus had slept beside me for seven years.
The closet he had used.
The drawers he had opened.
The walls he had touched.
“If he lied about the key…”
Jess understood before I finished.
“What else did he do in here?”
We didn’t sleep.
At 3:11 in the morning, Jess found something behind the television.
A tiny black device plugged into an adapter.
She held it between two fingers.
“What is this?”
I stared.
A little light blinked once.
Then stopped.
My phone buzzed.
Adrien.
Do not unplug anything else.
Jess and I froze.
I typed with trembling fingers.
How did you know we found something?
His reply came seconds later.
Because whatever Marcus put in your apartment isn’t the only thing watching him.
That was the moment my breakup stopped being about cheating.
And became something far more dangerous.
---