While we were waiting at the airport for our anniversary flight, my husband suddenly claimed he had forgotten his passport at home. I called my mother and asked her to grab it for him. Twenty minutes later, she called back, her voice shaking. “Honey, he set you up! Come home now!” Before I could ask why, she sent me a photo of something she had found in his bedside drawer. The moment I opened it, my heart sank. Suddenly, every strange thing he had done at the airport made perfect sense…

“No, Sheila. Don’t bother your mother with this. I’ll go back and find it myself.”

I ignored his protests and called Vivienne, who answered cheerfully. She agreed to visit our house, check Dereck’s bedside drawer, and bring his passport to the airport as quickly as possible.

After ending the call, I noticed that Dereck seemed unusually tense. Rather than appearing relieved, he kept adjusting his luggage and checking his phone, although I assumed he was simply embarrassed about forgetting such an important document.

Twenty minutes later, my mother called again, but her voice sounded completely different. Instead of telling me she’d found the passport, she quietly asked whether Dereck was standing close enough to hear our conversation.

“Honey, where’s Dereck right now? Can he hear what I’m saying?”

I moved several steps away from him, suddenly worried that something serious had happened. When I assured her that he couldn’t hear us, she whispered words that made my stomach tighten.