Page 45 of Rich Little Liars

Then Daniel scrambled backwards, nearly falling off the bed in his haste.

‘Kelly. Christ. I didn’t know you were⁠—’

‘Obviously.’ My voice sounded strange. Flat. Like it was coming from someone else’s mouth.

Roxanne was slower to move. She sat up casually, reaching for her shirt with no urgency. Like she had all the time in the world. Like I was the one intruding rather than her.

‘This isn’t what it looks like,’ Daniel said.

The cliché of it almost made me laugh.

Almost.

‘Really? Because it looks like you’re having an affair with my friend in our bed.’

‘We weren’t… We haven’t…’ He stopped, running his hands through his hair. A gesture of frustration I knew intimately. I’d seen it a thousand times over five years of marriage. ‘It just happened. We were talking and it just… happened.’

‘Yeah, happens all the time,’ I said sarcastically. ‘Just last week I saw on the news that some poor guy fell over and landed in a sexy young blonde. Tragedy.’

Roxanne pulled her shirt over her head. Still moving with that same infuriating calm. When she finally looked at me, her expression was something I couldn’t quite read. Not shame. Not even guilt. Satisfaction, maybe.

‘I should go,’ she said quietly.

‘Yes, you really should.’ The words came out like a gunshot.

She stood, collecting her jacket from where it had been draped over the chair by the window. My chair. The one I sat in every morning to put on my shoes.

‘Kelly, I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘I never meant for this to⁠—’

‘Get out.’

She hesitated, glancing at Daniel like she was waiting for him to defend her. To tell me to calm down or be reasonable or any of the things people say when they’re caught. But Daniel was staring at the floor, his shoulders hunched in a posture I’d never seen before.

Defeated.

Ashamed.

Good.

Roxanne walked past me without another word. I listened to her footsteps on the stairs, the front door opening and closing with a soft click that somehow felt louder than a slam would have. Then it was just us. Me standing in the doorway. Daniel sitting on the edge of our bed, still shirtless, still looking at the floor like it might offer answers.

‘How long?’ I asked.

‘Kelly…’

‘How long has this been going on?’

‘It hasn’t. Not really. Today was the first time we⁠—’

‘Don’t lie to me. Not now. You owe me that much at least.’

He looked up then. His eyes were red-rimmed but I couldn’t tell if it was shame or just the shock of being caught. Most likely the latter.

‘A few weeks,’ he said finally. ‘Since she started coming round more often. But it was just talking at first. Just… I don’t know. Connection. Someone who listened.’

‘I listen.’

‘Do you honestly think so?’ There was something sharp in his voice now. Something that had been building for months maybe. ‘Because lately it feels like we’re just two people living in the same house. Going through the motions. You’re always working or distracted or⁠—’