My Husband Cheated With My Sister, So I Married His Double

Seven years ago tonight, I married Mark Delaney in my grandmother's backyard. Tonight, I burned my wrist on the oven door making his favorite beef Wellington.

Worth it, I told myself.

I lit the last candle and checked my phone. 7:42. He'd promised to be home by seven.

Then I heard voices from the living room.

"You swore to me, Mark. You *swore*."

That was Selina. My little sister. She'd been staying in our guest room for two months, ever since her latest breakup.

"Keep your voice down."

Mark's voice. Low. Sharp. A tone I'd never heard him use with anyone.

I set the lighter down and walked toward the hallway.

"Down?" Selina laughed, but it cracked in the middle. "I've kept it down for a year. How much quieter do you want me to be?"

"Don't push me, Selina. You're getting greedy."

"Greedy? I'm asking for what you *promised*."

I stepped into the doorway.

They stood close. Too close. Selina's eyes were red, mascara smudged at the corners. Mark had one hand gripping her elbow. Not rough. Not gentle either. Like he owned it.

For one strange second, I didn't recognize either of them.

"Hey," I said. "What's going on?"

Mark dropped her arm like it was hot.

Selina's whole face changed. Her chin wobbled. Her shoulders curled in. She looked about twelve years old.

"Amy." She sniffed. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean for you to hear that."

"Hear what? What promise?"

"It's nothing." She wiped her cheek with the heel of her hand. "Mark said he'd help me find an apartment. And then he said I should stay longer. And I got upset because I feel like such a burden. On your *anniversary*, too. God, I'm awful."

She started crying for real. Big, wet sobs.

I reached for her automatically. Twenty-six years of habit. "Sel, you're not a burden."

"I am. I always am."

Over her shoulder, I caught Mark's eyes. His jaw was locked tight. Then, slowly, it loosened.

He walked over and pulled me away from her, gently. His thumb brushed my cheek.

"Don't overthink this, sweetheart." He kissed my forehead. "I was just worried she'd do something stupid again. You know how she gets."

I did know. The pills when she was nineteen. The car she drove into a ditch at twenty-two.

"Is that true, Sel?" I asked.

She nodded into her sleeve. "He was just looking out for me."

Mark slid his arm around my waist. "Something smells amazing. Did you make the Wellington?"

"I did."

"For me?"

"Who else?"

He smiled. That smile used to make my knees weak. "Then let's eat before it gets cold. Selina, you'll join us?"

"No." She shook her head fast. "No, it's your night. I'll stay in my room."

She brushed past me. Her perfume trailed after her. Something sweet and expensive. Something I'd smelled before.

On Mark's collar, last Thursday.

I pushed the thought away. Lots of women wore that perfume.

"Amy?" Mark was already pulling out my chair. "Coming?"

I forced a smile. "Coming."

---

Dinner was fine. He praised the food. He gave me a bracelet, thin gold, with a tiny diamond. He said, "Seven years, and I'd marry you seven more times."

I laughed at the right moments.

But twice, his phone buzzed against the table. Twice, he flipped it face-down without looking.

"Work?" I asked.

"Always." He reached across and squeezed my hand. "Nothing that matters more than you."

---

I woke up at 2:17 a.m.

The bed beside me was cold.

"Mark?"

Nothing. The bathroom light was off.

Then I heard it. A soft thump through the wall. A muffled laugh.

A woman's laugh.

I sat up. My heart pounded so hard it hurt my ribs.

*It's Selina. She's on the phone. She's watching something.*

Another sound. Lower. A man's voice.

I pulled on my robe with shaking hands and stepped into the hall. The hardwood was freezing under my bare feet.

The guest room door was open maybe three inches. A thin line of lamplight cut across the floor.

I stopped right before it touched my toes.

"Shh." Selina, breathless and giggling. "She'll hear you."

"She sleeps like the dead. You know that."

Mark.

I leaned toward the gap.

My husband was on top of my sister. His shirt was gone. Her nightgown was bunched around her ribs. Her arms were wrapped around his neck, fingers buried in the hair I'd cut for him last Sunday.

He kissed her like he was starving.

Not the polite kiss he gave me on birthdays. Not the quick peck on his way out the door. This was hungry. Desperate. His hands everywhere, like he needed to memorize her.

In seven years, he had never once kissed me like that.

I clapped a hand over my mouth. Hard. My teeth cut into my lip.

Selina pulled back just enough to smile up at him. "So when are you going to tell her?"

"Tell her what?"

"That we stopped being just in-laws a long time ago." She traced his jaw with one finger. "I'm tired of sneaking around in my own sister's house, Mark."

He didn't answer. He kissed her again instead. Deep. Slow. She melted under him with a sound I wanted to rip out of my own ears.

Tears ran down my face. I didn't make a sound. I didn't even blink.

The strangest thing happened then. I almost laughed. A tiny, horrible bubble rose up my throat, because all I could think was: *I burned my wrist for that man tonight.*

I swallowed it down.

"You didn't answer me," Selina whispered.

Mark lifted his head. In the lamplight, his face looked like a stranger's. Calm. Cold. Patient.

"Give me a little more time."

"How much more?"

"Until she can't live without me." He brushed her hair off her forehead, the exact way he'd brushed mine at dinner. "Once she's completely dependent on me, I'll make sure she walks away with nothing."

The floor tilted under my feet.

Nothing.

The house my parents left me. The company I built from my kitchen table. The trust fund.

*Nothing.*

Selina laughed softly. "And then?"

"And then," Mark said, "it's all ours."

My hand slipped against the doorframe.

The wood creaked.

Inside the room, Mark went completely still.