The Camera He Installed Filmed His Own Downfall
Three a.m.
The blue light of my phone cast long shadows across the bedroom, a sterile glow that felt colder than the truth it was revealing.
A single line on the credit card statement, an alert I’d set up years ago and forgotten about.
$2,980.
The Sterling Grand Hotel.
Executive Suite.
The charge was from eight p.m. last night.
My husband, Dean Roth, was a detective with the MPD’s Major Crimes Division.
Last night, he was on a double shift.
Or so he said.
I held the phone, my knuckles white, the glass screen slick beneath my suddenly numb fingertips.
My thumbs moved with a cold, mechanical precision.
*Just saw the credit card bill. A hotel charge from last night?*
He replied in seconds.
*Yeah, forgot to tell you. Department put us up. Big case, all hands on deck.*
I stared at the words, a bitter laugh caught in my throat.
The Sterling Grand was on the west side.
His precinct was clear across the city.
I didn’t ask any more questions.
Instead, I took a screenshot of the merchant address and sent it to Darcy Keane.
My best friend.
And the best private investigator in the city.
Her reply was instantaneous.
A single thumbs-up emoji, followed by a text.
*On it. I’ll peel this onion ‘til it cries.*
§02
My marriage to Dean hadn’t just cracked; its entire foundation had been a lie.
I knew, with the cold certainty of an architect condemning a building, that it had to be brought down.
Not repaired.
Demolished.
Five years ago, I had been a promising young architect.
My final thesis project—a cantilevered, eco-friendly residential design—had won national awards.
Firms were calling.
Then I met Dean.
He was brilliant, driven, a rising star in the police department.
He spoke of justice, of putting away monsters, of a city that needed him.
His world was chaos and darkness; mine was order and light.
We fell in love fast and hard.
“I need you, Mona,” he’d said, his voice rough against my hair. “You’re my foundation. The only place I feel safe.”
So I’d made a choice.
I put my career on the back burner, taking on small freelance interior design projects.
Enough to keep my skills sharp, but not enough to demand the all-consuming hours a real firm would.
I handled our life so he could handle his job.
I was the architect of our home, our peace.
It was in that home, three years ago, that I’d sat for hours, weaving a cord from a strip of leather I’d saved from his police academy uniform.
I’d worked a small, silver St. Christopher medal into the braid—the patron saint of travelers, a whispered prayer for his safety on the violent streets.
When I gave it to him, his eyes were wet.
“I’ll never take this off,” he’d sworn, his voice thick. “Except for a mission where it might get compromised. This protects me. It protects *us*.”
He had never taken it off.
Until now.
Two hours after my text to Darcy, my phone buzzed again.
It was a video file.
And a location pin.
“Northgate Youth Foundation.”
My heart seized.
I opened the video.
The grainy footage was from the Sterling Grand’s elevator lobby.
There was Dean, his uniform crisp, his posture straight and proud.
He was holding the hand of a girl in a simple white dress.
Long hair, a slender waist.
She looked no older than her early twenties.
She laughed, tilting her head back, her eyes curving into crescent moons.
And on her delicate wrist, catching the light as the elevator doors slid open, was a glint of silver on a dark, worn leather cord.
The St. Christopher medal.
My prayer.
On her arm.
§03
The Northgate Youth Foundation was a place I knew of.
A charity Dean’s precinct supported.
He’d mentioned a girl there before.
Phoebe Lark.
Parents died in a car crash.
An orphan, he’d said.
Quiet, withdrawn.
“The kid’s got nobody, Mona. She just needs a little extra looking after.”
I had offered to go with him, to help.
He always had an excuse.
“She’s shy. Let me build some trust first.”
I’d even bought her books, a warm coat for the winter, passing them to Dean to deliver.
I was a fool.
I changed my clothes, my movements stiff, robotic.
The drive to Northgate felt unreal, the city lights blurring past the windshield like watercolor streaks.
The security guard at the gate recognized my car from the charity events.
He waved me through, telling me Phoebe was usually in the back garden at this time.
I saw her from a distance.
Sitting on a bench, bathed in the soft morning sun.
She was looking at her phone, a small, secret smile playing on her lips.
The sunlight caught the silver medal on her wrist, a flash of blinding pain in my eyes.
She heard my footsteps on the gravel and looked up.
Her smile froze when she saw me.
She stood quickly, her posture instantly changing to something timid, almost fearful.
“Mrs… Mrs. Valdez?” she stammered, exactly the shy, broken girl Dean had described.
A different person from the laughing woman in the elevator.
I walked right up to her, my gaze locked on her phone.
The screen was still lit, a chat window open.
The contact name was “Dee.”
His last message, sent just last night at 7:30 p.m.: *Old spot tonight. Got a surprise for you.*
Her reply: *Yay! Dee’s the best!*
I said nothing, my eyes lifting from the screen to the leather cord on her wrist.
“That’s a nice bracelet,” I said, my voice flat, devoid of emotion. “Dean give it to you?”
Her face paled.
She instinctively tried to hide her hand behind her back.
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