Page 26 of The Silent Hour

Toya smirked at her. "Lucky for you, you've got friends with lawyer husbands to make it go away."

The joke hung there, half funny, half true.

For a beat, I watched the condensation trickle down my glass of water.

"People do wild things. What a mess that has to be now."

I didn't say the rest of my thoughts aloud.

That could just as easily be us one day, our names being traded around as gossip fodder.

"I don't know how the hell I'd handle that either," Toya said, apparently riding the same wavelength. "Two years is insane. Why don't they ever just leave? Damn. That's seven hundred and thirty days of being a secret. Seven. Hundred. Thirty."

She punctuated each number like a tiny blow.

Mehgan scoffed. "They don't leave because they don't think they'll get caught. It's always some bullshit when they do. It meant nothing. I only love you. Where was all that love when your trifling dick was in another woman's snatch?"

Carmen's mouth twitched, sympathy and disgust mingling. "Poor thing. She just had a baby six months ago."

I sighed. "Men."

I felt a flash of anger for a woman I didn't know personally but couldn't help feeling for.

"Women do it too, sure, but in this case? Men."

Toya sat back in her chair, long hair swaying as she shook her head. "But if I take a razor to his dick and balls afterward, I'd be the one in the wrong."

We shared a laugh, and I noticed two older women at a diagonal table glance over, lips pursed like they'd just sucked on lemons.

"I think they're going to try and work it out," Mehgan went on, lowering her voice now as if it mattered and the rest of the patio hadn't already been treated to half the conversation.

Carmen gave a short laugh. "Because now he's sorry, right? Now that his mistress showed up on their doorstep, suddenly he's had time for self-reflection and wants to start respecting his wife."

"Only took him two years," Toya muttered.

I traced the rim of my glass.

"I think that's the part I'd struggle with most. The physical act would hurt me, sure. Knowing another woman got something that was supposed to be sacred and mine. But the disrespect? The betrayal?" I shook my head. "That would destroy me."

Mehgan nodded, her mouth a tight line. "Yeah. I agree. If Troy cheated on me, I'd be haunted by never knowing exactly what was going through his head. Because it sure as hell wouldn't have been me."

She paused.

"Then he'd die and go right in the hole with Damian."

That cracked us open again, our laughter spilling across the table and earning us more stares we happily ignored.

By the time our plates were cleared and the check was settled, the sun was leaning heavily toward mid-afternoon.

We started going our separate ways with promises of the next meet-up and kisses pressed to cheeks, the comfort of knowing our pact still held.

Except Toya and me.

We lingered since we both needed to pick up the kids from Palm Crest Academy before heading to the park. By the time we climbed into our cars, we'd already decided on a detour, tailing each other to the shopping district a few blocks away for some window shopping to kill the extra time.

The street was crowded, every parallel spot tighter than the last.

I attempted one, pulling in at an awkward angle, then cursed under my breath when I nearly mounted the curb. People walked past, a few of them even glancing my way, and the heat of their imagined judgment crawled up my neck.