“They took me,” Derek continued. “The others… they weren’t so lucky. I was their prize. For eighteen months, I was in a hole in the ground. They wanted to know who I worked for, who our sources were.”
He looked at Paul again, a fresh wave of fury in his eyes. “And all that time, the official report said KIA. Not MIA. Not captured. Killed. You signed off on that, didn’t you, Paul? You buried me.”
Paul finally looked up, his face ashen. There were tears in his eyes. “I did,” he admitted, his voice cracking. “I had to.”
“You had to?” I screamed, the sound tearing from my throat. “Why? Why would you do that?”
“Because of the people who took him!” Paul’s voice rose, filled with a desperation I’d never heard. “They aren’t soldiers, Clara. They’re monsters. They’re a splinter cell known for one thing: leverage. If they knew he was alive, they would have come for you. They would have come for Liam.”
My blood ran cold. Liam. Our son.
“Declaring Derek KIA was the only way to get you off their radar,” Paul pleaded, his eyes now on me. “It was a protocol, a last resort. It put you and your son under a different kind of protection. It made you invisible. I thought… everyone thought he was gone for good. No one survives them.”
The story was so horrific, so unbelievable, that a part of me knew it had to be true. The world of spies and soldiers I only saw in movies had just crashed into my wedding day.
“So you were assigned to watch me?” I asked, the pieces clicking together with sickening clarity. “Our meeting wasn’t an accident.”
He nodded, shamefaced. “I was supposed to stay in the background. Just be a neighbor, a friendly face. Make sure you were safe. But I saw you. I saw how broken you were. I saw you trying to be strong for Liam. And I fell in love with you, Clara. I swear, that part was real. I never meant to lie, not like this. But the lie just got bigger and bigger.”
Derek stepped forward. “You fell in love with my wife while I was being tortured in some forgotten corner of the world.”
The accusation hung in the air, heavy and sharp.
