The Other Man in My Wife's Tent novel · Chapter 2 of 24

Chapter 2: Tent Four

Cal and Freja agree to say nothing until they have proof, and the camp log shows the same two names in Tent 3 for six winters.

Freja walked me up the trail to Ridge Camp without saying a word.

Her boots made a steady crunch, and mine kept slipping.

The camp was a clearing with eight tents, a fire pit and a long canvas shelter where a guide in a red hat was handing out soup.

Tent Four had a sign nailed to its pole and two sleeping bags already laid out inside.

"They pair everyone off by tent," Freja said. "There's an odd number of us up here, so the two loners share."

"You signed up as a loner?"

"I signed up as Holly Ames. It's my grandmother's name."

She sat on her bag and unzipped her parka.

"Dean thinks I'm at my sister's in Duluth. He kissed me goodbye at the door and told me to give her his love."

I sat across from her.

My hands had finally started to shake, and I put them between my knees.

"You're allowed to be angry," she said. "It comes in waves. The first wave is usually the loudest."

"I want to walk down there and drag him out by his jacket."

"I know you do."

"So why don't you?"

"Because I tried that in January a year ago."

She pulled out her phone and showed me a photo.

It was the same ring of pines and the same row of numbered tents.

In the middle of it stood Dean, smiling, one arm around a woman I couldn't see because the shot was too far away.

"I walked in and called him out in front of a whole circle of people," Freja said. "He told them I'd been having a breakdown. He had tears in his eyes. He said I'd followed him because I was sick."

"And they believed him."

"Every one of them. He was so gentle about it."

She put the phone away.

"I went home and apologized to him. That's the part I hate the most."

I understood then why she had stood behind me and not walked in.

She wasn't being cautious.

She was being smart.

"What do you want?" I asked.

"Proof nobody can talk their way around. Video, dates, names. Then a room full of people who can't look away."

I took out my phone and played her the clip.

She watched it all the way through, her face blank, and then she nodded once.

"That's more than I had."

"There's a log," I said. "The receptionist said Dean's been in Tent Three 'same as every year.'"

Freja went still.

"Same tent, every year?"

"That's what she said."

She stood up, pulled her scarf back over her nose and held out a gloved hand.

"Come on. The camp office keeps the old registration book in a drawer."

The camp office was a plywood hut behind the shelter.

Freja told the girl at the counter that Holly Ames wanted to double check her bunk assignment for next year, and the girl pulled out a binder and left to find a pen.

Freja turned the binder around.

Every winter had its own page, with the tent numbers down the side and names beside them.

I went back through them with my finger.

This winter, Tent Three, Tolland and Niskanen.

Last winter, Tent Three, Tolland and Niskanen.

The year before, Tent Three.

There were six pages.

Six winters.

On the first page, dated six years back, the two names were written in my wife's handwriting.

She had put "Mr. and Mrs." in front of them.

My legs felt very far away.

"Cal," Freja said.

The girl was coming back.

Freja shut the binder, smiled and took the pen.

Out in the snow, I leaned on a fence post and tried to breathe.

My phone buzzed.

Lindsay.

"Phones are off from tonight, they're strict about it. Don't call, okay? Love you so much."

I stared at it.

Freja read it over my arm.

She took out her phone again and scrolled back through her pictures to one from last winter, and held it out to me.

It was a close shot of two hands in a tent doorway.

One of them wore the wedding ring I had put on my wife's finger.

The other one was holding it, and kissing the knuckle.

"I took that one through the flap," Freja said. "I stood there for twenty minutes."

"Why?"

"I wanted to be sure."

She put her hand on my sleeve.

"I'm sorry it's you," she said. "I'm sorry for both of us."

← Chapter 1 · All chapters · Chapter 3 →

Want to keep talking to characters like these? Chat with AI romance characters: AI Boyfriend · AI Girlfriend · Dark Romance · Fantasy Romance · BL (Boys’ Love) · Billionaire Boyfriend · Mafia Boyfriend · Possessive Boyfriend · Hockey Boyfriend · Older Boyfriend · K-Drama Boyfriend · Anime Boyfriend · Vampire Boyfriend · Werewolf Boyfriend · Demon Boyfriend · Fae Romance · GL (Girls’ Love) · Anime Girlfriend · Goth & Alt Girlfriend · Gamer Girlfriend · Tsundere Girlfriend · Fantasy Girlfriend