I used to think marriage was about compromise — give a little, take a little, forgive, move forward. Simple, right? That’s what I told myself on our wedding day. It’s what I whispered to myself during the hardest years, when the bills piled up, when the babies came, when exhaustion pressed me so tightly I felt like I couldn’t breathe. But somewhere along the way, Jason forgot about balance. Or maybe… he never really knew what it meant in the first place. We had been married six years. Three kids.

When my husband begged me for money to save his dying son, I gave him everything I had. I worked myself to the bone, took extra shifts, drained my savings, and even sold my grandmother’s jewelry. I thought I was helping an innocent child fight for his life. But the truth? The truth hit me like a slap in the face—his son was never sick. It all started when I first met Christopher. He was the kind of man who made you feel like you’d known him your whole life.

When we moved into our new house, we thought we’d found the perfect neighbors in the Johnsons. But after coming back from vacation to find our property completely trashed, a hidden note forced us to question everything—who we could trust, and who was out to ruin us. We moved in about a year ago. The place felt like a dream—quiet streets, big shady trees, kids riding bikes in the afternoons, and our new house, which looked like something straight out of a home magazine. Everything felt right. And then came