Chapter 4: The Other Woman
Chapter 4: The Other Woman
The monitor crackled again, the audio crystal clear.
A woman’s voice came through the speaker. It was faint, tinny from being played through Jason’s phone receiver, but the tone was unmistakable.
Vanessa.
Vanessa Hale had been Jason’s brilliant, beautiful executive assistant. The woman Margaret had once loudly proclaimed was "the exact kind of woman a Bennett man should have married." Jason had sworn she relocated to Chicago six months ago.
“Jason,” Vanessa’s recorded voice warned, sounding impatient and cruel. “Your mother will absolutely destroy her if you let this psychological game continue.”
Jason’s recorded voice answered without a single ounce of hesitation or warmth.
“That’s the point.”
Olivia’s hand tightened so fiercely around her belly that her fingernails bit into her own palms. A wave of physical nausea washed over her.
Jason snapped back to reality. He stood up so fast his heavy mahogany chair nearly toppled backward onto the rug.
“Turn that off!” he shouted, the smooth executive facade shattering into absolute panic. “That is private!”
His father, Richard Bennett, rose slowly from the head of the long table.
Richard was a man who commanded boardrooms with a whisper. His voice was dark and dangerous.
“Private?” Richard asked.
Jason lunged forward, scrambling across the rug, reaching desperately for the monitor on the sideboard.
But Olivia moved first.
Adrenaline flooded her system. She snatched the small white receiver off the wood, pulling it tightly against her chest like a shield.
“No.”
Her voice shook violently, but her eyes were steady, unblinking, and entirely devoid of fear.
“No. You don't get to hide this. For once in my life in this house, everyone is going to hear exactly what I have been hearing alone.”
Margaret looked at her son, her voice barely a terrified whisper. “Jason… what is this?”
Jason turned on Olivia, his panic morphing rapidly into defensive, cornered anger.
“You recorded me? You set a trap in my own house?”
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Olivia let out a small, broken laugh that held no joy.
“You confessed your affair to a baby monitor in your own nursery, Jason. I didn't set a trap. You built your own cage.”
