Chapter 1: Threats in Red Lipstick

What do you do when the other woman isn’t a secret—she’s a threat with a business degree and a killer smile? For three months, that question’s been chewing holes in my sleep.

In the quiet moments—after the kids are asleep, with the dishwasher humming in the background and my mug clutched tight, the bitter coffee long gone cold—this question circles, refusing to let me rest. Maybe it sounds like a plot from some trashy reality show, but here I am, living it for real. Trust me, it's not as glamorous as you might imagine.

And not without reason—I actually ran into one myself.

That moment when I realized who she was—it hit like a sharp winter wind through an open door. Not some distant rumor, but a real person with a name, a face, and a plan. The air tasted like pennies for days after.

She’s a female classmate my husband met in his executive MBA program: beautiful, highly educated, running her own business. She could’ve been the star of her own Netflix series, but instead, she picked the fast lane—right through my marriage.

The kind of woman you see in glossy magazine features—someone who could probably run a non-profit before lunch and still make her own kombucha in the evening. I half-admired her hustle, but couldn’t shake the bitterness at the choice she made. Maybe, in another life, we could’ve been friends. Here, though, we’re rivals, whether she knows it or not.

Honestly, we could have each gotten what we wanted and coexisted peacefully. She could take resources from my husband, and as long as she didn’t threaten my core interests, I could put up with her.

It was almost like running a family business, with clear lines of what I could live with and what crossed the line. In my mind, we could have maintained this unspoken détente—her getting her share of Marcus’s time and attention, as long as my world stayed intact.

But lately, I’ve noticed my husband seems to be considering divorce.

He’s started pulling away—staying later at the office, keeping his phone on silent even during dinner, hesitating when I talk about family plans. There’s an undercurrent, like a rip tide I can’t see but can feel tugging at my ankles.

That, I can’t tolerate.

I won’t lie to myself. It’s not just pride—it’s survival. I clutch my phone sometimes and picture our house empty, the echo of the kids’ laughter gone, and my life split in two. Would I still be me if everything I built was gone? Or just a ghost rattling around an empty house, waiting for someone to come home? That’s not an ending I’ll accept.

If you’re reading this and thinking, "Girl, just kick him to the curb," you didn’t grow up where I did. Stability isn’t a luxury—it’s the whole game. My husband isn’t just some worn-out shoe to be tossed aside without consequence. He’s my money tree, and I can’t bear to let him go.

If you grew up where I did, you’d understand—stability isn’t just a word, it’s the bedrock under everything. My grandma used to say you don’t chop down the apple tree just because it drops a rotten fruit now and then. Well, Marcus is my whole orchard. I won’t let anyone else harvest what I’ve cultivated.