I Donated My Kidney to My Wife—Then I Heard Her Secret Through the Hospital Curtain
Chapter 6
I returned home before Claire.
Then I did something I had never done in six years of marriage.
I searched her private office.
The first drawer contained nothing unusual.
Receipts.
Insurance papers.
Old notebooks.
The second contained photographs.
The third was locked.
I broke the lock.
Inside was a small black journal.
I opened it.
The first page contained a date from six years ago.
The day before our wedding.
Under it were three words.
“Phase One: Trust.”
My hands began shaking.
I turned the page.
“Daniel believes I’m marrying him because I love him.”
Another page.
“His father’s records remain inaccessible.”
Another.
“Need time.”
Then another.
“Do not tell Adrian.”
I stopped.
Adrian hadn’t been working with Claire.
He had been investigating her.
I kept reading.
The journal wasn’t a confession of hatred.
It was worse.
It was a record of guilt.
Claire had originally married me to gain access to my father’s records.
But somewhere along the way, something had changed.
She had fallen in love with me.
The entries became increasingly conflicted.
“He’s kind.”
“I didn’t expect this.”
“I want to stop.”
“I can’t.”
Then, three years ago:
“I found evidence that Daniel’s father was not the person who caused Marcus’s death.”
I froze.
Another page.
“Thomas Vale lied.”
Then:
“He destroyed both families.”
I turned the page.
Nothing.
The next page had been torn out.
So had the next five.
Someone had removed them recently.
I heard the front door open.
Claire was home.
I closed the journal and put it back.
She entered the office.
“You shouldn’t be standing.”
“I’m fine.”
She smiled.
“Did you miss me?”
I looked at her.
“Did you ever love me?”
Her smile disappeared.
“What kind of question is that?”
“Answer it.”
She stepped closer.
“I love you.”
“Before or after you found out my father’s records might clear your father?”
She stopped.
The silence answered first.
Then she whispered:
“How much do you know?”
“Enough.”
She sat down.
Her eyes filled with tears.
“I was going to tell you.”
“When?”
“After you recovered.”
“From giving you my kidney?”
She covered her mouth.
I had never seen Claire cry like that.
But I couldn’t comfort her.
Not this time.
“Tell me everything.”
She looked at me.
And for the first time in six years, my wife told me the truth.
