Chapter 3Raising My Husbands Mistresss Son

Benedict didn’t come home for days. I stopped checking. I stopped calling. I focused on the only thing I had left: my work.

But when I returned to the university for the start of the semester, the atmosphere was different. Students whispered as I passed. Colleagues looked at the floor.

“Professor... you should go to the lab,” one of my favorite seniors said, her face twisted with pity.

When I reached the experimental wing, I saw her. Callie was standing in the plaza, holding a megaphone and a massive banner.

“FIVE YEARS AGO, I WAS FRAMED!” she screamed, her voice echoing off the brick walls.

“My mentor, Michelle—the university’s ‘Golden Professor’—she’s a fraud! She stole my research! She Photoshopped those pictures to ruin me because she was jealous of my talent!”

Callie saw me. Her eyes filled with a terrifying, vengeful light. She rolled up her sleeves, revealing a lattice of scars—some old, some fresh.

“I spent five years in the gutter because of her! I was an undocumented worker in a foreign country! I worked construction! I went to prison just so I wouldn't freeze to death! All because of Michelle! She isn't a teacher—she’s a monster!”

The crowd turned to me. I felt the weight of a thousand judging eyes. I kept my posture straight.

“Where is your proof, Callie?” I asked calmly.

I knew the truth. I knew I hadn't stolen a thing. But before Callie could answer, a man stepped out from behind her.

Benedict.

My husband—the man every person in this department knew as my partner—stood protectively in front of the woman who had helped destroy my peace.

“I can testify,” Benedict said, his voice carrying across the quad. “I have the evidence of her academic fraud. I have the proof that she stole Callie’s life’s work.”

I stared at him, my breath hitching. “Benedict? You’re lying. Why are you doing this?”

He didn’t look me in the eye. He simply tapped a USB drive in his hand. “I’m just finally telling the truth.”

It didn’t matter if the drive was empty. The fact that my own husband was siding against me was all the "proof" the world needed.

I was suspended that afternoon. My research projects were frozen. The internet exploded with vitriol. The university’s enrollment plummeted because of the scandal.

I spent my days trying to clear my name, but the doors were slammed in my face.

“Professor, I’m so sorry,” Callie whispered when I ran into her near the parking lot a few days later. Her tone was mocking. “Benedict saw how much I was suffering and decided to help. If you had just been a little kinder to me, maybe it wouldn't have come to this.”

It was a coordinated strike. To "wash" Callie’s reputation, they had decided to drown mine.

When I finally saw Benedict at home, he didn't apologize.

“You should go stay at a hotel for a while,” he said. “Toby is here, and I don't want the protesters affecting him. Michelle, it’s just one sacrifice. I know it’s unfair, but if you hadn't been so cold to Callie, I wouldn't have had to do this.”

I looked at him and felt a deep, visceral surge of disgust. I didn't even have the energy to scream.