OUR PERFECT LOVE WAS A LIE

THE QUESTION HE CAN'T ANSWER

CHAPTER THREE

Elena waited until Adrian finished breakfast before bringing up the photograph.

She had spent most of the night thinking about what she had found, going over every possibility until exhaustion finally overtook her. The simplest explanation was that she had misunderstood the date or that there was something about Adrian's past she had never bothered to ask about.

But the more she thought about his reaction the previous evening, the harder it became to believe that.

Adrian sat across from her at the dining table, reading something on his tablet while his untouched coffee cooled beside him. Elena watched him for a moment, trying to reconcile the man sitting peacefully in front of her with the stranger she had begun to suspect existed somewhere beneath everything she knew.

"Who was waiting outside that building with you?"

Adrian slowly raised his eyes.

"What building?"

"The old Cole office."

Something changed in his expression.

It was subtle enough that another person might have missed it, but Elena had spent three years learning his moods, his silences and the slight shifts in his face that appeared whenever something mattered to him.

"Where did you get that photograph?"

"So you know it."

He placed the tablet on the table.

"Elena, where did you get it?"

"Does that really matter?"

"It does."

"Why?"

Adrian leaned back in his chair, and for several seconds he seemed to be deciding how much of the truth he could give her without revealing everything he had spent years trying to keep buried.

"I should have told you about that period of my life."

"You should have told me that you knew who I was before we met."

His eyes dropped.

The silence that followed confirmed what she had already begun to understand.

"You knew me."

"I knew about you."

The distinction did nothing to ease the growing ache in her chest.

"How?"

"I heard your name through my family."

"What did they say about me?"

"Not enough for me to understand everything."

"Then tell me what you did know."

Adrian looked at her.

"I knew your name. I knew you were Marcus Hart's daughter. I knew your family had a connection to mine."

"And the photograph?"

"I had seen you before."

Elena's fingers tightened around the edge of the table.

"Where?"

"I don't remember."

"You don't remember?"

"It was years ago."

"You expect me to believe that?"

"No."

The honesty of his answer unsettled her more than an excuse would have.

Elena rose from her chair and walked toward the window. She needed a moment to collect herself before the hurt turned into anger.

"You knew my name. You knew my father. You had information about me before we met. Now I'm supposed to believe none of that had anything to do with why you approached me."

Adrian stood.

"I was investigating something connected to your father."

Her eyes closed briefly.

There it was.

The answer she had been afraid to hear.

"Did you approach me because of him?"

"At first, yes."

The words seemed to change the room around her.

She turned slowly.

"At first?"

"I didn't know what would happen after that."

"You knew exactly why you were there."

"I knew what I was looking for."

"What were you looking for?"

"I can't tell you yet."

Elena gave a quiet, disbelieving laugh.

"After three years, you still can't tell me?"

"There are things I need to confirm."

"You've had three years to confirm them."

"I know."

"Then what have you been waiting for?"

Adrian didn't answer.

That silence hurt more than anything he could have said.

Elena had always believed that whatever problems existed between their families belonged to a past neither of them had created. She had never imagined that Adrian had entered their relationship carrying a question about her father.

Now she wondered how much of their beginning had been real.

"Was any of it real?" she asked.

Adrian's expression changed.

"Elena."

"The first time we met. The conversations. The way you kept finding reasons to see me. Was that all part of your investigation?"

"No."

His answer came immediately.

"Not after I got to know you."

She wanted to believe him.

That was the most painful part.

---

Elena left the house before either of them could continue the conversation.

She drove to a café near her office and sat at a table by the window, though she barely noticed anything around her. Her coffee remained untouched while she searched through old records on her phone.

The photograph had given her one useful clue: the building.

She searched its name and found references to a company that had once been connected to both the Hart and Cole families.

The discovery made her sit upright.

Her father's name appeared beside Richard Cole's in an old business article.

A partnership.

She searched again, this time looking for the year the partnership had ended.

The results were surprisingly vague.

There were mentions of a financial dispute, an unfinished project and a disagreement between the two families, but nothing that explained why the partnership had collapsed.

Her father had never told her about any of it.

Neither had Adrian.

She was still reading when her phone vibrated.

A message appeared from the same unknown number.

Now ask him why your families stopped working together.

Elena stared at it without replying.

Another message followed.

You're closer than you think.

She locked her phone.

Whoever was behind the messages knew too much.

This wasn't simply someone trying to interfere with her marriage. They knew about the old business relationship, Adrian's investigation and apparently the reason she was asking questions now.

For the first time, Elena wondered whether the person sending the messages had been waiting years for her to start looking into the past.

---

When Elena returned to the office, she found a message from her father asking her to call him.

She hesitated before dialing.

Marcus answered almost immediately.

"Where are you?"

"At work."

"You sound upset."

"I have a question."

There was a pause.

"About what?"

"Did the Hart family ever have a business partnership with the Coles?"

The silence that followed was longer than she expected.

"So there was one," Elena said.

"Who told you about it?"

"That's not important."

"It is if you're asking questions about the Coles."

"Why have you never told me?"

"Because it happened a long time ago."

"That doesn't explain why you kept it from me."

Marcus sighed.

"Elena, there are things from that period that are better left alone."

"Adrian knows about them."

Her father's voice changed.

"What did Adrian tell you?"

"That he was investigating you."

Another silence.

Then Marcus asked, "Did he tell you why?"

"Not completely."

"Listen to me carefully."

His tone had become serious.

"Whatever Adrian told you, don't trust him."

Elena leaned back in her chair.

"Why?"

"Because the Cole family has never forgiven us for what happened."

"What happened?"

"I don't want you involved."

"You're my father. I think I deserve to know what happened to my own family."

"You will know when the time is right."

"When is that?"

Marcus didn't answer.

Instead, he said, "Stay away from Adrian's investigation. Whatever he thinks he knows about our family, he doesn't have the whole story."

The call ended shortly afterward.

Elena remained at her desk, staring at the screen.

Her father had sounded frightened.

That was what disturbed her most.

Marcus Hart was not a man who frightened easily.

---

Adrian came home later than usual.

Elena was sitting in the living room when he entered. He removed his jacket and placed it over the back of a chair before noticing the expression on her face.

"My father called you, didn't he?"

Adrian looked at her.

"Yes."

"What did he say?"

"He asked what we'd discussed."

"And?"

"I told him the truth."

Elena studied him.

"Did he warn you?"

"He warned me to stay away from you."

Her brows drew together.

"He said the same thing to me."

Adrian's expression tightened.

"What exactly did he say?"

"That I shouldn't trust you."

He looked away for a moment.

"He's right about one thing."

Elena waited.

"I have kept things from you."

She stood.

"Why?"

"Because I was trying to protect you."

"From what?"

"I don't know yet."

She stared at him.

"That's the problem, Adrian. You keep using protection as an excuse for silence."

"I know."

"No, you don't."

Her voice shook despite her effort to remain composed.

"I could have accepted that your family had problems with mine. I could have accepted that you had information about my father before we met. What I can't accept is discovering that the person I married made decisions about my life without giving me the chance to make them myself."

Adrian's expression softened.

"I was afraid."

"Of what?"

"Of losing you."

For a moment, neither of them spoke.

Then Elena asked, "When you first met me, did you already know who I was?"

"Yes."

"Did you know where I would be?"

"No."

"Did you arrange our meeting?"

"No."

"Did you begin talking to me because of my father?"

Adrian nodded.

"Yes."

The answer was painful, but at least it was an answer.

"What changed?"

"You did."

Elena looked at him.

"I wasn't expecting to care about you. I wasn't expecting to fall in love with you. By the time I understood what was happening, the investigation no longer felt more important than what I had with you."

"But you never told me."

"I kept thinking I would find the truth first."

"And then you would tell me?"

"Yes."

"When?"

"When I knew it wouldn't put you in danger."

Elena shook her head.

"You still don't understand. The secret itself isn't the only thing that hurts. It's that you decided I couldn't handle the truth."

Adrian looked down.

"I know."

She took a breath.

"Before you met me, were you looking for me?"

This time he didn't hesitate.

"Yes."

"Why?"

"My father believed your family had taken something from ours."

"What did they take?"

"I don't know."

"Then what were you looking for?"

"Evidence."

"Evidence of what?"

Adrian's expression hardened.

"That your father was responsible for what happened to mine."

Elena felt as though the ground beneath everything she had believed about their marriage had shifted.

The man she loved had once entered her life believing her father had destroyed his family.

Yet somewhere along the way, that investigation had become something else.

Something real.

Before she could ask another question, Adrian's phone rang.

He glanced at the screen.

It was Clara.

He answered.

"Clara?"

He listened without speaking.

Elena watched his face change as the conversation continued.

"What do you mean it's missing?"

Another pause.

"Where did you find it?"

He ended the call.

"What happened?" Elena asked.

Adrian looked at her, and whatever Clara had told him had erased the uncertainty from his face.

"There was a file."

"What file?"

"The investigation I started before we met."

Elena's stomach tightened.

"What about it?"

"Clara found out someone had accessed it."

"Who?"

"We don't know."

Adrian's phone vibrated again.

He looked down at the new message.

After reading it, he handed the phone to Elena.

The message contained only one sentence:

She found the file.

Elena looked back at him.

"Who is she?"

Adrian's silence told her that the answer was going to change everything.

"The file contains information about you," he finally said.

Elena stared at the screen.

"What kind of information?"

Adrian's voice dropped.

"Information I was never supposed to let you see."