I Worked Three Jobs To Support My Paralyzed Mother-in-law. I Came Home Early And Found Her Dancing While My Husband Filmed Her. How Should I Get Revenge?

The Fifty Thousand Dollar Trap

As I left Helen’s room, I felt as if I had just escaped from a tomb. The dim evening light filtered through the living room window, but it couldn’t dispel the chill that enveloped my soul. I looked in the mirror and saw a strange woman with a cold gaze looking back at me.

That night, Kevin came home slightly drunk. He mumbled something about a grueling work dinner and stumbled towards the bathroom. Kevin’s habit hadn’t changed in years; when he got home, he would leave his briefcase on the sofa and his laptop always in sleep mode. He rarely shut it down completely. Normally I respected his privacy and had never felt the curiosity to open his computer, but today that respect had become an unnecessary luxury.

I waited to hear the sound of the shower and crept over to the laptop on the desk. I opened it. The screen lit up asking for a password. I tried Kevin’s date of birth, then our wedding anniversary; both were incorrect. My heart raced. An idea crossed my mind. I remembered the information from Amber’s Facebook profile I had found that afternoon; her birthday was June 12th.

Trembling, I entered the sequence 1206 followed by the last two digits of her birth year. Enter. The desktop appeared instantly. I felt a sharp pain as if I had been slapped. The password to his computer, which contained his entire work world and secrets, was his mistress’s birthday. The last fragile hope that Kevin was just going through a passing affair completely vanished.

I had no time for self-pity. I quickly scanned the desktop folders, which looked normal with messy work files, but my intuition told me it wasn’t that simple. I went into the D drive and looked for folders with generic names like “Reference Documents” or “System 32.” After a while, I discovered a hidden folder named “New Project.”

I clicked on it and a series of image files appeared. They were ultrasound scans of the fetus, from a tiny dot to a clear 4D image of a baby sucking its thumb. Under each image were careful notes of the date: Son 12 weeks, Son 20 weeks, and the most recent, Son 26 weeks, looks just like dad.

Next to them were intimate and explicit photos of Kevin and Amber during his work trips. They were hugging, kissing, laughing happily. The look in Kevin’s eyes towards her was filled with an affection he hadn’t shown me in a long time. But what left me breathless were not those photos, but a PDF file named “Loan Agreement.”

I opened it. It was a scan of a promissory note for $50,000. The borrower was me. The signature below was 90% identical to mine. The lender was a completely unknown name. The content clearly stated: “I have borrowed this money for a business investment that resulted in losses.”

I covered my mouth to keep from cursing. It turned out they had planned everything with this level of detail. A fake debt of $50,000. In case of divorce, this debt would be considered a joint debt, or worse, they would attribute it entirely to me, forcing me to sell the house and car to pay it off. They wanted me to leave empty-handed or even burdened with debt while they enjoyed the assets I had built with so much effort. This was no longer a simple sentimental matter; it was a conspiracy of fraud and misappropriation of assets.

Kevin had not only betrayed me physically but also wanted to corner me to steal my future. The water in the bathroom stopped running. I jumped and quickly connected a small USB drive I always carried with me. I copied the entire “New Project” folder at lightning speed. The progress bar moved slowly, mocking me. My heart felt like it was going to burst out of my chest. 90%, 95%. Kevin started to open the bathroom door. The sound of the latch echoed. Done.

I pulled out the USB, closed the laptop, and quickly got into bed, covering myself with the blanket and pretending to be asleep. Seconds later, Kevin came out drying his hair, glanced at the bed, and muttered,

“Sleeping so early, what a useless woman.”

He went to the desk, turned on the computer to check something quickly, and then turned it off. I lay under the blanket, my back drenched in sweat, clutching the cold USB drive in my hand. This was going to be a long night, but I knew I now held the weapon that would make them pay a heavy price.