My husband’s mistress wasn’t my biggest problem. She was my first clue.
I thought catching my husband with another woman was the moment my life burned down, but I was wrong.
For seventeen years, I trusted Rick Brandt. He was my husband, a respected fire investigator, and the man everyone believed when he walked onto a scene. I believed in him too.
Then I see him with the insurance adjuster who has spent years fighting my reports, and the first crack appears in the foundation of our marriage.I’m a structural engineer. My entire career is built on finding hidden damage, and once I start looking at Rick the same way I look at a burned building, I realize the affair isn’t the biggest thing he’s been hiding.
It’s only where the evidence starts.
Someone has been altering reports and using my name to condemn houses that could have been saved. Someone has been turning tragedy into profit, and every answer I find points back to my husband.
When Matthew Anderson comes to me with questions about the fire that killed his sister, everyone else dismisses him as a grieving brother looking for someone to blame.
I know better.
Matthew isn’t emotional. He’s right. Together, we uncover a pattern of burned properties, forged evidence, and lies that cost an innocent woman her life.
Rick thinks he knows exactly how to destroy me. He knows my weaknesses, my habits, and every piece of the life we spent seventeen years building.
He forgot my job has always been finding the truth after everything else burns away.
