But hidden behind his toolbox, I found something that made my heart stop beating for a moment.
Three glass bottles with clear liquid inside.
They had no labels, but they didn’t smell anything at all.
Just like the liquid I saw pour into my soup that terrible night.
Next to the bottles was a notebook with my daily schedule written in Marcus’s lyrics.
I had been checking what time I was going to work, what time I was going home, what I was eating at breakfast and dinner, like I was some kind of scientific experiment.
I took pictures of everything with my phone and put the bottles back exactly where I found them.
My hands were shaking so much that I could barely hold the phone firmly.
That night, Marcus prepared dinner as usual: grilled chicken with rice and vegetables.
First the dish served me, smiling like the loving husband I pretended to be.
“Eat, honey,” he said. You need to regain your strength.
I stirred the food on my plate, pretending to eat while watching Marcus carefully.
He seemed nervous, checked his phone every few minutes and looked at me in a snatch to see if he was really eating.
When she got up to go to the bathroom, I quickly picked up most of my food on a napkin and hid it in my bag.
I’d throw it away at work tomorrow.
Later that night, I heard Marcus quietly speaking on the floor in the lounge.
I sneaked to the top of the stairs and listened.
“It’s getting worse faster than we expected,” he said. “Maybe we should slow down a little bit.”
A female voice answered me, but I could not hear clearly what he was saying.
It sounded like Sophia, but I wasn’t sure.
“No, you’re right,” Marcus continued. We have to follow the plan. Just a few more weeks and all this will be over.
I crawled back to our room and pretended to be asleep when Marcus went up the stairs.
But I spent the whole night awake, finally understanding the truth.
My husband was slowly poisoning me to death, and my own sister was helping him do it.
I couldn’t stand the uncertainty anymore.
I needed proof of what Marcus and Sophia were doing to me.
So I decided to install hidden cameras in our Lincoln Park home.
The next morning, while Marcus was in his downtown office, I drove to an electronics store in Wicker Park and bought three small wireless cameras.
The salesman taught me how to connect them to my phone so I could see everything from my office in Willis Tower.
I placed a camera in our kitchen, hidden behind a coffee boat on the counter.
Another went to Marcus’ basement workshop, hiding among some cans of paint where he kept those mysterious bottles.
The third camera was placed in our living room, behind a photo frame on the shelf.
For three days, I saw normal, boring images of Marcus doing things typical of a husband: brewing coffee, watching TV, working on his laptop.
I started to think maybe I was going crazy.
Perhaps the stress of managing hotels in Chicago, Miami and Los Angeles was turning me paranoid.
Pero el jueves por la tarde, todo cambió.
Estaba en mi oficina revisando los informes de ganancias de mi hotel en Beverly Hills cuando mi teléfono vibró con una alerta de la cámara de la sala de estar.
Abrí la aplicación y vi a Sophia sentada en nuestro sofá con Marcus.
Estaban sentados mucho más cerca de lo que deberían estar una cuñada y un cuñado.
Subí el volumen de mi teléfono y escuché su conversación.
—¿Cuánto tiempo más tenemos que seguir así? —preguntó Sophia, pasándose los dedos por su cabello rubio—. Estoy harta de fingir que me importa Victoria cuando la veo.
Marcus le tomó la mano y se la apretó.
“Solo unas semanas más, cariño. El médico dijo que el arsénico debe acumularse lentamente en su organismo, o resultará sospechoso.”
¿Arsénico?
Me estaban envenenando con arsénico.
“I’ve been throwing it in the morning coffee and dinner for almost two months,” Marcus continued. “He’s losing weight and getting weaker every day. It will soon seem to have died of stress and overwork.”
Sophia leaned towards Marcus and kissed him on the lips.
It was not a family kiss.
A romantic kiss between two people in love.
“I’m looking forward to us being together openly,” he whispered. When Victoria leaves, we’ll have all her money and hotels. We can get married and live in that beautiful Miami penthouse.
My own sister planned to marry my husband after I was murdered.
Marcus pulled out his phone and showed Sophia something on the screen.
“Look, I’ve been forging Victoria’s signature on these documents. When he dies, you will be listed as a beneficiary of all his business instead of me. So no one will suspect that I killed her for money.”
“You’re so smart,” Sofia said, kissing him again. Victoria always believed the sister ready, but she has no idea what’s going on right in front of her nose.
They talked for another hour about their plans.
How would they make my death look like a heart attack caused by work stress.
How would my Chicago hotels sell and move to California together?
How they had been having an affair for over a year, seeing each other in secret while I was traveling on business.
Sophia even commented on how jealous I had always been to my success.
“Victoria was given everything,” he said bitterly. “The intelligent, the successful, the one who couldn’t be wrong. Well, now it’s my turn to have the perfect life.”
I recorded everything with my phone, with my hands shaking with rage and betrayal.
These two people I loved most in the world had been slowly killing me for months while planning their future together.
But the worst came at the end of their conversation.
“When should we give him the final dose?” Sophie asked.
Marcus thought for a moment.
“Next Tuesday. I’ll put enough arsenic at dinner to kill her in a few hours. Then I will call 911 and pretend to be the shattered husband who finds his wife dead of a heart attack.”
“And then we’ll be free,” Sofia said, smiling like she was talking about a vacation instead of my murder.
They said goodbye with a kiss and Sophia went out the back door so that the neighbors would not see her.
I was sitting in my office on the 40th floor of Willis Tower, contemplating Lake Michigan, and I realized I had five days to figure out how to save my life.
Mi marido y mi hermana llevaban dos meses envenenándome, y planeaban terminar el trabajo el próximo martes.
Pero ahora conocía su plan, y me aseguraría de que les saliera el tiro por la culata de la peor manera posible.
El martes por la noche llegó antes de lo que yo quería.
Me senté a la mesa del comedor en Lincoln Park, observando a Marcus servir la sopa, sabiendo que se suponía que esa sería mi última comida.
Pero Marcus no tenía ni idea de que yo lo sabía todo.
Durante los últimos cinco días, estuve fingiendo comer la comida que él envenenó mientras, en secreto, la tiraba a la basura.
I felt stronger than in months.
My hair stopped falling out.
The stomach pain had disappeared and I could think clearly again.
Marcus seemed excited tonight, almost elated, as he removed the tomato soup.
“I prepared your favorite dish,” he said, smiling like he really cared. Lately I’ve been looking very tired. I thought some comfort food could be good for you.
I watched him carefully as he served the soup in our bowls.
When he thought he wasn’t looking at it, he pulled a small glass bottle out of his pocket.
This time, it poured much more clear liquid into my bowl than I had ever seen before.
Enough to kill me in a matter of hours, as I had told Sofia.
“I’m back right away,” Marcus said when his phone rang. It’s a work call.
He walked into the living room and I could hear him speak quietly.
I knew I was probably telling Sofia that it was all over, that I would die soon.
This was my chance.
My hands were shaking, but I quickly changed the bowls of soup.
The bowl with enough arsenic to kill me was now in front of Marcus’ chair.
The clean bowl was in front of me.
When Marcus returned, he was practically radiant with happiness.
“I’m so sorry, honey. You know how demanding the job can be.”
We both started eating our soup.
Marcus told me how the day had gone, I wondered about my meetings in downtown Chicago, behaving like the perfect husband, but I could see the excitement in his eyes.
He thought he was watching me eat my last meal.
“This soup is delicious,” I said, taking another tablespoon of the clean plate. You cook very well.
Marcus radiated pride.
“Anything for my beautiful wife.”
About twenty minutes after I finished eating, I was washing the dishes when I heard Marcus make a strange noise behind me.
I turned around and saw that his face had become completely white.
“I don’t feel good,” he whispered, holding on to the edge of the table.
Then I started sweating.
Large drops of sweat were running down his face, even though our house was fresh.
His hands were shaking as he tried to get up from his chair.
“Victory,” he exclaimed chorshortly. Something’s wrong. I think I need to go to the hospital.
But before he could take a step, his legs failed him and he collapsed on the kitchen floor.
That’s when the seizures started.
Marcus’s entire body was shaking violently. It came white foam from his mouth and his eyes were exorbitant from terror.
I was trying to say something, but only drowned sounds came out.
I stood there, watching my husband die poisoned with the same poison he had planned for me himself, and I didn’t feel the slightest compassion.
This man had been slowly killing me for two months while planning a future with my sister.
Marcus’ phone vibrated over the counter.
I picked it up and saw a text message from Sophia.
Is it done yet? Call me when you’re gone. I love you.
My own sister was waiting for the news of my death.
I looked down at Marcus, who kept convulsing on the floor of our kitchen.
His eyes met mine and, for a moment, I think he understood what had happened.
I think he realized he’d changed the place bowls.
“You were going to kill me,” I said quietly, kneeling next to him. You and Sophia were going to stay with everything I had worked for and lived happily ever after.
Marcus tried to talk, but now only blood came out of his mouth.
I found another text message on his phone, one that I had written but had not yet sent.
It’s already done. He’ll be gone in the morning. I’m looking forward to starting our new life together.
I had also prepared a suicide note on his laptop, making it look like I had committed suicide because of work stress.
Every detail of my murder had been planned perfectly, except one thing.
Marcus never expected me to discover his plan and use it against him.
Now he was dying for his own poison, and I was perfectly fine.
I called 911 with shaky hands, as I watched Marcus give his last sighs on the floor of our kitchen.
“911, what is your emergency?” the operator asked.
“My husband is dying,” I said, trying to sound scared rather than relieved. I think he’s been poisoned. Please send help to the 1247 North Cleveland Avenue in Lincoln Park.
“Ma’am, are you conscious? Are you breathing?”
I looked at Marcus.
His body had stopped shaking.
His eyes were still open, but now they were empty.
“No. I think he’s gone.”
First came the paramedics, followed by two police officers.
Detective Rivera was a tall woman with short black hair who immediately began asking me questions while paramedics confirmed that Marcus had died.
“Mrs. Victoria Martinez, I’m Detective Rivera of the Chicago Police Department. Could you tell me what happened here tonight?”
I had rehearsed this story in my head.
We were having dinner together, a normal soup and bread. About thirty minutes after lunch, Marcus said he wasn’t feeling well. Then it collapsed and began to shake. I’ve never seen anything like it.
Detective Rivera was writing everything down in her notebook.
“Did your husband have any health problems, heart problems, allergies, something like that?”
“No, I was perfectly healthy. They did a physical exam last month and everything was fine.”
