We started this business very small as a couple. It was my idea but I put my wife in charge because we were selling women’s products. My wife would come on live and sell the things like her life depended on it. When I had to come on live to sell them, it was all comedy, so I had a lot more people buying from me than from my wife.
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I would go live on weekends and my wife would do it on weekdays. Very soon, we had a shop. Very soon, stock ran out as quickly as it came in. Very soon, we started dealing with retailers. It took us over five years to get to the point where my wife decided to leave her job and concentrate on the business full-time.
She would travel to Dubai, China and Turkey to buy stock. I stayed behind to make sure things ran smoothly while she was away. It got to a point where she was buying everything from China, even items we previously sourced from Dubai or Turkey. She said she got them at a better price there but the figures on the receipts didn’t support that.
Anytime she was travelling to China, I handled all the bookings until one day, when she had already spent two of her four booked nights there, I received an email from the hotel asking us to confirm our reservation and whether we were still coming or cancelling it.
Red flags were raised.
I didn’t ask any questions until she returned and I started digging.
My wife has two numbers—one personal and the other for business. Her business phone had all the information I needed. Her ex was schooling in China and they had rekindled whatever they once had. So anytime my wife was in China, it was a honeymoon for the two of them.
I saw money she had wired to him, the thank-you messages from the guy, messages about how much he had enjoyed their time together and how he wished my wife would move to China permanently to live with him.
I even used the phone to chat with him while pretending to be my wife. The kind of things the guy said, I can’t repeat here.
I placed the evidence on the table and she started shivering.
“Oh my God, why did I bring myself into this situation? I don’t even know what to say. Oh my God. I’m dead. What came over me?”
She went on in a monologue without giving any concrete explanation.
She’s currently pregnant—a pregnancy I thought was mine. But now, she can’t even say for sure whether the child is mine or the guy’s in China.
We are still together but we both know we no longer have a marriage. Our families are also aware.
I wanted 70% of the business but she says no. Lawyers are currently involved. I also want the child to be born so we can do a DNA test.
Once everything is confirmed and I get my share of the business, we’ll be over so she can travel to China and live with the love of her life.
—Ennin
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