A 30-year-old Burlington man being held for the attempted murder of his wife reportedly told police in Sunnyside that he killed his wife because he believed she cheated on him.

His wife didn't die, but she was left for dead Oct. 5 in the woods along Nulle Road, within feet of the Whatcom County border.

Two bicyclists found the 20-year-old woman crawling out of the woods, bleeding profusely from an "ear to ear" slice across her neck, according to the arrest affidavit.

Hector Garcia-Pelayo is being held in the Skagit County Jail for investigation of second-degree attempted murder.

The day before the incident, the woman packed her belongings and went to her brother and sister-in-law's house in Bellingham with her two children, ages 2 and 5, incident reports say. She intended to stay there because of marital problems.

The next morning, Garcia-Pelayo came to pick up his wife and children and go shopping, he told his sister-in-law.

The woman's brother called Garcia-Pelayo repeatedly later in the afternoon after the couple did not return. During the first call, Garcia-Pelayo said the couple was "on their honeymoon," according to the affidavit. He didn't answer the other calls. Later, the woman’s brother received a call from Garcia-Pelayo's brother in Mexico who said Garcia-Pelayo was going to kill his wife.

The woman’s brother and sister-in-law broke into the couple’s Burlington home and found the woman’s purse with her credit card and identification laid out, reports say. A note in Garcia-Pelayo's handwriting said the woman cheated on him, according to the detective's report.

That afternoon, the bicyclists reported finding the woman bleeding along Nulle Road between Summerland Drive and Nulle Woods Court. Responding officers found a trail of blood from south of Nulle Road to about 40 yards into the woods, where they saw two large blood stains, according to the affidavit.

The woman was taken to St. Joseph Hospital in Bellingham and underwent surgery. She's expected to survive.

At 1:18 a.m. Saturday, Skagit 911 received a State Patrol report of Garcia-Pelayo telling Sunnyside police he had killed his wife, investigative reports say. He admitted to cutting her throat and leaving her in the woods, indicating on a map where he did it.

He said he threw a kitchen knife in some bushes at the scene and that the children were in the back seat of the couple’s pickup truck nearby at the time, according to the affidavit.

After he left his wife in the woods, he dropped his children off at a relative's house near Yakima.