Total pages in book: 37
Estimated words: 36268 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 181(@200wpm)___ 145(@250wpm)___ 121(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 36268 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 181(@200wpm)___ 145(@250wpm)___ 121(@300wpm)
“I don’t want his money.”
“Then what do you want?” The question escapes before I can stop it, rough and demanding.
She looks at me then, really looks at me, and for a moment her mask slips. Raw pain flashes across her features, so acute it steals my breath.
“Nothing you’re capable of giving.”
The words hit me in the chest. I actually feel myself flinch, the movement small but there. Myca’s hand finds my knee under the table, squeezing in what she probably thinks is comfort.
My skin crawls at the contact. Wrong wrong wrong. Every instinct screams at me to shake her off, to reach for the right woman, to fix this before—
“If we could focus,” Adriano suggests mildly, though his eyes miss nothing. “There are assets to discuss. The Monaco property—”
“She can have it.” The words tumble out, surprising everyone including me.
Sienah’s eyes widen. “I don’t—”
“The cars, the investments, whatever she wants.” I’m unraveling, everything slipping through my fingers like sand. “Just—”
Just come home. Just look at me the way you used to. Just let me fix this somehow.
But the words stick in my throat, choking me.
“How generous,” Myca purrs, her fingers tracing patterns on my thigh now. “Though I’m sure we can negotiate something more...reasonable. After all, ten years isn’t so long in the grand scheme of things.”
I feel rather than see Sienah flinch. The small wounded sound she makes hits me like a sledgehammer to the chest.
“Ten years,” she repeats softly, like she’s tasting the words. Testing their weight. “No. I suppose it’s not.”
Her chair scrapes back. She’s standing, swaying slightly, and I’m halfway out of my seat before I catch myself.
“I need a moment,” she says to Shayla. “Please.”
She turns to leave, and panic claws at my throat. She’s walking away again. Leaving again. I can’t—
“Sienah.” Her name tears from my throat without permission.
She pauses in the doorway but doesn’t turn. I can see the tension in her shoulders, the way her hand grips the doorframe for support.
“I’ll sign whatever you want me to sign.” Her voice is steady now, empty of everything that makes her...her. “Just send the papers when they’re ready.”
She’s almost gone when Myca speaks again, her voice pitched to carry.
“Don’t worry about Aivan, darling. I’ll take excellent care of him.” She leans into me, her breath hot against my ear as she stage-whispers, “Just like I did in the limo earlier. You remember, don’t you? How eager you were to—”
The sound that tears from Sienah’s throat is wounded animal pain. She spins, eyes wild, hand reaching out to steady herself against the wall.
And then—
She sees Myca’s hand on my thigh. Sees how close she’s pressed against me. Sees what this looks like, what Myca wants her to see.
The last bit of color drains from her face. Her eyes go glassy with shock, pupils blown wide with something beyond pain. Beyond betrayal.
Recognition.
She thinks I’ve already replaced her. Thinks I’ve already moved on. Thinks the limo was—
“No.” The word rips from my chest. “Sienah, it’s not—”
Her hand moves in what seems like slow motion, reaching for something, anything to hold onto. Her fingers brush the side table, catching the edge of Shayla’s crystal vase.
Time slows as it topples.
I watch her face crumble in the space between heartbeats. Watch the last thread holding her together snap. Watch her shatter as completely as the vase that’s about to—
CRASH.
The sound of shattering glass cuts through her words like a scream.
I’m on my feet before the last shard hits the floor, my body moving without conscious thought. Every instinct screams at me to go to her, to explain, to fix this catastrophic misunderstanding. The crystals scatter across marble like tears, like all the broken pieces of what we used to be.
Sienah stands frozen in the doorway, her face gone ghostly, her eyes fixed on where Myca’s hand still rests on my thigh. The look on her face—
No. Fuck. No.
It’s the same look from eight years ago. The night she begged me not to become her father. Not to break her the way he broke her mother.
And now she thinks I have.
Behind her, Shayla’s expression is unreadable. “I’ll get a broom.”
But I can’t look away from my wife’s face. From the devastation bleeding through before she locks it down, pulling that awful numbness around herself like armor. And suddenly I’m transported back to the only time we’ve truly fought in ten years.
Don’t cheat, Aivan.
Her voice breaking on my name.
Please don’t be like the man who sired me and made a fool of my mother.
One look at her face now and I know exactly what she’s thinking. What this looks like. Myca pressed against me, talking about the limo, about making me happy, about being eager...
My blood turns to ice in my veins. She thinks I’ve already betrayed her. Thinks I’ve already become everything she feared.