chapter ten
Pepper Spray
Tiffany
“What about this dress?” I ask Mira, pointing to the black modest high-neck dress on the rack.
Mira cuts her eyes at me and lifts a brow. “You’re going to an award ceremony, not to a damn funeral.”
I shove the dress aside and go back to scan the racks for something else. We were in one of those formal dress places in the mall.
“Every dress I pick out, you say it looks old, or too uptight.”
She doesn’t seem to like any dress I find.
Noah giggles at something his godmother does, drawing my attention to my baby boy.
“Your mother is being ridiculous, fat man. She knows good and well everything she has picked so far is ugly.” She looks back at me with a smirk. “I don’t even know why you’re in this store? Your husband is a millionaire. You can get a custom-made dress from a designer sent to your house. What’s the use of having a rich man if you don’t do rich shit?”
Instead of laughing like I usually would at her joke, I place my hands on my hips, turn and glare at her. “Just because Nico has money doesn’t mean I’m going to just use it. I make my own money, I don’t need his.”
Mira watches me closely. Her gaze narrowing.
“What’s this really about?”
Tossing my hands up in the air, I let out a breath. I hate that my best friend knows me so well. Looking around, I spot Jake leaning up against the wall a few feet away. His attention is focused outside the store and not on our conversation.
“He told me I didn’t have to take him. Can you believe him? He is my husband, and he should want to go with me. Instead, he says you can take Mira. It’s like he isn’t even trying to fix us.”
Mira cocks her head to the side. “He told you he didn’t want to go with you to a ceremony for an award he nominated you for?”
Glancing down at my feet, I cross my arms over my chest. “I mean, basically.”
It’s been a little over a week since he told me about the award. Since then, he has been avoiding me. Usually, Nico is always finding a reason to be in the same room as me. Hell, he was around so much I got tired of arguing with him. Just like the morning he came into my room after my shower to tell me about spending the day with Noah. However, suddenly I can barely find him in the house.
“What did he say exactly?”
Ugh. I repeat word for word what he said to me that day in the kitchen. Every time I think about it, my stomach seems to twist in on itself. When I finish, Mira watches me without speaking.
“Girl,” she finally says. “Something is wrong with you. That man basically begged you to take him.”
“He did not.”
“Tiff, he said he wants to go with you but understands if you’d rather take me. And just so we are clear, I’m now going to be busy that night. You are taking your husband.”
She pushes the stroller with my baby over to another rack and starts scanning through the dresses.
“You don’t understand.” I run my fingers through my blowout roughly. “Nico doesn’t ask permission. He just puts himself in my life. Him saying I can take you tells me he doesn’t want to go.”
“Or,” she says, not turning to me. “It sounds to me like a man willing to get out of his comfort zone to appease his wife.” She finally stops looking through the dresses to turn to me. “You won’t tell me what he did, I get it. But everything you’ve told me since says he is trying to fix things.”
The problem I’m having with Nico is that I question everything he does now. Nothing feels authentic. It’s like I have to stay on my toes with him because nothing is as it seems. Looking back at the start of our relationship, I missed so much. Things that should’ve been obvious.
I hate this feeling, but it is where I am with him. The last time I took everything he did for face value, I was getting kidnapped and looking over my shoulder for a fake bad guy. How can I believe that anything he says and does is real? I can’t.
“It’s hard to believe him,” I admit softly.
She places a hand on my shoulder. “The best advice I can give you is to stop overthinking and listen to your gut.”
