“You’ll regret this.”
“Maybe,” I say softly. “But I regret staying.”
“That money is mine,” she screeches.
“Then take it. It’s all you care about,” I say and feel relief that she can just take what she truly wants and disappear from my life. Clearly not the reaction she wanted, she then storms toward the door and pauses.
“You were nothing without me, Leo.”
“I was something before you, and I’m something again without you. Now fuck off.”
The door slams behind her as my body sags before slumping into the armchair behind me. Everything hurts, but something inside me, something that was poisonous feels immense relief.
“Well, she was delightful,” Lilian says from the kitchen and it makes me laugh out loud.
“You have no idea,” I say, grinning in disbelief.
Ethan stands nearby, watching me.
“How did you know?” I ask.
“I had some acquaintances do a deep check on her. I was going to tell you tonight after we moved your shit over here.”
Of course he did. Let’s ignore the moving in comment as I should be annoyed he went digging around, but I can’t find the energy to care.
“I don’t know why she stayed for so long,” I say as I lean back.
“She stayed because you made daily life easier,” he says. “Not because she loved you.”
I nod, knowing it to be the truth, but it still fucking hurts like hell. All the years together, only to find it was a lie. I was her key to escaping the small town life, and I was her bank account to use while she tried to find something better.
Lilian comes over and touches my shoulder gently before leaving the room, which is very sweet of her.
Ethan kneels in front of me.
“I know you don’t believe me, but you’re safe here,” he says.
I look at him, at my monster. At the man who broke another man’s face in a bar. At the voice that dismantled my marriage with surgical cruelty.
“I don’t know who I am anymore, it’s like I’ve taken over someone else’s life,” I say.
“All you need to know is that you’re mine. Nothing else matters.”
His. Maybe it’s not so bad after all.
CHAPTER 28 - ETHAN
I’m lost in contracts at work, my mind drifting back and forth to Leo and what he is doing. I know he’s in the mailroom, but I want to see him. I thought having him would ease the longing, but it’s only made it worse. I’d prefer him here, chained to my chair while I work.
“Ethan, there is a woman here insistent on seeing you,” Mara, one of the admin girls says, her head peeking around my open office door.
“Who?”
“Sarah, she said you know her,” she says, rolling her eyes like it must be some kind of groupie.
For three seconds, I consider refusing because I’m over the tediousness of the situation. I can’t lose my cool here. But then I remember Leo’s face yesterday morning and decide that this needs to be finished.
“Send her in.”
