I stared at him.
And for the first time, it really hit me. The exact words in the prenup, which maybe I’d misconstrued.
He never actually said I couldn’t sleep with other men. He just said I couldn’t becaughtcheating on him.
“As long as I don’t get caught with my pants down in a video, huh?” I said.
He glared at me.
“And I take that to mean that you’ll be doing the same?” I inquired.
“Yeah,” he growled. “I guess that’s how you can take that.”
“Fine. I’d love to come to the fight.”
I turned on my heel and walked out of the room.
For the rest of the day, I generally avoided my husband.
I’d been personally overseeing the agency’s move into the new office, so I was busy anyway. The office had come furnished, and by lunchtime, the moving company had already come and gone, dropping off all our files and office supplies. I wanted to get settled and up and running as quickly as possible, so I could keep busy and not fall behind with work.
Dane had settled into the big meeting room, right next to my office; his temporary office space. I could see him anytime I wanted to, through one of my glass walls. If I wanted to.
He hadn’t mentioned going back to Toronto yet. I wondered when he would.
So far, we’d talked about him doing a bit of a back-and-forth between Vancouver and Toronto, while I stayed here, for the most part.
I really would’ve liked him to go. So I didn’t have to deal with him every day. So maybe I could focus more on work and less on the big spectacle of our relationship.
It was distracting, constantly fielding questions—in person, on the phone, via email, text and social media—from old friends, distant relations, random strangers. Every damn person who wanted the scoop on my marriage.
And trying to keep up with the Google alerts I’d set, to alert me to online posts about us? Forget about it. Yesterday, I’d turned them all off.
Trying to keep up with that, and analyzing every word that was said, would be crazy making.
I should’ve known. I’d been through it all with Katie. But somehow I just didn’t realize people would care this much. Dane was no rock star. But right now, he was a hot topic, post-sex-tape and all. We were trending, and I wasn’t loving it.
I also didn’t love how my personal life was overflowing into my work life. Clients, models, my coworkers… everyone wanted the damn scoop.
I’d taken to giving absolutely everyone who asked a very shorthand, “He’s wonderful. It’s all been such an amazing whirlwind! How have you been?” And trying to move on.
But so far, Dane didn’t seem to be in any hurry to move on. Like, spend some time back in Toronto with his family, at his own damn office.
He seemed much more interested in making sure our marriage looked real. Which apparently meant staying right where he was. With me.
And getting unaccountably surly with me because his best friend flirted with me.
Other than that, things between us were… copacetic. I mean, they weren’t terrible.
Aside from the fact that he’d basically just told me that we were both free to fuck other people, as long as we didn’t get caught, yet he seemed pissed off at me about it—when I hadn’t even done anything.
That was lame.
The fact that he’d moved the agency into this incredible high-rent office on his own dime, though—an investment in his wife’s future, as he’d called it publicly—went a long way to convincing me that maybe he wasn’tallevil.
I didn’t like him.
But maybe I didn’t have to hate him so hard at every turn?
