“To be clear, I was talking about rock flavours.” I smile down the phone as I look through the selection.
“What are you talking about, Mat?”
My stomach drops. That’s not Connor’s voice. Panicked, I check the name on my screen and realise I’ve picked up a call from Rhys by mistake.Shit.
“Erm…” My mind races as I try to figure out what to do. I should just hang up or tell him to fuck off, but my brain won’t send the right signals to allow me to do either. My fight, flight or freeze response has kicked in, and apparently, I’ve chosen tofreeze.
“Matilda, where the hell are you?” Rhys sighs. “I came over to your fucking boyfriend’s house to talk to you.”
“We’re not there,” I say quietly.
“Obviously. That’s why I had to phone you!”
I flinch at his tone but try to keep my voice even so I don’t attract attention in the tiny shop. “What do you want?”
“I want you to stop being stupid and come the fuck home!”
I feel my heart start to pound in my chest and lean on a shelf of teddies wearingi love llandudnoT-shirts, for support. I’d stupidly assumed that my telling Rhys I wanted a divorce was the end of us, and I’d pretty much forgotten all about him for a couple of glorious days, so hearing his voice has come as a shock.
“Home?” I repeat. “I don’t have a home with you anymore, Rhys.”
“For fuck’s sake, Matilda. I’ve given you a couple of days to be dramatic and now I’m done. Come. Home.”
“I don’t live with you anymore, and I want a divorce,” I whisper-shout into my phone and switch it to my other ear, slightly further away from the shop owner, who’s currently trying to eavesdrop while he works.
“We’re not getting a divorce.” Rhys’s confident tone takes me by surprise, and for a moment I’m speechless.
“I… What…? Yes, yes, we are!” I finally say.
“No, we’re not, Muffin.”
I flinch at the sound of my old nickname and swallow a mouthful of bile.
“Shall I tell you why?” Rhys asks casually.
I nod reluctantly, then realise he can’t see me. “Yes.”
“Because you’re going to come home to be my wife again. You will call off this ridiculous fling you’re having, which I’m willing to eventually forgive you for, by the way, and move back in withme. You will never speak to yourfriendagain, and you will only leave the house for work or if you’re with me so I can keep an eye on you. And you will do all of this without complaining because if you don’t, I’ll be going straight to the police.”
“The police?” I scoff. “It’s not illegal for a woman to divorce her cheating husband. What the hell would they charge me with?”
“Not you,” Rhys replies with glee. “Connor.”
“I don’t understand.”
You dragged Connor into your drama again, and now he’s in the firing line.
I pull myself deeper into the shop to avoid being overheard and press my phone closer to my head so I can hear Rhys over the ringing in my ears.
“The day you walked out on us, Connor came over and attacked me. It was totally unprovoked, and I was vulnerable seeing as my wife had just abandoned me. At the time, I was too intimidated to go to the police in case he took his temper out on me again, but I’m starting to feel braver. I might take a trip to the station and make a statement. Unless” – I take a sharp breath as I wait for the final blow I know is coming – “you agree to my terms.”
This can’t be happening. I’ve misheard. Rhys wouldn’t do this to me. We’ve had our problems, but he’s never been this cruel and controlling, has he?
“You can’t be serious.”Please say you’re not being serious.
“Oh, I am,” he says, his smile evident in his voice. “Ball’s in your court, Matilda. Come home and be a proper fucking wife or I go to the police and lay it on really thick about how Connor assaulted me. If I play it right, I might be able to get him done for ABH. That’s, what? Up to five years in prison?”
Five years in prison because he was trying to defend me.
