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“It’s a dangerous business,” he said. “To downplay that is to lie.”
“He’s just sharing his experience?—”
“Why do you defend him?” He slouched in the chair, elbows on the armrests. “You confided your fears to your father, and he basically told you to dust yourself off and get back out there.”
“I’m not defending him,” I said. “And can we ever discuss my father without it turning into this?”
His fingers came together in front of him, his stare annoyed. “Probably not.”
“I told him I was thinking of opening a restaurant.”
“And?”
I shrugged. “He didn’t have much to say.”
“At least he accepted your decision. That’s more than I expected.”
The conversation went deeper than that, and I wasn’t sure why I was tempted to share it. “He said if I don’t want the business…then there’s no reason for me to stay married to you.” Once the words were out into the ether, tension filled the room and masked the aroma of the meal we’d just finished.
Axel didn’t change his posture or his stare, rigid and hard as stone.
I wasn’t sure what he would say to that, but I didn’t think he would say nothing.
I continued to withstand his stare, absorbing the tension until it made me feel toxic.
“Is that what you want?” His deep voice broke the silence, calm despite the malice in his expression.
“My father thinks you would keep him as a partner if I did decide to leave.” I didn’t phrase it as a question, afraid of being too forward about the situation.
He cocked his head slightly, continuing to look at me with coldness. “Let’s just say I did keep him on… What would you do?”
Now the air was too thick to breathe. It was like hot steam filling my lungs, so heavy that I couldn’t get the oxygen that I needed. “I don’t like to speak in hypotheticals?—”
“I’ll keep him on if you leave. There.” He massaged his knuckles, his focused stare trained on me like a scope from a sniper. “No more hypotheticals.”
The stakes had just been raised, and I felt like I’d walked into a trap.
“What’s it going to be, baby?”
Now that I wanted nothing to do with the business, I had no reason to be there anymore. I could walk away whenever I wanted…start over with someone new…move back in to my old apartment. I’d tried so hard to avoid Axel when we were first married, but now my old life sounded pathetic…and miserable. “I want to stay.”
He continued to massage his knuckles as he looked away, his face turning toward the window that showed the dim lights through the heavy fog. Then a slight smile moved over his lips. “You knew how I felt before I said a word.” He turned back to me, arrogance in his stare. “Because you felt it. Felt it in my gaze. Felt it in my obsession. My commitment, passion, and words. That’s how you know it’s real, when it exists without ever being spoken. Now I know you feel the same way.”
I felt like a deer in the headlights. Felt like my diary had been opened and read from cover to cover. All my secrets were exposed for everyone to see—and Axel had a fucking microscope.
“So why don’t you be a man and say it?” He stopped massaging his knuckles, his joined hands resting against his bottom lip.
My eyes dropped to the table between us, the goose bumps like hills and mountains up my arms. My heart beat at a quicker pace, like I was running rather than sitting in place. His stare was too much, like the sun was right in my face as I tried to drive.
“Come on, baby…”
My eyes lifted to meet his, and the same old flashbacks swept across my mind, picturing him with Cassandra, a woman who looked so different from me that I didn’t understand how he could be attracted to us both. It filled me with as much pain now as it had the moment it happened. It toughened my heart and covered it with scales. “My father said as long as you’re associated with the business, I would be associated with it. And the best way to hurt you…is to hurt me.”
The arrogance was slowly wiped away.
“So, I’ll never be safe.”
“You’re always safe with me.” His voice dropped, turning quieter and stronger at the same time. “I would never let anything happen to you. Ever.”
