Silence.
"We've been... I mean...it's been two years."
It was like her silence induced his verbal vomit.
She felt that number land like a stone in her chest.
There was a shuffle in the doorway.
David. His voice was small, hesitant. "Mum...?"
Her eyes snapped to his, panic flaring so suddenly it almost choked her. How was he going to take this? How much did he hear? She needed to protect him from the worst of it, from the jagged edges she'd just seen.
"It's not anything to worry about," she said quickly, the words tumbling out before she could stop them. "It's...it's nothing, David."
His eyes told her that he knew more than he had let on before he shook his head slowly. "I know, Ma...I know."
She froze.
"I saw them together." He glanced down, then met her gaze head-on, and it was like looking into the eyes of a stranger.
Her lips parted, but no words came.
"Two months ago," he added, answering the question she had yet to ask.
She stood there, barely breathing, the air thick and unmoving around her.
"She's nice," he said finally. "If Dad's happy with her...maybe" He shrugged as though it were that simple.
The sound of her pulse roared in her ears.Nice. If Dad's happy...The words landed like stones hitting her vulnerable body, one after another, until she couldn't tell if she was more stunned by the betrayal or by how easily her son could accept it.
Chapter 3
Ronin felt like the world had slowed to half speed.
For two years, his two lives had run in parallel lines—never touching, never threatening to intersect. The first ripple had come when they had unexpectedly run into David at the mall. And now, without warning, they had collided in the most public, unprepared-for way imaginable.
Dazed, he looked at the woman who, in his mind, if not on paper, was his wife.
Sage was looking at him, her gaze unblinking and glassy with shock. Her brown hair was a little mussed, strands escaping around her face. They'd decided years ago it would be best for her to quit her job in his company and stay at home. She'd put on a little weight around the hips, her belly had never been quite the same after she'd had David. And that was fine with him—he'd never minded—but it struck him, with a sudden pang he couldn't name, that he hadn't reallyseenher in a long time. Not beyond the blurred glimpses between meetings, phone calls, and over the glow of his laptop screen. The hurried dinners and occasional cursory matings.
Everything about Sage was soft. She had been the most loving partner. But about two years ago, her moods had started to swing without any warning. There were days she wouldn't get out of bed. He'd tried to be patient, but his work demanded so much. His company was an e-commerce platform that connected merchants with payment service providers, a start-up now valued at £8.6 billion, headquartered in Bristol. The pace and pressure was relentless. She managed the house, David's school and football activities, and acted as hostess while he made the money. That was the deal, wasn't it?
When they had sex, it felt perfunctory, lights off. He knew she was conscious of her weight and looking back, he didn’t do much to make her feel better about herself because life got so busy. He couldn't remember the last time he'd looked into her eyes in those moments. It had all started to feel like a life on a hamster wheel right about the time David started secondary school.
Her eyes were the softest dove-grey, and in a certain light, they turned into molten silver. Now they were blank and dull, filled with a raw emotion so brutal, he had to look away. For a moment, she looked like a defenceless child, abandoned by those who should have protected her.
He'd met Amanda at a convention two and a half years ago, and she seemed to pull all the air out of the room with her presence. Gorgeous blonde curls, deep dark eyes, a charisma that made heads turn. He admired her beauty, her fire. She'd moved to Bristol for work, and applied for a job at his company. She was a friend of a cousin, and he'd actually met her once before—years ago, when David was still a child and she'd visited his house.
They'd grown close quickly. Amanda was married, but her husband was negligent, sometimes abusive. Ronin remembered the first time he saw the faint bruises on her arm and howsomething in him had clicked into protector mode. But she always went back to that man.
The first timethingshappened was on a group business trip, and he'd regretted it afterwards. They were celebrating a contract signed and they had stayed on in the bar, chatting about life and choices. He hadn’t pushed her away when she pulled him into her room or when she dropped down to her knees and reached for his zipper. He had allowed her to pull his boxers down and take him into her mouth. He had promised himself that it was a onetime thing and Sage never had to find out. But two months later, when Sage was in the grip of another bad spell and he was drowning in work stress, it had happened again. Over the months that followed, it happened nine times. He started telling himself he was in love. That what he had with Sage was the affection that came with all the ways she had been a friend to him and supported him through the years.
Once, he'd thought about telling Sage the truth about a year into the affair. He'd come home to find her reading to David while he played on his Xbox, the smell of his favourite pot roast filling the house. She had stopped midsentence and their eyes had held for a long moment before she blushed and looked away. They'd made love that night. He'd decided then that he couldn't lose her.
But Amanda had a way of drawing him back. She'd sat there as he stammered his way through a breakup conversation. She had looked at him uncomprehendingly with her big dark eyes. Then she had whispered that she was pregnant and broken down as she swore it was his. And things had started to unravel.
Now, here they were, with Sage sitting across from them, and he knew the time of reckoning had was upon him.
