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‘Explain that, if you please,’ he rasped tightly.
‘You’re lauded for your sharp brain, Neo. Work it out for yourself.’
When I tugged myself free he released me. And that little act of setting me free, when deep down I wanted him to recapture me, drove the hard truth home.
His actions would always skew towards protecting himself. Towards shoring up his foundations with thick layers that guaranteed everyone else would remain on the outside.
Which was rather a sad and agonising state of affairs, because I very much wanted to be on the inside. So much so that when the composure that had held me together crumbled I let it, allowing the hot scald of tears to mingle with the warm shower jets. The hiss of the water muffling my quiet sobs.
But what I didn’t know in those stolen, self-pitying moments was that my agony was only just starting.
Work it out for yourself.
I resented the unnerving panic those five words had triggered.
We were married. We’d made an agreement!
But listing her better qualities had opened my eyes to what I’d known for a while...that Sadie was truly different from Anneka. A wife a husband would be proud to possess.
But...what kind of husband? One who valued her for her brain but was too jaded to look into her heart? Perhaps because his own emotions fell short of fulfilling her needs?
Could I really stop her if she deemed me unfit to hold up my end of the bargain? If the doubts I harboured about my effectiveness as a father grew apparent?
I’d negotiated another deal in my favour by reclaiming her in my bed. One that had given me a yearning for a state I’d never considered before.
Contentment.
Theos mou, the woman I’d married was sensational. She tasted like the purest strain of innocent temptation, which would only get richer when she’d fully embraced her sensuality.
I should be pleased.
And yet, her words had only intensified that hollow sensation I’d woken up with the morning after the wedding. The feeling that had expanded ever since.
Not in a glaring, aggressive way, that could easily be identified and fixed, like a marketing flaw that required sharp intellect and an eye for detail. It had started as a ripple on the surface of a pond, effortless but determined. Unstoppable. Expanding against my will and desire to contain it.
And you need this triple-strength protection, why?
I ignored the wheedling voice, alarmed when I couldn’t find any immediate comeback as to why I needed protection against Sadie.
Even more disturbing was the louder voice that questioned whether I was equipped to safeguard what I fought so valiantly for once my child was born. Cynicism and bitterness and being a shark in the boardroom were hardly the cornerstones of fulfilling parenthood...
Would the child I was so intent on claiming eventually resent me?
No. I would do better than the indifferent and bitter hand I’d been dealt. Just as I knew Sadie would too—if only to counteract what her own father had done to her.
The hollow sensation intensified—as if now I’d admitted one craving, several more demanded to be addressed.
Something was missing. Perhaps...within me.
Had I bargained with chips that were flawed? Pushed Sadie into marriage without stopping to examine whether I was the type of husband she wanted? A fit father for our child?
Money. Influence. Power. All things I could offer.
All things she’d rejected one by one without batting an eyelash.
Her question lingered long after she’d disappeared into the bathroom, after the hiss of the shower taunted me with the knowledge that tonight might have been the only pleasure I experienced with her.
And then, like that tree I’d known would be my doom in that moment of clarity right before the accident in Gstaad, when I heard the sharp scream from the bathroom, I suspected things would never be the same again.
