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He flushes with pleasure. I get the feeling that he doesn’t get very many pats on the back. “It is my pleasure, ma’am. Always happy to be of service. Can I help you up to bed?”
“No.” I turn towards Misha’s office. “Not just yet. Go ahead and lock up, Noel. Goodnight.”
As I go, my thoughts are a pounding drumbeat of one word, again and again. Nag. Nag.Nag.
That word—I loathe it. I have a long and complicated history with it. I linger on the stairs, remembering how I felt the first time Clara had hurled it at me.
“You’re such a fucking nag,”she snapped.“No, I didn’t hurt myself on purpose. I slipped and fell. That’s why I have the scar.”
“What did you cut yourself on?”I pressed.
“You don’t believe me?”
“I didn’t say that. I asked what you cut yourself on.”
Clara laughed cruelly.“You’re going all red and blotchy. What’s the problem, Paige? It’s not a big deal. It’s nothing but a little scar.”
All those years ago, I let her shut me up like that. Now, I wish I’d kept asking. Kept nagging.
Because one little scar turned into more, and more, and more.
Until she drew a cut that she wouldn’t ever come back from.
My heart is thundering, but I ignore my nerves and bust into his office just in time to see Misha pull out the sofa bed. Shirtless. I force my gaze from his abs to his eyes.
“You’ve got another thing coming if you think that hiding in here is going to solve anything.”
He sighs without looking at me. “I’m not hiding, Paige. It’s been a long night.”
“Then you should go to our actual bedroom and go to sleep.”
“I’m avoiding a fight.”
“You can face those shadowy men in the yard, but you’re too afraid to face your wife when she’s angry?”
“I didn’t want to spoil the victory of your first dinner party. You did amazing tonight. You deserve to feel good about that.”
I nod angrily. “I agree. I do deserve to feel good about that. Except that all I’m feeling is hurt and pissed off that my husband called me a ‘stubborn nag’ and walked away.”
He raises his eyebrows. “What do you—”
“See the thing is, Misha,” I say, powering through the half-formed speech I drafted in my head while stomping over here, “it’s not nagging when you care about the person. It’s not nagging when you love the person. Clara used that word to shut me up, and I refuse to let you do the same thing.”
“Paige—”
“Any time I tried to get past her walls, any time I feared she was going to do something dangerous or unsafe, I’d question her. All she had to do was throw that word at me, and I’d shut right up. I’d step aside and let her make mistakes I could have prevented because I didn’t want to be perceived a certain way. And now, well… Fuck that,” I continue. “The day she died, I knew deep down that something was wrong. I asked her not to go see Moses. I told her I thought he was trouble. She turned around and said,‘Stop with the nagging and get off my back.’That’s what she said to me, and I let it work. Then she walked out of my life and she never came back. So I’m not about to let you hurt me in order to get me to back down. I’m your wife, Misha. You gave me a ring and said I could never take it off. So I won’t. But guess what? If I can’t take it off… neither can you.”
He holds my gaze for a long moment.
Then he walks around the sofa bed and grabs my hips.
“That was quite the speech.”
I frown. “Don’t distract me.”
“How am I distracting you?” he asks. “I’m just standing here, talking to you.”
“Stop looking at me with those eyes.”
