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I’m getting pretty good at it, and then reality comes crashing down on ordinary Tuesday night while we’re eating the steak and mashed potatoes that Mona served for dinner.
I’m almost done with my meal when I notice that Ava has spent more time moving the food around her plate than eating it.
“What’s wrong, pet? You’ve been quiet all night.”
As though she’s trying desperately to find some normalcy in our “relationship”, Ava acts like the girl I remember whenever we’re alone. She’s chatty and smart, witty and thoughtful, silly and sweet. She’s mine, and I spend every minute away from her counting down the seconds until I can tuck a stray strand behind her ear as she tells me another story about her last group of first-graders.
I’m head over heels for a teacher. Part of me is so fucking proud that she lived out her dreams, that she didn’t let me going off the rails the way I did throw her off her path. The other side—the darker side that’sDevil—wonders how she’s going to react when I eventually tell her that she won’t be going back to Springfield Elementary in September.
I couldn’t risk it. Set aside how a school is a dangerous place these days because of fuckers with no brains and guns that I never would’ve passed into their hands. Sooner or later, all of Springfrield is going to know that she’s the Devil’s bride. It won’t be safe for her out there.
I don’t know if it’s safe for her in here, either, but that’s where she’s going to stay.
Tonight, something’s on her mind. I wonder if it’s because she’s figured that out, but then she looks up from her barely-touched food and says, “Did you mean it?”
“Mean what?”
“When you said that this was a real marriage… did you mean it?”
I drop my fork to my plate. “Why are you asking me that?”
I thought we got this shit out of the way. From the moment I claimed her in the judge’s bathroom, she was mine, and there was no going back. For God’s sake, she has my name wrapped around her finger—just like she hasmewrapped around her finger—and she still doubts that I’m dead-fucking-serious about spending the rest of my life with her?
What else do I have to do to prove that she’s mine?
“It’s nothing,” she says, pushing her potatoes around the plate.
The fuck it is. “Ava. Tell me.”
She exhales.
I grip the table, so tight my knuckles turn white.
Pretty green eyes flicker my way. “No.”
I’m glad she feels comfortable enough to deny the monster in her midst. I don’t ever want Ava to fear me the same way the rest of Springfield does, and I thought I lost the silver of affection I garnered from her after I showed my true colors at the Playground.
But this is different. The whole conversation started because she can’t shake the idea that our marriage is fake.
I’ll get her to see that it couldn’t be any more real if it’s the death of me—or someone else.
“If you don’t tell me, I’ll get them to.” And they won’t like my ways of getting them to talk. “Mona, too. If they’re talking shit in front of my wife, I know she heard them.”
“No,” yelps Ava. “She stood up for me.”
Ah. “Mona,” I call, lifting my voice so that my housekeeper can hear me. “Come here, please.”
“Link… it’s fine. I shouldn’t have said anything.”
Yes. She should.
“You will always tell me when something is bothering you,” I say firmly, waiting for Mona to bustle her way into the living room. “I want to know, especially if it’s something that I can fix.”
“You’ve done enough for me—”
“I’m your husband,” I remind her, hating how cold I sound as I say that. It’s better than raging—which part of me wants to do—but not by much. “I will doeverythingI can for you.”
“Link…”
