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Reid followed, slamming the door shut. “And we’re going to have to be more vigilant about the rings,” she added, slipping hers back on now that we were safe in the car.
The strain of our secret marriage weighed on me more and more every day.
We spent the next few days frantically shifting from happily married newlyweds at home to perfectly professional at the office, and the constant tension had me ready to snap.
Apparently, Reid wasn’t too far either. “Could you get me that report? I left it on your desk, thanks, babe.”
“Reid!”
She glanced up and realization washed over her face. “Fuck!” she hissed, glancing past me and out the door to where Clara sat on the phone with a client. “Do you think anyone heard that?”
“God, I hope not.” I sighed, my brows bunched in exhaustion. “This is getting dangerous.”
It was hard enough to get used to something as simple as remembering to act normal when I dropped a kiss on Reid’s cheek before leaving for work just because her mom was awake. But having to shed the persona I wore as Reid’s wife also stripped me of that sense of security that had become familiar to me.
Maybe because being married to Reid meant I could stay and provide for my family. Maybe because I enjoyed how well she slipped into the role ofmywife around her mother, going as far as making me coffee in the mornings.
“We’ll manage,” she assured me, even though she sounded far from sure of herself.
It was all a little overwhelming.
I couldn’t help but wonder when the other shoe would drop.
Chapter 16
Mom To The Rescue (Not)
REID
“Youstillhaven’ttoldthem, right?”
I glanced up from my phone, my eyes meeting Mia’s.
“Told who?” I asked, my thoughts otherwise occupied by her appearance.
She wore a pair of checkered plaid pajama pants with an old T-shirt, her feet hidden away in a pair of very fluffy yellow duck slippers. It shouldn’t have been nearly as endearing as it was but the fluffy duck slippers were so out of place in her otherwise normal outfit.
She grabbed handfuls of her hair and twisted it up into a bun, securing it with a hairband before resting her fists on her hips and staring at me.
“Your friends,” she clarified, as if she could have been talking about anything else. “You haven’t told them about the marriage.”
I shook my head slowly. I wasn’t sure what had prompted this line of questioning and I didn’t know where it would lead.
“Apart from Alex,” I reminded her needlessly, setting my phone down on the coffee table to give her my full attention. “None of the others know about it. They’re under the impression that Warren pulled a miracle. Why?”
Mia shrugged nonchalantly. “I was just thinking about it,” she explained. “I have my sister and you have Alex. At least we’re not going totally crazy with the secret, right?”
“Right,” I murmured, and smiled as she waved good night and disappeared up the staircase.
It shouldn’t be difficult. Keeping our marriage a secret for a year should be easy. I’d said as much when I pitched the entire idea to Mia. So why was it sapping me of every shred of energy I had?
I toyed with the wedding band on my left ring finger. My mother had gone out to dinner and God knew when she’d be back, and I didn’t want to be caught unaware. Trying to hide our sleeping arrangements had been hard enough.
A part of me was still convinced my mother was suspicious, but there wasn’t much else I could do. It was either camp out in the living room together with Mia until my mother went to bed or hide in my bedroom and wait.
The latter was, for obvious reasons, plan B.
And when I brought it up to Alex the next day at brunch, she was as helpful as I’d imagined her to be.
