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“Did you talk to her?”
“Yeah.” I leave it at that. There’s no way I’m telling him that I tracked her down not once but twice last night. Not when I don’t even understand the reason I did that.
“Have you called that lawyer Dayton told you about?” he asks, referring to our brother, Dayton, who’s a lawyer out in Colorado but has connections all over the US.
“She’s getting the paperwork together. And with the evidence I was able to get on Naomie, she claims I should be good when it comes to paying alimony.”
“Thank fuck.”
“You can say that again,” I mutter. “Because there is no fucking way I would have given her a penny, even if that meant going against some judge’s orders.”
He grunts his agreement without another word. Then again, there is nothing to say. He knows I’ve paid more than my fair share over the years. I’ve taken care of her during our marriage, given her everything she wanted and more than she needed. And after four years, I’ve got nothing to show for the time I wasted trying to make shit work between us.
CHAPTER SIX
miranda
Hearing footsteps, I take my eyes off Kingston, who’s in the living room, dancing along with a video playing on TV, and I watch Bowie hold up a stack of papers as he walks toward where I’ve been sitting at the island in the kitchen.
“What the fuck is this?” he asks, and my heart drops into my stomach when I realize he found the lease for the apartment I’ve rented and the documents I got from the lawyer a week ago.
How did he find them?
I know I hid them in the bottom of my pajama drawer—somewhere he never goes.
“Hello?” He slams the papers on the island, and I jump, causing the coffee in my hand to slosh over the side of the cup.
“I—”
“You want a divorce?” he cuts me off, and I stare at him as I try to get my thoughts in order. I had a whole plan for the way this conversation was going to go. I’ve gone over everything I’d say countless times in my head, but it’s not a conversation I planned on having for at least a few more days. And I wasn’t planning on Kingston being here when it did take place. “Are you going to answer me?” He raises his voice, and my spine stiffens.
“Lower your voice,” I hiss, glancing over at Kingston to make sure he’s still distracted.
“Don’t tell me to lower my voice. What the fuck is this?” He picks up the papers and waves them in front of my face.
“I know,” I say quietly, feeling all the anger I’ve kept bottled begin to bubble to the surface.
“Know what?”
“About Naomie,” I whisper, and his head jerks back.
Surprise? Shock? I don’t know what it is, but it’s obvious he thought he was hiding his affair well.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Don’t do that. Don’t lie. I’ve known about her for more than two weeks, Bowie, and I know you’ve been sleeping with her for a whole lot longer than that.”
“You’ve lost your mind.”
“Oh my God,” I breathe, staring up at him. “You think I’m an idiot.”
“Right now, yeah.”
“Okay.” I set down my coffee, slide off my stool at the island, walk to where his laptop is on the kitchen table, and grab it.
“What are you doing?”
“Hold on.” I open the screen, click on his Messages app at the bottom, then I click on the name Nick, because he was smart enough to know that if I saw a text from some random dude named Nick pop up on his phone, I wouldn’t think anything of it. “Here you go.” I hand him his computer, and his face pales when he realizes what he’s looking at.
God, he really had no idea those messages were on there.
“This isn’t—”
“Do not… say it’s not what I think it is.”
“Miranda…” He sets the computer down. “I—”
“I don’t want this to be ugly,” I cut him off, my heart thundering against my ribcage. “I don’t want to fight with you. I just want us to figure out how to raise our son together.”
“She means nothing. It meant nothing.” He walks toward me, and I hold up my hands.
“I don’t care.” I shake my head. “I told you when we got together that I would rather you leave me than cheat on me, and I meant that.”
“I love you,” he whispers, clenching his fists at his sides.
“You don’t,” I whisper back. “Not the way you should.”
“You’ve been so fucking distant, Miranda. When is the last time we had sex? When is the last time we spent time together?”
My throat burns. “God, it would be so easy to take the blame, to say you’re right, that I have been distant, that our sex life is non-existent because I’m flipping tired. To tell you that when I do have a minute to myself, the last thing I want is to spend time with you or anyone else.” My eyes start to water. “All of that is true, but as my husband, you could have helped me out more, given me a break when you were home so that I didn’t always feel so overwhelmed.” I drag in a shaky breath. “But I messed up. I did too much without asking anything of you. I put you first, because I knew you were working to take care of our family, and I appreciated that sacrifice. But you never realized I was making sacrifices too.”
