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She snorts at my impassive statement. “You probably blame me.”
“No. I think it takes two people to get to where you are.”
Her eyes turn to me with a sharp expression. “No. It takestwoto make a marriage work and onlyoneto break it.”
I cross my arms over my chest, watching her drown her sorrows in wine. “Who do you blame for your marriage breaking?”
The red liquid sloshes against the glass as she refills it. As a matter of fact, she says, “Him.”
“Did you cheat on him?”
My mum always told me you can read people through their eyes. Mouths lie, but the eyes don’t. When I look at her dark eyes, I don’t see guilt in them. She seems reassured in herself.
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because he didn’t care. He knew about the first man the second it happened but kept quiet until he could use it to hurt me.”
She seesherselfas the victim even though she is the cheater.
“You are looking at me like I’m the devil.”
Maybe the devil’s twin sister.
She puts her wine glass down for the first time and stares at me. “I tried to get his attention, but it didn’t work. Men are possessive over their women. I thought if he knew I was looking elsewhere, he would come back to me. But he didn’t.” She picks up her glass and takes a long sip. “He didn’t care until the world almost found out. Only then did he call me out on it.Onlythen did he remind me I was his wife.”
As she laughs to herself, I try to find an excuse to leave. She isn’t threatening, but she gets into my head.
Imagine how Xavier feels.
She stops to take a drink before continuing. “Are you in love with my husband?” Her eyes hone in on me – unwilling to move as she scrutinises the shock on my face at her blunt question.
I square my shoulders. “No. Why would you think that?”
Her tongue darts out slowly as she runs it along her bottom lip. “I wouldn’t blame you. He’s handsome and charming. He’s very well endowed.” There’s a spark in her eyes as she reminisced about his cock.
“No,” I bite out. “I’m not in love with him.”
The smile is gone in an instant. “But you want to be? You want him all to yourself?”
She is fucking crazy. I have done nothing to make her think I’m after her husband.
“I have no interest in Xavier.”
A pool of tears brims in her eyes. “You are naïve. My husband wants you all to himself. He looked at me the same way once upon a time. It was meant to be a fairytale, but it’s nothing but an ugly tragedy.” She looks around the room as she says, “This is the only room in the house I can freely be me. I don’t have to be Emery Rivers. I’m just plain old orphan Emery. She doesn’t have expectations forced on her. She isn’t made to feel like a failure. She doesn’t have a husband who watches her every move.” Her gaze turns back to me. “This is the only room where he can’t hear and see everything.”
What?
My throat runs dry, and I feel violated. “The rest of the house has cameras?” I try to remember everything I have said and done in this house.
She nods. “Yeah. He watches everything. All the fucking time. I had to beg him to give me one space without an invasion of privacy.” She gestures to the room. “This shitty small room and the hallway outside is all I have. I used to come up here and lock myself in all day to piss him off. It would be the only time he would care about my existence. He hated not knowing what I was doing.”
I feign indifference as I ask, “What about the guesthouse?”
She waves me off. “No. He didn’t need cameras there because it was always locked. He put these in to make sureIwas behaving.”
I make a mental note to check for cameras anyway.
