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At the second, louder knock, my heart is calmer, and I can manage a coherent “Yes.”
I pull the duvet tighter around me as the door opens, the light from the other room flooding the bedroom.
“Mrs. Sinclair…” Murphy’s eyes flit down to the floor like I’m standing naked or barely covered. “Your husband is trying to call you.”
“Oh.” I’m taken aback by his use of my marital name. I don’t know why. “Ryan, you don’t have to call me Mrs. Sinclair anymore. I’m here.”
“The orders are the same.”
Of course they are.
“Thank you,” I say, turning back to the bed.
“Your phone.”
He doesn’t enter the room. Extending the phone, he waits for me to take it from him, where he stands. When I do, he excuses himself and closes the door softly.
I debate ignoring the call that comes through almost instantly, but I can’t. I thought we’d wake up to each other. After last night…
“Belles?” Christopher’s muted voice comes from the device in my hand.
Holding it up to my ear, I take a deep breath before I reply. “Christopher.”
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.”
I shake off the unease in my chest as I drop the duvet back on the bed and head to the bathroom. I’m fully prepared for the chaos we left behind last night. However, when I go in, it’s all cleaned up. The basin is still cracked, the mirror is gone, but apart from that it’s all clean.
“Why are you quiet?”
“I just…the bathroom…”
“Oh, ummm…I had someone come clean it up after you fell asleep.”
I don’t know what bothers me more—the fact that he allowed people to potter through our room when I was asleep, that I didn’t notice it at all, or that he’s made it sound like he hasn’t slept.
“I didn’t want you waking up to all that shit.”
Turning the shower on before I sit on the toilet, I wait to see if he’ll carry on. But he’s quiet, and my chest hurts with the silence between us. It wasn’t like this last night…this morning?
“I had to come into work.” His voice has that tone that suggests he’s not saying everything. “I didn’t want to wake you.”
“I wish you had. I …”
“Belles, I need you to tell me something.”
“Anything.” The word blurts out of my mouth before I can stop it. I know I’m fucked with his sharp intake of breath.
Standing, I pace from one end of the large bathroom to the other as I wait for him to ask me whatever it is that’s bothering him. I have a fair idea of what’s coming, but I don’t understand why he’s taking so long to come out with it.
The longer I wait, the tighter my chest becomes. My stomach turns and twists with my building anxiety.
With the steam from the shower, the air is becoming too thick and impossible to breathe.
“What do you want to know?” I ask, opening the door to the bedroom, and as I’m about to head back towards the running shower, my eyes catch on the bedroom door.
It’s partly opened when I watched Murphy close it. Although I know I shouldn’t, I start for it.
