Total pages in book: 30
Estimated words: 26768 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 134(@200wpm)___ 107(@250wpm)___ 89(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 26768 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 134(@200wpm)___ 107(@250wpm)___ 89(@300wpm)
“I love you boys and you be safe. Mamma needs to use the restroom,” I say over my shoulder, the tears getting ready to fall.
“Love you!” they holler after me, and I rush to the stairs and head to our bedroom. I need a minute.
Once inside, I rush to the closet and sit on the floor against the middle island of drawers. Finally, I let those errant tears return and have their pesky way. Nico looked through me today. He couldn’t see past the rage and see that all I wanted was to explore myself and him more. To end the remaining reminders of all the women he experienced things with. Yes, there are a million other times he has been with women outside of that club, but that is his business, a place he goes to, day in and day out and every time he passes those rooms or has to god forbid step in one, it won’t be me who crosses his mind. It sounds so foolish, but it really isn’t. Nico isn’t just a man, and I am not just Emelia. We are extensions of each other and our mutual possession knows no bounds, at least I didn’t think it did until today.
“Amore mia.” Nico’s voice fills our large walk-in closet and the sob rips violently from my chest.
“No. I can’t look at you right now. I don’t even think I can speak to you. Please leave me alone.” I drop my head in my hands and cry some more. The feelings inside me are incomprehensible. There is a hollow feeling I have never had since becoming Nico’s. It feels like a limb was severed.
“You know I won’t let that happen. You and I can’t avoid this.”
“We can and I plan to for as long as I can. You really hurt my soul today, Nico.” I whisper the tail end of this statement. The words were hard enough to get out, as if a hand were tightly around my neck.
“I know and I see that now. But you need to know why, just like I need to know why you wanted to be in those rooms.” He counters, staying still in the doorframe. I chanced a look up at the mirror and caught a glimpse of those green eyes. Shit. Shit. Shit. At forty-two, he looks even more rugged, aged and experienced than he did at thirty-two when we married and I don’t know how. When I married him, I despised him but had never seen a more handsome, sexy, and rugged man. We are aging together. I am still in my early thirties, but we are supposed to grow old together and that brings me peace usually, but the wedge is so far deep between us, that I can’t help but hurt when looking at him.
“What does it matter? You didn’t care then, and you only care now because you what? Pity me?” I scoff, wiping at my tears.
He growls, “I don’t pity you. I am hurting because my wife is hurting, and I caused it. You said I wanted to look at other women, Emelia. You looked so fucking hurt, like you believed that.”
I stand in a rush and wipe my cheeks more.
“Well, what is it? You are not wanting those memories to be stolen from you, the ones that happened in that room? Or you’re embarrassed for me to be seen there in that way? Which is it, Nico? Go ahead. Spit it out!” I yell, and he rounds the island, gaining on me and in my unpreparedness, I step back and hit the mirror.
“What the fuck is in that head of yours and why are you making up these fucking lies, Emelia! I am sure as hell not embarrassed of you. I show you off like a goddamn prize. What about the night you decided to test me so badly, I fucked you with my gun above all those men and women? So, I am calling your bluff. What do you want?” he hollers, wrapping his hands possessively around my neck.
“You! I wanted you to show me what things I have never had before! To explore me in ways that don’t make me feel like you have to because I am your fucking wife! Treat me like a whore. Like I mean nothing to you. I wanted to be every version of myself, for myself and for you! Your whore, your fling, your mistakes, and your fucking wife!” My chest heaves up and down rapidly, and my skin is ablaze. The room feels like a million degrees, but hell, did it feel good to get that off my chest.
“There it is, oh my wife. Such a good girl. I knew you knew better than to think those things about us,” he coos at me, releasing one hand from my neck and petting my hair as I cry harshly.