Let's end the contract

Xander turned, the blonde woman under him gasped and pulled the sheet over herself. I just stood there, frozen in place, remembering Jax and Tom together. This time around, this betrayal made me feel worse. My eyes blurred and I knew I was about to cry, but I wouldn't do that here, not in front of them. 

I picked up my purse, “Kaia,” Xander called out as he got up from the woman and approached me. 

I took a deep breath, calming myself down and smiled at him. 

“Enjoy yourself Xander.” I said and turned around. As I walked further, the tears came flowing as I walked. 

You handled that well kai. I told myself as I walked to my room. I wouldn't let this break me, no this time. We still hadn't caught whoever was trying to scare me, so I could still say my life was in danger.  

That night, Xander didn’t come looking for me. Honestly, I wasn't expecting him to. The next morning, I showered, dressed for work, and left before he was even up. 

That became the routine, we lived in the same house but didn’t speak. Ate at different times. Slept in different rooms. We passed each other like ghosts, like two people who used to know each other in a past life and had forgotten how it felt to care.

The silence was worse than the screaming would have been. Silence gives you space to think, and thinking, thinking will break you.

I buried myself in work, extending hours, volunteering for projects I didn’t care about. The office became my escape, the place where I could pretend things weren’t falling apart. I laughed when people spoke to me, nodded when needed. 

The second time I caught Xander having sex with another was on a thursday.

I got home early because I left a file behind and had to return it. The driver dropped me off and I walked in, heels clicking against the marble floor, I called for him without even thinking. 

He didn’t answer, then the scent hit me again. Same as before, same direction, same damn guest wing. I followed it, heart pounding but not with fear this time, with anger. I pushed the door open and there was my supposed husband on top of a different woman.

I didn’t drop my purse this time. I just turned and walked out.

By now, even the guards avoided looking me in the eye, the staff whispered when they thought I wasn’t listening. My skin crawled in that house, and I couldn’t sleep without locking my door. I was a prisoner inside a mansion, a wife on paper. Nothing more.

The third time broke something. 

It was raining when I got home. I hadn’t bothered with an umbrella, soaked by the time I stepped through the door. I didn’t go looking this time. I didn’t need to. The moans echoed off the walls before I reached the stairs. The kind you can’t mistake.

I just stood there. Water dripping from my clothes, my hair plastered to my face, and I stared at the staircase.

I didn’t cry. I was too empty for that. What hurt wasn’t the cheating, not even the sex. It was that he knew it would break me, and he did it anyway. Over and over, with no remorse.

I went to my room, peeled off the wet clothes, wrapped myself in a towel, and sat on the floor until the sounds stopped.

Then I got up, walked to the closet, and pulled out my suitcase. It was time.

The next morning, I waited for him.

He walked into the kitchen in joggers and a t-shirt like nothing had happened. Like I wasn’t dying a little every day in front of him.

“We need to talk,” I said.

He didn’t look surprised, didn’t even sit. Just crossed his arms over his chest and leaned against the fridge.

“I want to end the contract,” I said, voice flat.