8

Tobias

The quiet hum of the engine was the only sound inside the leather-scented interior of the sedan. Beside me, Valeria turned her face toward the rain-slicked window, her reflection pale and ghostly against the dark glass.

I looked down at the glowing screen of my laptop, pretending to analyze a spreadsheet, but the numbers were just blurred shapes. My mind kept pulling me back to the hospital room—to the sickening, visceral panic that had seized my chest when I found her motionless on the guest room carpet.

I hated how it felt. I hated that sudden, wild loss of control. I was a man who managed multi-billion-dollar corporate acquisitions, a man who navigated cutthroat boardrooms without a flicker of emotion. Yet, for an hour tonight, I had felt like a helpless spectator, carrying her light, fragile frame down the stairs, terrified that she might stop breathing in my arms.

It irritated me. It irritated me because I couldn't rationalize it. It was just basic responsibility, I told myself, hardening my jaw as I finally shut the laptop screen. She is my wife. Any decent man would react the same way if his wife fainted. It doesn't mean anything more.

When we arrived at the mansion, the heavy iron gates swung open in silence. I stepped out first, opening her door and offering a hand to help her out of the car. Valeria looked at my outstretched palm for a second, hesitated, and then stepped out on her own without touching me. Her hand stayed tucked deeply inside the pocket of her wool coat.

A sharp, familiar prickle of annoyance settled in my throat.

We walked into the quiet warmth of the foyer. Mrs. Gable hurried out to take our coats, her eyes lingering nervously on Valeria.

"I'm fine, Mrs. Gable," Valeria said, her voice soft and surprisingly calm. "I just need to rest."

She began walking up the grand staircase. I followed a few steps behind her, watching the slow, deliberate way she moved, holding onto the mahogany handrail as if she were afraid her legs might give out again.

When she stepped into the guest bedroom, I stopped at the threshold. The room was dark, save for the dim yellow light spilling from the hallway lamp. And there, sitting right beside the dark oak wardrobe, was the navy-blue leather suitcase. It was still open. A few sweaters and dresses were neatly folded inside, while a white silk blouse lay crumpled on the carpet where she had dropped it when she collapsed.

I stared at the suitcase. The breath hitched in my lungs.

"You were packing," I said, my voice dropping into a low, dangerous tone as I stepped into the room.

Valeria didn't turn around right away. She walked over to the vanity table, reaching up with slender, pale fingers to unpin her hair, letting the dark waves fall over her shoulders.

"Tobias, I'm tired," she said quietly. "Can we please not do this tonight?"

"You were actually planning to leave," I repeated, ignoring her plea. I took three long strides into the room, stopping a few feet behind her. I looked at her reflection in the oval mirror. Her face was entirely blank, stripped of the warmth and devotion that had filled her eyes for four years. "Without a word. You were just going to pack your bags and walk out of my house."

Valeria turned around slowly, resting her hands against the edge of the vanity. She looked directly into my eyes.

"Would it have mattered?" she asked softly.

The sheer simplicity of the question threw me off balance. "Would it have mattered?" I scoffed, crossing my arms over my chest, letting cold authority mask the strange hollow feeling opening up in my stomach. "You are my wife, Valeria. You don't just pack a bag in the middle of the night and disappear like a thief. You are overreacting because of a single argument."

Valeria looked at me for a long moment, and then a quiet, bitter laugh escaped her lips. It wasn't a loud, angry laugh. It was a sad, breathless sound that cut deeper than any scream.

"A single argument?" She shook her head, a dry, sad smile touching her lips. "Tobias, our problems didn't begin yesterday. They didn't begin when you forgot our fourth anniversary, or when you took a call about Serena while I sat waiting in a cold room. They began four years ago, the day you put a ring on my finger and brought me here to live in a house full of her shadows."

"I have provided everything for you!" my voice rose, the quiet tension in the room snapping. "You have a home, security, freedom, status—anything you could possibly ask for! I have never been cruel to you, Valeria."

"You haven't been anything to me," she countered, her voice remaining impossibly steady, though her dark eyes burned with raw, suppressed grief. "You haven't been a husband. You've been a roommate who pays the bills and looks at me as if he's wishing I were somebody else."

I clenched my fists at my sides, my patience wearing thin. "We have Serena’s memorial gala in three days. The Vale family, the press, the Hayes board of directors—everyone will be there. We cannot afford a public scandal, Valeria. I will not have the media writing stories about my marriage falling apart while we are honoring her memory."

The moment the words left my mouth, I saw the subtle shift in her expression. The faint flicker of emotion in her eyes vanished completely, replaced by a cold, glassy stillness.

She nodded once, slowly. "Of course," she whispered. "Appearances. That's what this is about. It's always about appearances, isn't it? It's about what the board thinks, what Eleanor thinks, what the papers say. You don't care that I collapsed on this floor, Tobias. You care about how it looks if your replacement wife isn't standing neatly at your side on Saturday."

"That isn't what I said," I gritted out, though a wave of guilt hit me hard against the chest.

"It's what you meant," she said quietly.

My eyes shifted away from her face, landing on the dark polished wood of the dresser beside the vanity. There, sitting quietly in the center of the mirror tray, was her diamond wedding ring. It glittered under the dim light—a cold, heavy band of platinum and ice.

I reached out, my fingers wrapping around the metal. It was still cool to the touch.

I took a step closer to her, extending my hand, holding the ring out between us.

"Put it back on," I commanded, my voice flat, leaving no room for negotiation.

Valeria looked down at the sparkling diamond sitting in the palm of my hand. She didn't reach for it. She didn't make a move to take it.

"Why?" she asked, her voice barely audible over the sound of the rain beating against the windowpane.

"Because you're still my wife," I said, staring down at her, trying to force the absolute reality of that truth into the air between us. "You bear my name. You live under my roof. And as long as you are Mrs. Hayes, you will wear this ring."

Valeria stared at my hand for a long, agonizing moment. Slowly, her eyes raised to meet mine. There was no anger left in her face. No tears. No desperation. There was only a vast, terrifying emptiness—a quiet distance that made her feel a thousand miles away, even though she was standing right in front of me.

"Being your wife," Valeria said, her voice dropping into a whisper that felt like a final sentence, "has never meant the same thing to you as it does to me."

She raised her hand. For a second, I thought she was going to let me slide the ring onto her finger.

Instead, she gently folded my fingers back over the diamond, pushing my hand away from her.

She left the ring in my palm, turned her back on me, and walked over to the armchair by the window, sitting down in the dark.