My Wife Needs To Be Strong

The jazz music was low-key, but it filled the whole lounge as people drank their selves away.

A waiter walked by with a tray of whiskey glasses, and you could smell the good stuff - aged liquor and a hint of cigar smoke.

It was like the smell was teasing you, making you want more and spend your entire savings there.

In one of the private rooms, two friends sat as they drank.

Rafael was lounging on a plush leather couch, looking relaxed with one arm stretched out behind him.

His shirt was open at the collar, and his sleeves were rolled up. He'd already had a good amount of scotch, but it seems he wasn't done yet.

He was halfway through his second glass when Nikolai dropped a bombshell.

His words were calm and smooth, but totally absurd.

Rafael froze mid-sip. The glass hovered halfway to his lips before he choked on his drink.

After coughing several times to regain his senses, his eyes slowly lifted to the man sitting across from him.

"What - what did you just say?" His voice wasn’t loud, but it was filled with disbelief. "No! Don't answer that. I mean, that wasn't supposed to be my question. Let me rephrase it... Could you repeat what the fuck you just said?"

Nikolai didn’t blink and just shrugged. He leaned back in his chair, his posture impeccable, like he owned the whole world. He had one ankle resting on his opposite knee like a man entirely at ease. "You heard me. And I don't repeat myself."

Rafael set his drink down briskly. "Don’t start with me, Nick. What the fuck, dude? You told Cassie she has to join the army… to gain her soul back?" His tone darkened with each word. "Are you insane? That's bullshit!"

Nikolai’s gaze was steady and his face unreadable as always. "That was my condition. And she accepted it. So don't bull talk me!" He said curtly before taking a sip of his drink.

"Condition?" Rafael repeated, feeling incredulous. "You’re talking about her like she’s signing some twisted business contract—"

"It is a contract," Nikolai interrupted, his voice calm but firm. "You just refuse to see it for what it is."

Rafael let out a humorless laugh and leaned forward. "You can’t be serious. This isn’t about negotiation—this is about a woman who’s been through hell and is still finding her footing. And your answer is to send her into more hell?" Rafael snapped.

He was usually jovial and didn't allow anything to get to him. But this... this is insane!

"Look at her, Raf." For the first time, there was a faint note of heat in Nikolai’s voice... not anger exactly, but conviction. "Really look at her. Cassie’s broken and hollow. I won’t marry a woman in her current state, not because I don’t want to help her, but because I won’t see her destroyed when I bring her into my world."

"Destroyed?" Rafael’s voice tightened. "She’s already been torn apart once. She doesn’t need more battles, Nick! She needs peace. Come on!"

Nikolai’s jaw ticked slightly, but his tone remained controlled. "And battles are exactly what’s waiting for her. You know my family for fuck sake! You know the rivalry, the manipulation, the constant games. If I take her to my family now, in her current state, they’ll see her as prey. They’ll strip her down piece by piece until there’s nothing left but a shell, which she already is! Fuck! And they’ll smile while doing it."

Rafael ran a hand through his hair, frustration rolling off him. "God, you’re always calculating. Always ten moves ahead. Can’t you just—" he gestured vaguely, "—live? For once? Without turning everything into a damned chessboard?"

"I can’t afford that luxury," Nikolai said evenly. His eyes didn’t waver, indicating that he was damn serious. "And neither will she, once she’s mine."

"Yours," Rafael repeated with a note of disbelief. "Do you even hear yourself?"

Nikolai leaned forward now, resting his elbows lightly on the table. "She needs to be more than my wife. She needs to be Cassie someone... a name with its own weight. The army will do that for her. It will give her discipline, strength, and resilience. When she walks into a room, I want people to see her, not just my shadow.

Anyone can become a Rosewood. But I don't want that for my wife. If she wants to become my wife, then I will help her be a woman of her own, and not only depend on my fucking surname!"

Rafael’s expression hardened. "And what if she doesn’t survive it, Nick? What if the army breaks her instead of building her?"

"Then she was never meant for my world," Nikolai replied without hesitation.

The words hit Rafael like a blow. For a moment, he just stared at him, caught between fury and disbelief.

He had known Nikolai for years, no, his whole life, long enough to know that once he made a decision, there was no swaying him. But this wasn’t a strategy... this was gambling with a woman’s life.

Just what is wrong with his friend? Why can't he see his point?