Semua Bab Condemned Wife's Compliance: Bab 21 - Bab 30

She walked right past me like I didn’t exist. Like everything we ever had wasn’t worth even a hello. I should’ve said something. God knows I wanted to. But I couldn’t. Not when every time I look at her, I see his face. Felix. My own brother. The man I warned her about. The man she turned to, apparently. She doesn’t deny it. Not anymore. Not convincingly, anyway. And the memories of that night… dammit, they burned holes in my brain. I can’t tell what’s real anymore. I just know she stopped looking at me like I mattered long before I ever turned to Belinda. The worst part? I still care. I saw it... the way she’s been fading. Like life is draining out of her a little more each day. And I hate that I still want to pull her back. I hate that I wonder if it’s all a lie. Maybe she didn’t do it. Maybe she’s not the woman I’ve convinced myself she became. But I can't be foolish enough to deny what I saw with my own eyes. Maybe that was her charm or my love for her. It swallows truth

That morning, Adrea had been downstairs before Rafael had woken up. She waited nervously wondering how she was going to ask him what she needed from him. She heard him moving about in the floor above her. She bit her lower lip.She told herself that she had nothing to be nervous about. She felt she had everything to be nervous about. She knew their relationship was strained. Hell, she had downright ignored him the previous night… What if he chose to be vindictive and punished her for that?She heard the door open and she told herself to stop pacing. She hadn’t realised she was doing that until now. She looked up as his footsteps reached the top of the stairs.First, she saw his feet. Clad in shiny leather shoes and over them, nicely tailored black slacks. Her gaze travelled up his torso and to his face. He saw her. His eyes watched her watch him. She thought there was a quiet annoyance in them. He probably did not want to deal with her this early in the morning if at all. She wanted to

She did not cry. When he walked back to the car and turned on the engine, she calmly told him that she wanted to go home. When they got home, she silently got out of the car, slammed the door to spite him, and calmly walked into the house and upstairs to her room. She did not cry when she sat on the window seat and looked up at the night sky. Not when she got tired and laid her forehead on the cool glass of the window, closed it, and finally fell asleep.When she woke up the next morning, she was stiff and moving was rather uncomfortable at first. She took her time as she went to the bathroom. She went to the sink with the intent to wash her face. One look at her face in the mirror made her realise that she had cried after all. Mascara ran down her puffy cheeks. She did not remember crying. But there was the evidence.She took a breath and opened the tap. She began the process of washing the makeup off her face and wished she had done it the previous night before she had cried on it.

Adrea opened her mouth to say something and then snapped it shut. What was she going to say? That she was sure he was actively luring her to his bed? What if she was wrong? Wasn’t that irrational?That infuriating, teasing look he was giving her. With his eyes, he was daring her. She knew better. She would embarrass herself if she said a single word on the matter. For all she knew, his office was on this floor.“Well?” he asked her, not even bothering to hide the delight he was taking in her plight.He damn well knew what she thought. She could see it.He wanted to play that game, did he? Well, she would accompany him to the end. She was no shrinking violet.“I’ll wait for you here while you take your bathroom break. Then we can go to your office.”Aris threw his head back and laughed.“Alright,” he said, as she watched him intently with those sharp blue eyes, “alright. I will stop jerking you around for a little bit. I have an office up here. Come on. I’ll show you.”‘Said the spider

Rafael did not come home that day, or the next, or the one after. Either he was on a business trip or he was with Belinda. Adrea did not ask and she did not want to know. She told herself not to care, not to notice the emptiness in the house. What did it matter? He was not going to be in her life after everything was done and over with. He was going to be a blip in her rear-view mirror one day. He was going to be a distant memory. She just needed to work on that.And that’s where poker came in. It got her out of that miserable house. That now skeleton of the home she had been trying to build for herself and her husband.‘Why are you thinking of him?’ she mentally asked herself as she stopped her car in front of Aris’ casino.She got out and a valet boy rushed over to take over and get the car. She had left the engine running and she gave her name to the man with the clipboard as she made her way inside.She realised something in that moment. She had been waiting for Aris to be waiting