All Chapters of She Was Never Just the Billionaire’s Wife: Chapter 251 - Chapter 258

(Natasha)"Chin down," the painter says.Mr Warren, please relax your shoulders. You're sitting like you're waiting for bad news."Chase drops them half an inch.They climb straight back up.We've been at this twenty minutes.Lily has escaped twice, and eaten a tube of cadmium something the man swears is non-toxic.She’s now decided the one thing she wants in this life is the floor.Having my painting done is not something I ever imagined myself doing.I said yes for reasons I haven't fully explained to myself, never mind to him.Eleanor seemed so vulnerable when she brought it up, and that’s half of why I agreed.The rest was Chase across the dinner table, already building the little speech that lets me off the hook.He was so used to me saying no to anything that hinted at permanence between him and me, that he was braced for a no.I’m tired of being the wife who won’t.So. Here we are. Oils. A Thursday. Holding still.I’m somewhat regretting my agreement in the moment.I was expect

(Chase)"Your nervous system thinks you're being chased by a lion," Chloe says."All day. Every day. That's the not-sleeping. Your body's been screaming at you and you've had it on mute."I'm on a floor cushion in an apartment that smells like incense and burnt oranges, holding a mug of something brown she's promised me isn't coffee and is, in fact, "the opposite of coffee, energetically."After tasting it I suspect it may just be muddy water.I’ve made a terrible mistake.I came here on my own two feet. Nobody made me. I have to keep reminding myself of this."Mute," I say."Mute. Oh my God, completely."She lowers herself onto the cushion across from me, still as lithe as a willow, even with the tiny bump."Most powerful men I meet are running on cortisol and spite. You can hear it. Your voice sits up here."She taps her throat."It should sit down here."She taps her belly, which is round now, which I am being very normal about.Some of this is insane. I'd like that on the record.

(Natasha)I asked Julian weeks ago how sick his wife was.He handed me a magic trick instead of an answer.Said she was magnificent, changed the subject, the way he does when the truth is load-bearing.So tonight I’m circumventing him for his own good.Taylor may think he’s still in love with me. I know that’s not true.He’s going to lose the woman he really loves soon, and I want to be prepared so I can clear my schedule in time to be there for him.I invite Taylor to my place for a drink, because I want to see what she does when the audience is only me.She arrives with a bottle of something expensive and tells me my townhouse is aggressively tasteful.Which from her is a compliment and an insult holding hands.We have one drink.She's funny.She does an impression of Julian ordering wine that’s so accurate I have to set my glass down so I don’t choke to death on the contents of my glass.But I'm not just watching the show.I'm watching the spaces around it.And the spaces are wrong

(Chase)The board meeting has been going an hour and I've stopped hearing words.That's the first thing I notice.Someone's presenting numbers, mouth moving, and it won't resolve into meaning. It's just sound.I haven't slept right in weeks.The nights are all the same.When Lily isn’t with me I work past midnight, then lie in the dark running tomorrow on the ceiling, and get up again before dawn.It's been like this ever since the company was handed back to me.I had the best intentions about striking that work-life balance this time around, but I can’t help feeling I have something to prove.Mostly that I’m much better at this job than Mason.And mostly I want to prove that to Natasha.On top of that Lily's teeth is coming in.And I spend most nights tossing and turning, wondering if I’m using the right approach in trying to win my wife’s heart.Slow and careful.It’s the one thing I've made myself not rush, but what if that’s the wrong way to go about it and I lose her?Every night