Overnight Wife

I wince. “Honestly? I’ve thought about it. I could annul it, if I act within the next week. There’s still time.”

“Well, John has experience there, he probably wouldn’t care.” Bianca purses her lips.

I blink in surprise. “What do you mean?”

She lifts an eyebrow at me, confused. “What, you never even googled your husband?”

Belatedly, I remember the article Lea showed me. His ex. But… “He got married before?” I ask. I thought that girl was only his fiancée.

“Does it count, if you annul it straight after?” Bianca shrugs, her gaze dropping to my ring finger again. “Just a thought.”

Just the same thought I’ve been wrestling with, ever since I woke up in John’s bed with this ring on my finger. And yet I still haven’t walked away. Why?

Because I’m too naïve. Just like John’s mother said. A little part of me, a part I’m embarrassed to even admit to, kept expecting this to turn into something more. To maybe become real, the way John claims to have wanted all along.

But it was never real. None of it. And to make matters worse, he’s done it before. That girl Lea showed me, his ex, she was more than just his fiancée, if Bianca is to be believed—and to be honest, I trust her information on my husband more than I trust my own. Maybe she’s right. Maybe I should have obsessively googled him. Maybe it would have given me more of a warning what this marriage would be like. And what I was getting myself into.

Or at least a warning about the fact that I’m not the first girl he’s played this game with.

Fuck this.

I shove away from my desk without another word to Bianca. She watches me go, her eyebrows raised, worry and surprise warring on her face.

But she’s right. Lea was right too. Everyone sees this situation clearly. Everyone except me.

John is a player, and I’m done with his games.

I track through the office, and ignore the eyes trailing after me. All of my nosy colleagues are peering after me, probably trying to guess what’s going on with me, or wondering why I’m headed toward John’s office. I don’t care. Our secret is out now, so let them whisper. Let them think I’m headed in there to hook up with him. I don’t give a damn about my reputation anymore.

Besides, for once, that’s not the truth. I’m on an entirely different mission this time.

I fling open his door, only to find him with the phone raised to one ear, clearly in the middle of a call. But he locks eyes with me, taking me in in one look, in that way only he can do, a way that pierces me to the core, makes me feel seen all the way through. It’s a lie, I tell myself. All of this has been a lie.

“I’ll call you back,” he says into the phone and hangs up without another word. “Mara.” His eyes on mine are almost enough to make me crack.

But I ball my fists and stand my ground. “This is a game to you, isn’t it?”

A crease appears between his eyebrows. “If you’re talking about the news articles, I assure you, I tried to stop them. You were right, someone at the party must have taken our photo—”

“Do you even care how this makes me look?”

“Of course I care.” He stands and crosses around his desk, reaching for me.

But I twist out of his reach. “I’m a laughing stock. Everyone here thinks I slept with you to get my job, married my way into it.”

“Who cares what other people think?” He shakes his head.

“I do. I care if my coworkers respect me. I care about my career and being with you has done nothing but jeopardize that at every turn. Ironically, since everyone seems to think it improved it,” I add with a scowl.

He reaches for me again, and again I twist away. “Mara, I’m sorry. I know you’re still mad about what happened this weekend, and you have every right to be.

“Is this what you did last time?” I ask, and now his expression shifts, from concern to confusion. I shake my head, not falling for it. “I know you’ve done all this before. Marriage, annulments.” I grab the ring on my finger and tug at it. “I bet you thrive off the drama, don’t you?”

“That’s not it. Let me explain.”

“Oh, so now you want to tell me everything? Where was this before, when you should’ve been letting me know what the hell I was getting into?” With an effort, I manage to wrench the ring free. Then I gasp in pain, glancing down to find a long, angry red scrape along my finger. Dammit. It must have been swollen from the gloves I was wearing in the workshop earlier this morning. My ring finger throbs, and a streak of blood appears where I scraped the skin raw.