Page 111 of Checkmate
“Can we just get this over with?” Erica said, sighing heavily.
“What’s going on, Alex?” Sophie said finally. “Why are they here?” Alex looked over his shoulder and cursed under his breath.
“Just… go back to the kitchen, yeah, Soph? Breakfast, remember?” From behind Erica, Marcus snorted in amusement, and Sophie shot a dirty look in his direction. “Something funny asshole?”
Delighted that Alex came to her aid, she watched as Marcus came into full view, a small gasp leaving her lips before she could help herself. Why did he look so good?
When she left only three days ago, Marcus had been looking a little worse for wear. She supposed it was the stress of the affair. But that man was long gone.
He looked insultingly good.
“Plenty of things are funny about this scenario,” Marcus said. “But none more so than Sophie playing housewife. Change your mind about cooking being beneath you?”
“You mistook me, Marcus,” she said, feeling her face flame again. “I only meant that cooking for you was beneath me.”
Ha.
She smirked at him, smugness radiating from her. He barely even reacted. Instead, he glanced at Erica and the two of them shared a secret smile. What the fuck? Were they laughing at her?
“Well, I think we can just keep on cooking together, right Marcus?”
This had to be for show, right? No way there was actually something going on! Marcus had said it himself; they’d only pretended they were fucking. And the kiss was only to wind Alex up, right?
No way.
Marcus loved her far too much to move on so fast.
But then, why were they looking at each other like that? Surely no one was that good an actor. She glanced at Alex, who looked ready to punch someone. Maybe he could take care of Marcus and she could wipe that smug look off Erica’s face.
“Look, how about we all cool off?” Marcus said. “Erica can get her shit, and we can get out of here.”
“Don’t speak to me like I’m a fucking child,” Alex said, balling his fist. “I think we can sort this out between ourselves. Me and my wife. Or did you forget she’s married, prick?” Sophie felt a stab of hurt punch her right in the gut. She was standing right there.
“I’m not sure your girlfriend would like that,” Erica said. “Or did you forget you cheated on me with her?”
“She’s not my—” Alex stopped himself before he could finish his sentence, but the damage was done. Sophie scoffed and turned on her heel, stomping back to the kitchen. She heard Alex curse under his breath as he followed her, abandoning Erica and Marcus at the door.
“Sophie! Soph, wait, wait, wait.” He grabbed her arm and pulled her closer, tilting her chin up to face him. “I’m sorry, okay? I didn’t mean it.”
“So, am I your girlfriend?” She asked, challenging him.
He hesitated for a moment. “I don’t know what we are,” he said. “I know that’s probably shitty, but we’re both married. How can we label ourselves right now? What I will say is I’m here with you instead of out there with Erica. So I made a choice, right?”
Well.
That was true. She hadn’t considered that. It hadn’t been that long ago when he told her there was no choice and Erica would win? And yet, here he was comforting her while Erica was still at the door.
“Yeah, I guess,” she said, offering him a sad smile. “Why didn’t you tell me they were coming?”
“I didn’t know shithead would be here,” he replied, his lip curling.
“But Erica? You knew she was coming?”
“Yeah.” He paused and sighed. “We’ve been texting on and off since Christmas.”
She processed that for a moment, trying to put herself in his shoes. There were things for the two of them to figure out, she supposed. But she was going to have to see those texts. She wondered if she could get access to his phone at some point. For now, she needed to seem cool. No point in causing an argument if there was nothing to argue about.
“Okay, that seems fair.” She chewed her lip. “You couldn’t have let me know, though? Instead of springing it on me?”
