Page 73 of Checkmate
“Is he a threat to our relationship?”
With a heavy sigh, Erica pushed her hand through her hair, shaking her head.
“No,” she growled, completely exasperated by this point. “The only threat to our relationship is you and this obsession you have that I’m cheating on you.”
“Can you fucking blame me, Erica? You’re acting like I’m crazy, but can you blame me?” Knocking back his drink, Alex scoffed and met her gaze. “Whether you want to admit it or not, it looks suspicious.”
“So divorce me then!”
The shock of her words silenced Alex, his eyes round. “I don’t want that. Seriously, Eri. You know that’s not what I want.”
“Then stop baiting me! Alex, I’m sick of having this argument. The facts are Marcus and I are working together and you either deal with it or you don’t.”
“Okay,” he said, holding his hands up in surrender. “Okay, I get it. I don’t like it but—”
“You don’t have to like it, you just have to shut up about it.” He nodded once in agreement. “Good. Because this isn’t just about me making a friend. This is me putting myself out there and doing something I’m excited about. It’s me making my own money and—”
“You’ve never needed to make your own money, Erica.”
“Needed to? No. You’ve taken care of me,” she admitted. “Want to? Absolutely. I need some independence, Alex.”
“Since when?”
“Since always,” she said with a sigh. “And I’m really surprised you have to be told that.”
Silence fell between them, each lost in their own thoughts.
Erica watched her husband, feeling her skin prickle at his hypocrisy. Even knowing how much she had done to convince him of her fake affair, she still felt incensed, knowing she was completely innocent of everything he was accusing her of.
Except for driving him crazy. She was absolutely doing that.
After the weekend she shared with Marcus, she could no longer stop herself from drawing comparisons between the two men.
If her life were a movie, Alex would be the villain. But the reality was, he was a fantastic husband. Infidelity aside, of course. But spending so much time with Marcus highlighted Alex’s shortcomings.
Although Alex was a good provider and had the resources to make her life as easy as possible, he had never appreciated the satisfaction Erica got from doing things by herself.
Marcus allowed her to celebrate all the things she was great at.
When she remembered his awe when presented with her folder of ideas, she still felt giddy. This was a man who appreciated her hard work and was as excited as she was to discuss it.
Over the weekend, they had ironed out a lot of the expected kinks and worked hard to make sure everything was in place.
In contrast, if he couldn’t throw money at a problem, Alex considered it beyond his capabilities. The number of times Erica had to watch a repairman change a fuse was infuriating.
Even with all that aside, the conversations she shared with these two men were so vastly different. It was shocking.
In the short time they had spent in one another’s company, she and Marcus had soon realised no topic was off limits. Once they’d worked through surface-level stuff like hobbies and favourite movies, they’d effortlessly moved into deeper topics of conversation.
With Alex, it was all surface-level.
After that first year together, it seemed the conversation ran out, and they stuck to what was safe without her realising it had happened. She couldn’t remember the last time they spoke about their aspirations for the future or the fears that held them back.
She felt some guilt for her part in that. Perhaps this was why he had looked at another woman. But then, Erica couldn’t imagine Sophie was full of stimulating conversation.
Would she have realised this on her own without Marcus drawing attention to it? Or was it the presence of him that made her take off the rose-tinted glasses and see that her marriage wasn’t the fairytale she once believed it was?
“What are you thinking?” She asked, watching the emotions play across his face. She had always thought Alex was easy to read, an open book. But there was no telling what was on his mind.
