Page 111 of His Forced Irish Mafia Bride

I closed the door and came to sit by her. Everything that had happened was still there in my head, but it didn’t feel like chaos anymore. It felt settled, like something that had already been faced and named.

I stopped a few steps away from her. She turned and looked at me. I looked back.

There was nothing left to hide between us. No more pretending. No more waiting for something outside these walls to decide what we were. I sat down across from her.

We didn’t speak at first. I watched her. She looked calmer than before. Not because things were easy. Because something heavy had finally been taken off her shoulders.

I understood why. I’d put it there.

The marriage. The pressure. The way this started. None of it had come from her choice.

It had been forced. That truth was clear now. No more layers around it. I let out a slow breath.

For a long time, everything between us had been held in place by things that weren’t real. Decisions made for survival. Lies that stayed too long. A marriage that started to repay a debt.

That foundation was gone now. I looked at Maeve properly.

“I don’t want you to be here because you have no choice.” I said. My voice stayed steady.

Maeve held my gaze. “I know.”

I’d taken away the structure that tied us together. And yet she was still here. I was still here. And for the first time, that wasn’t because of obligation.

“You could leave, if you wanted to.”

Maeve didn’t answer right away. I was giving her a choice. A real one. She could leave, no conditions and no consequences.

It should have sounded simple. It didn’t. I watched her closely, trying to see if she thought there was a catch in my offer.

There wasn’t. That was the problem.

I didn’t push her. I didn’t explain myself. I didn’t fill the silence. I just stayed still and let her decide in her own time.

Her fingers moved slightly in her lap, then stopped. “If I leave,” she said slowly, “you wouldn’t try to stop me.”

“No,” I said. One word, clearer than day.

My face didn’t change. She nodded once, but it didn’t look like agreement. It looked like pressure settling somewhere inside her.

She looked toward the window for a moment. “And there are no conditions attached to it,” she said.

“No,” I said again.

Her throat tightened slightly. She should have looked relieved.

She didn’t. I stayed quiet and watched her. She stood up slowly. The chair made a small sound behind her.

I didn’t move. She walked a few steps, then stopped. She didn’t look at me yet.

I stayed where I was. I wasn’t going to influence her choice. Not even with my eyes. After a moment, she turned back.

I met her gaze, and she took a breath. “You’re serious,” she said.

“Yes.”

She let out a small breath, almost like she didn’t know what to do with that. I watched her realize it.

She could leave. Really leave. Nothing in this room would stop her.