Page 9 of Untying the Knot
“Haven’t heard you complain about the orgasms,” she says as she strips out of her bra and underwear, leaving her completely naked.
Yeah, I’d never complain about the orgasms because our sex life has always been fucking incredible. So if she wants to fuck, I’m naked in seconds.
From the hook near her vanity, she grabs her short silk robe and slips it on.
While she starts her nighttime routine of putting her hair in a bun secured by a silk scrunchie and washing her face, I move toward the doorframe and lean on the wood, watching her.
In a soft, steady voice, I say, “Just tell me what I fucking did, Myla. I don’t want to fight with you.”
Her shoulders roll in, and she drops her hands to the counter as she uses the mirror to look at me. Her eyes are tired with bags resting under them. Her face is thinner than normal, and so is her body. Normally curvy, with delicious thighs that I love gripping on to, she seems more . . . fragile and, right now, there’s only intense animosity. Toward me. “Do I look happy, Ryot?”
“No,” I answer honestly. “You don’t.”
Something isn’t right. This isn’t just a fight. There seems to be something deeper happening.
“Because I’m not.” She turns now to face me and leans against the counter, her posture no longer snide but defeated, as if she can’t take this back and forth anymore, and she’s throwing up the white flag. “I haven’t been happy for a while.”
I swallow hard. I’ve noticed a change, but I thought that maybe she was taking a second to adjust to our new house, our new life.
“Happy with me?” I ask.
“Happy with my life,” she says with a sigh.
“What does that mean?” My heart trembles in my chest.
“I haven’t been happy for months now, and I thought . . .” She pauses, her voice catching in her throat. “I thought that maybe it would get better. That we would get better. But we’re not.”
“What are you talking about?” I ask, my throat growing tight. “Babe, we’ve been fine. We made love this morning.”
“No, we fucked, Ryot. Fucking has never been an issue between us. But fucking isn’t going to make me happy. You can fuck me all you want, but at the end of the day, it won’t put a smile on my face.”
“Then what will?”
“A healthy marriage, and that’s not what we have.” Pulse thundering, I try to steady my shaking legs. “We are anything but healthy.” Her head drops forward as she grips the counter behind her. That ominous, doomsday feeling falls over me. She’s avoiding eye contact with me. The air around us stills as the tension grows thick and muddy. She quietly says, “I want a divorce.”
The room spins around me in slow motion, squeezing the air from my lungs in one fell swoop, leaving me gasping.
“What . . . what did you just say?” I can barely hear my own voice over the hammering of my heart. My mind whirls, trips, tumbles, and struggles to comprehend the words that came out of her mouth. There’s no way.
Did she really say divorce? She couldn’t have . . . right?
When her gaze lifts to mine, her mouth thins, and with no expression in her eyes, she repeats, “I want a divorce.” She opens one of her vanity drawers and pulls out a yellow envelope and sets it on the countertop.
“What the fuck is that?”
Still dead in her eyes, she says, “Divorce papers. I had them drawn up last week. I’m asking for absolutely nothing. I don’t want your money—”
“Our fucking money,” I say.
“It’s your money, Ryot. You’re the one who played in the Major Leagues, and you’re the one who cashed in on the endorsements, so that’s your money, not mine. And I’m not about to sit here and argue with you about it. I don’t fucking want it. All I ask is to keep my car and half of the sale from the house in Chicago since I’m the one who did the renovations.”
“Hold the fuck on for a second,” I say, trying to wrap my head around all of this. “You want a divorce?”
“Yes. Everything is done. You just need your lawyer to look it over and then sign it.”Everything isdone? When did she start?
“The fuck I will,” I say, moving closer to her. “I’m not about to sign divorce papers without knowing where all this is coming from. I love you, Myla—”
“Don’t, Ryot. Don’t say that shit when you don’t mean it.”
