As soon as the door closes, Elliot sits me up and gets to his feet. “How the hell do you have this card?”
His voice is seething with fury, and I flinch. Cold fear flows through my veins. This is the exact tone he used when he found out about Mr. Grayson.
* * *
Elliot
My wife’s face turns pale so fast, I worry that she may faint without giving me the answers I want.
“What is it?” she whispers, her lips barely moving.
“Keith Shellington.”
Her eyes don’t register any recognition. But how can that be? She has his card.
“I don’t understand,” she says finally. “Who is Keith Shellington?”
“He’s the fucker who stole from me and Lucas. The embezzler I told you about.” I wave the card in her face. “This didn’t jump into your wallet on its own.” Grayson and now this… I want her to explain what the hell is going on. Tell me what I need to hear to make the nasty pit in my gut go away.
“Let me see it.” She takes the card from my hand and reads the name and phone number on the heavy stock. She shrugs helplessly. “It’s a guy I ran into outside a sandwich shop two or three weeks ago.”
“What were you doing there?”
“Having lunch with Traci. We were just saying goodbye when he bumped into me and spilled coffee on my clothes. I told him it was fine, but he was all apologetic and gave me this card to call him in case I couldn’t get the stain out. He said he would replace the dress. He seemed to feel really terrible about it, and I didn’t… Elliot, I had no idea he was the man who stole from you.”
I can feel my eyes narrowing. The story is too ridiculous and contrived to be believed. Keith couldn’t have known she would be at that particular place at that particular time. He doesn’t even live in L.A. And for him to just conveniently run into my wife out of millions of people in the city?
No way.
Then I finally register the bloodless, glassy-eyed expression on my wife’s face. Her slim arms are wrapped around her legs, and she’s watching me like a prisoner awaiting execution.
She’s horrified at having been found out.
The thought rams into me with the force of a wrecking ball, and my knees almost give. I curl my hands into fists, my body vibrating with a cocktail of emotions—bitter disappointment, anger and grief.
I mentally count to ten. I have to calm myself or I’m going to fuck everything up. I tunnel my fingers into my hair.
Is my love so shallow that I don’t trust her?
Even when my discovery has turned her face into a rictus of panic, she’s lovely. I want to protect her, tell her I can fix everything, that nothing will be different because—in spite of everything—I still love her.
Love.
Belle’s story is very, very hard to swallow. Even Nonny could come up with a better lie. At the same time, life is complicated, and has its share of ridiculous coincidences. If it were anybody but Keith Shellington’s name on the card, I wouldn’t think twice about what she told me.
As the moment stretches, her teeth dig into her shaking lower lip. I crouch before her and gently free her lip with shaky fingers.
“Do you want me to pack my things?” she whispers without meeting my gaze.
“What?” I couldn’t have heard that right.
She finally looks up. “I can’t do what we did after you found out about Mr. Grayson. I just can’t!” Unshed tears shimmer in her eyes. She blinks rapidly to make them go away, but they spill over her cheeks anyway.
The sight cuts like jagged glass. The realization that I crushed her like that eviscerates me. She hasn’t been dreading the discovery, but my reaction. And my accusatory tone must’ve gutted her.
I’m such a fucking douchebag. I don’t deserve her even though I have no intention of letting her go. Ever.
I reach out and hold her fragile shoulders. “You won’t have to.” I kiss the corner of her mouth and taste the salt of her tears. “I trust you.”