Page 76 of Six Month Wife
Adair nods, her smile tight. “Thank you, Paul. Have a great evening.”
As Paul walks away, Adair slumps back in her chair with a dramatic sigh. “Well. That was the most acting I’ve done since I pretended not to hate you on the way in.”
She glances sideways at me, one brow arched. “Think we convinced him? Or do I need to jump you right here and now to sell it?”
“You’re not getting any of this. You contradicted me. Twice.”
I hold up my hands. “Hey, you’re the one who leaned into the juice-selling bit. I was trying to keep it vague.”
She groans. “We hadn’t agreed to full honesty. You have a terrible memory.”
“Or maybe you’re rewriting history to make yourself look better.”
She huffs, but doesn't argue. Just leans on the table and buries her face in her hands. “Okay, that might be a fair assessment.”
I glance toward the exit, where Paul is disappearing into the crowd like some kind of mild-mannered executioner.
“He seemed okay, I guess. Suspicious, maybe. But not enough to call bullshit.”
“Right,” she says quietly, lifting her head. “But people like him never show their hand until it’s too late.”
That chills me more than it should. I nod slowly, watching the doors swing shut behind him.
"It’s out of our hands now."
Adair mutters, “Five months and nineteen days. Maybe they’ll decide before that.”
I don’t answer. Because for the first time, I don’t know if I want this to end early… or at all.
21
Adair
The driveback to our condos is quiet.
Not the comfortable kind. The kind where your brain won’t shut up, but you don’t have the energy to say any of it out loud.
Parker’s hands are tight on the wheel. Mine are fisted in my lap.
We look like a couple on the brink of divorce. Ironic, considering the whole thing’s barely two weeks old—and choreographed to end in divorce anyway. Just not this soon.
When he pulls into the lot and kills the engine, I finally say, “Well. That’s over.”
He unbuckles and lets out a sigh of relief. “Could’ve gone worse.”
“Could’ve gone better,” I say. But my voice is light now. It’s done. We did what we could.
He glances at me, and for a second, I think he’s going to dig in. Instead, I pop the door open. “Come in. I have wine.”
That gets him moving.
Inside, I kick off my heels like they personally offended me and head for the kitchen. I envision they are Paul’s face.
“Red or white?”
“Red,” he says, peeling off his jacket and draping it over the back of a chair like he lives here. Which, technically, he does. Sometimes. Sort of.
I pour two glasses and hand him one before collapsing onto the couch. He sinks in beside me, but stays quiet. The AC is on and working overtime, making the room a little chilly. It’s the only thing in here not full of tension.
