Page 47 of Heartbroken Husband
“Alex has had the marriage contract drawn up,” he said. “I wanted to let you know that I’ll be going over everything with him tomorrow.”
“Okay.”
There was nothing else to say. He’d just dropped the wordsmarriage contractinto the middle of a conversation about art like it was just another piece to be discussed.
“I’ll sign, Zach. Whenever it’s ready, just have it sent over and I’ll sign,” I added then, feeling that creeping, familiar pressure building in my chest.
The sensation that said to get it over with before it got worse.
Zach narrowed his eyes at me, then abruptly shook his head. “No.”
“No?”
“No,” he repeated. “You’re not just signing whatever gets put in front of you.”
I frowned. “That’s sort of how this works.”
“Not this time.”
I folded my arms and averted my gaze, letting it drift back to the glorious mess on canvas that suddenly reminded me a lot more of my life right now than it had even just a minute ago. “We don’t have to get cute about it, Zach. I’m sure Alex has been more than fair and it’s not like I’ll be bringing in much except baggage, so I don’t have any bargaining power, do I?”
Despite everything else, I wasn’t naive. I really did know how this worked and I knew that without my trust fund, my last name didn’t mean all that much. Not when my parents’ reputation was tarnished and I already had one failed marriage under my belt.
Plainly put, I wasn’t worth much anymore. The Westwoods were only doing this to acquire a third of the Morris Company.Thatwas where my value lay for the purposes of this deal, and my grandfather would’ve made sure that everything was contractually buttoned up on that front.
The rest of it was just… the exchange. Me. The girls. Our future well-being. It was all just a bit of detail I was sure they’d hardly even looked at.
“I’ll have the contracts sent to you,” Zach said, completely ignoring my point about bargaining power. “You can review everything, add your own terms, and send it back when you’re ready.”
“My own terms?” I repeated lamely. “Like what?”
“You should get a lawyer to help you out with that, or maybe have Simon go through it with you? If you don’t want him, I can recommend Miranda Ellis over at Ellis & Anderson. Full disclosure, Jesse’s wife, Jacqueline, works for the firm, but they’re good and they’re not handling this for us, so there shouldn’t be a conflict unless Jacque gets involved, which she won’t.”
I blinked hard as the suggestion washed over me. It sounded fair, reasonable, and thoughtful. This definitely hadn’t been what it was like the first time around. So why was that same nagging suspicion I’d had the other day rearing up again?
It had been eating away at me ever since this had first come up, the possibility that he didn’t want to marry me and that was why he kept pushing me to rethink. Looking up into those clear green eyes now, I finally just said as much.
“You don’t want to do this. That’s why you keep building me an exit ramp, isn’t it?”
“We both know how it goes, Adeline,” he said. “Refusal doesn’t happen in our world. Especially not when the match makes sense, and this one does. It’s probably the best thing for the girls, but that doesn’t mean that you don’t have a choice. It’s entirely up to you.” He glanced down at his watch. “I have to get back to the office for a meeting.”
“Right,” I said, forcing the word past the lump of emotion that had settled in my throat. “Goodbye, Zach.”
“Bye.” He hesitated for just a second, looking back at the painting we’d been discussing earlier. His gaze lingered there, his expression suddenly thoughtful, like he was trying to make sense of something that refused to be explained. Then he turned and left without another word.
The interaction threw me off kilter for the rest of the day. Every time we talked, I felt more and more certain that Zach was actually looking for apartnerin marriage. He wanted me to be comfortable and seen, and he actually cared about what I thought. Which was the complete opposite of my ex.
When I got home that evening, I did my best to put the whole thing behind me for the night. Zach had always been reliable. If he said he would have the contracts sent over once he’d reviewed them, then he would have them sent over.
While I would rather have known that he actually wanted this instead of simply feeling like he couldn’t refuse, I would wait until I’d seen the contracts before I talked to him about wants and expectations.
One step at a time.
Honestly, after the emotional battles of the last year, baby steps were the only kind of steps I had the capacity for.
Amber was at the kitchen counter with the girls when I walked in, fully immersed in a glitter-based disaster of some kind. I cringed when I saw the countertops covered in the stuff, knowing we’d be finding glitter in our cabinets for years to come, but Amber seemed to be using it for whatever lesson they were busy with, and better yet, it seemed to be working.
“Mom!” Jennifer called when she looked up and saw me. “Look what I made. It’s a butterfly.”
