Page 160 of Seizing Control: Part Two

Just ask Sander.

She’s put him through the ringer for the past eight years.

“What do you think?” My wife’s best friend enquires.

“You did well.” With a nod, I add. “She’s gonna be very happy here.”

Nadia hangs back with me as Toker helps his cousin up the front steps. With a tight smile, Ziva steals Garrett’s pram from me. With Gabbi by her side, she wheels him toward the side entrance that doesn’t have stairs. I frown, pressing my lips together as I watch the Moscato & Monet club girls traipse around the property like they’ve spent years living here.

The twinge of intuition I’ve ignoring turns into nausea.

“Don’t stress, Fabio.” Nadia smiles up at me. “You’ll be happy here, too.” The wily blonde inspects her nails, huffing on them, then buffing them on her shirt, before she lands the punchline I can feel brewing. “Once she allows you to move in with her, that is.”

“Welcome home.” Lazarus steps out of the front door and greets his Lily in a voice that makes her eyes widen. When he holds his arms wide, my wife steps into his embrace. I avert my gaze while they do their best to keep their interactions platonic in front of our entourage and any prying eyes observing us from afar. “You like it?”

“So far, I love it.” After putting space between them, my wife claps her hands over her mouth when Nurse Deborah emerges behind Lazarus. “You... Deborah. What does this mean?”

“It means,” her first love interjects. “That you need to come inside so you can introduce the little man to his siblings in a non-hospital setting.”

“You didn’t.” My wife turns around, seeking me out. Leaving her friend to bask in her sarcasm alone, I take the steps two at a time. Looping her arm around my waist, Cherub peers up at me with open adoration as she asks, “You knew?” I nod, pulling her into my side, then brushing my lips over the top of her head. “You helped?”

Exchanging a wry look with Lazarus, I reply, “Yes.”

My agreement tells only half of the story.

I helped direct the people Lazarus hired to bring Cherub’s vision to life. Whenever I wasn’t at the hospital, I worked with Nadia to bring in the soft furnishings and other bits and bobs that make a house a home. And, sure, I knew the surprise that awaited her this morning. A custom built private NICU that enables her three children to sleep under the same protected roof.

Yet, as we enter through the ornate foyer, I discover that the third counterpart in this fucked-up love triangle has gone balls to the wall in his preparations for this homecoming. I’m not sure how he pulled this off in little more than sixteen hours, but Lazarus has poached every nurse Cherub bonded with during her stay. We wash up, then enter the purpose built NICU so the medical professionals can happily show my wife the medical equipment that’s available and explain their plan to get the twins to their birth weight and free of therapeutic interventions as soon as safely possible.

The man who made Cherub’s dream a reality hovers close by while I fade into the background. Not out of envy—to allow him the moment in the spotlight that he deserves. He has pulled off the impossible. A complete rabbit out of a hat. I should be shocked, but I’m not really. As Venom, I believed that his main priority was always his Lily, her needs, and her safety.

He lied, cheated, tricked, and deserted her to fulfil his quest.

Turns out he had a whole new level of domination in store upon his resurrection.

And that’s why it’s disconcerting to see my wife blinking with disbelief as she’s shown a new gadget. She’s overawed. Happy. Excited. A little worried. I can read every feeling as it floods her stunning face before she shuts it down. Her reaction is to be expected, however, the delight she feels is quickly being replaced by an incredulity that tells me Cherub’s also dying a little more inside with every second that passes.

We’ve overstepped.

Lazarus because he designed this without her input.

I am culpable via proximity and by dint of my compliance.

She asked for time and space—independence.

We bulldozed over her boundaries again.

“Ah,” Nadia remarks when she comes to stand next to me. “It’s finally dawned.”

“How bad is it?” I scrub my hand over my head. My wife’s comment about missing my longer hair has solidified my decision to grow it back. I’m impatient to return to my manbun so I have something to do with my hands when I’m on the cusp of losing my cool. “Surely, she can see he’s comin’ from a good place.”

“All you’ve done is made things more confusin’ for her.” After looking over her shoulder at her best friend, Nadia asks, “Would it have been so hard to sit her down and talk about it with her? You know she would’ve jumped at the chance to get the twins home safely... it’s not like this had to be some big production organised behind her back. It wasn’t necessary to keep Anna out of the loop...”

“Fuck.”

“Yeah.” Nadia exhales, then she pats me on the back. “Maybe you’ll start to listen now...”

The oddly wise woman leaves me alone to spiral. Heart racing, stomach churning, I busy myself with inspecting the finish on the closest wall. My brain is working double time, analysing the odds, crunching the numbers, trying it’s hardest to calculate a way out of this. As I come up empty, again and again, I note that the intercom system is active. The door to one of the panic rooms is hidden from view, but I find it eventually. Counting the cameras mounted at every vantage point, I take comfort in the knowledge that the constant surveillance monitoring is more than proficient. With live feeds that we can access from anywhere as well as on-the-premise security guards observing things too, Lazarus has spared no expense in his desire to create a secured safe space for our family.

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