Page 23 of Sweet Wicked Vows

Each time her name left his mouth, it was like dulled nails on a chalkboard. I was getting pretty sick of hearing him talk about her, of his tongue and lips sounding out her name.

I grabbed my trousers. “Can we talk about what I pay you for?”

“Have you been taking your prescriptions?”

“Don’t need them.”

“What about your exercises? You know that you need to be doing them nightly.”

“I do them when I remember.”

Noah grabbed his glasses and jotted a couple things down in his notepad. “Your leg is healing fine. Nothing I can see or feel that would be a red flag.” His face transformed from the man I called a friend to the serious private physiotherapist. “However, you can think twice if you think I’m going to sign you off to get back on that death trap.”

“You make it sound barbaric. It’s only a motorbike.”

“Doesn’t matter. You snapped your ankle in two places and broke four ribs falling off that thing. You are to stay the hell away from it. Drive a car like a normal person.”

“Is this because that woman you refuse to break things off with won’t let you buy one?” I toyed despite the throbbing starting to gnaw at my leg. “Grow a set of balls already and end things with her.”

“No motorbikes,” Noah said firmly. “And if you can pull yourself away from your new life in New York, I’d like to see you again in six months.”

He handed me the card with the appointment date and time.

“We’ll see each other before then,” I said. “The Reynolds are throwing a celebratory wedding party. You’ll be there.”

He took off his glasses, reverting back into the Noah I met when I first moved to Ontario. I found myself sitting in a random bar, drinking bourbon after bourbon by myself, after a heated argument with all three of my brothers. Noah sat himself down beside me and started to talk to me as if we were long-lost friends.

Usually that shit irritated me, but it must have been my wallowing in self-loathing that gave me the ability to tolerate it. A somewhat friendship came from that one time, mainly based on drinking at the start, but it grew into something more functional.

“Are you sure this is the right decision?” Noah asked. “I get that marrying for this sort of thing happens all the time. Success, power, money, is it really worth it?”

“Yes.”

“Seems like an awfully big price to pay, in my opinion.” Noah’s lips thinned. “Call it corny or whatever, but isn’t the foundation of a healthy marriage love?”

Then the foundations of our marriage were about to crumble beneath us.

“Marriage is only a piece of paper,” I said. “Love is for the weak. It makes a fool out of the strongest of men.”

I half-expected Evelyn to have sent me the wrong address in an act of defiance.

Relief bloomed when spice-tinged sweetness greeted me once the door finally opened. Evelyn stood barefoot, vibrant red hair gathered on top of her head and cheeks flushed. Every time I saw her, I was struck by her raw beauty. But it was her legs that my eyes were drawn to this time.

She wore a pair of skin-tight cycling shorts.

They were so tight that the curves of her thighs and her cunt were staring me straight in the face, begging me to reach out and touch them.

Aie pitié. It shouldn’t be legal for her to look that good in a pair of simple shorts.

“Good to see you,douceur,” I said, dragging my gaze slowly back to her narrowed eyes. “Is this the part where I scoop you up and carry you through the front door?”

“Didn’t I tell you to stop calling me that?”

A smirk played on my lips. “Did you? I don’t recall.”

She turned on her heel. The curve of her full ass in those fucking shorts was nearly enough to bring me to my knees. “Your boxes arrived this morning. I had the guys put them in the bedroom.”

Inside, the home smelt like Evelyn and fresh brewing coffee. Not lingering in the hallway or staring at the ass of the woman I married, I followed the scent of coffee into the kitchen.

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