Chapter 64

Lucian’s POV

“You said you’d be home after work,” Sheila said. “How long did you intend to keep me waiting?”

I had told her I was considering coming home tonight, not that I would. That I was here at all should have been reason for celebration, not an excuse to continue to berate me.

This type of behavior was exactly why I had been avoiding Sheila to start with. The blatant disrespect was grating on my nerves. Because of my guilt, I’d held my tongue time and time again, but I was losing my patience.

If – and it was a very large if – I was going to actually make Sheila his wife again, she would need to change. That didn’t seem likely, and the entire idea didn’t sit right with me anyway.

Maybe once Dr. A cured her, that would be enough. For Sheila, though, I doubted it. She seemed set on staying in my life.

“Let me guess,” Sheila snapped. “You were chasing around Aria again, weren’t you? She wants a divorce, Lucian. The sooner you realize that –”

“Aria and I have mutually rejected each other,” I snapped. “So you can stop talking about her now.”

Sheila was shocked, her eyes wide and her mouth dropping open. I felt slightly vindicated for being able to silence her, even if it was temporary.

After a moment, she recovered and her entire demeanor changed. Her frown lifted, her arms unhooked. She stepped toward me, hope and happiness bright in her eyes. She smiled.

“Oh, Lucian. That’s wonderful news! Come on, we have to celebrate!”

She immediately turned and walked into the den. Slower, I followed her.

“Quick,” she said to one of the maids. “Bring us some chilled champagne and two glasses.”

The maid glanced at me. When I nodded, she turned and hurried to obey.

Sheila huffed. “Well, that has to change, Lucian. I need my authority back. None of these servants actually listen to me anymore. It’s humiliating.”

I hummed, non-committal. Truly, I didn’t trust her to have the run of the house again. So far she’d done very little to prove she wouldn’t abuse the power, especially after she destroyed so many things not all that long ago.

“Tell me how it happened,” Sheila said, looking at me. “I want to hear everything. What finally convinced you she wasn’t worth your time?”

I frowned, irritation rising once more. Aria was worth my time. Yet I knew arguing with Sheila would only make things worse.

“I’d rather not talk about it,” I said, hoping to avoid the entire topic.

Her smile dimmed marginally as suspicion crossed her face for a moment. “You should be happy about this, Lucian. Aria is finally out from under you and you can move forward to a brighter future without her weighing you down.”

“Stop talking about her like that,” I said firmly. “In fact, stop talking about her at all.”

I hated the way Sheila spoke about Aria, like she was someone lesser. Maybe she hadn’t been born into privilege like Sheila and myself, but she was no less worthy of respect.

“You don’t have to be so sharp with me,” Sheila said. “I’m just trying to look on the bright side of all this.”

The maid Sheila had sent away returned to the room then, carrying a bottle of champagne in one hand and the pair of glasses in the other.

“Ah! Finally.” Sheila rushed over and took the champagne from the maid. She opened the cork with a loud pop! “Set the glasses down,” she told the maid.

The maid did as she asked. Sheila poured the champagne into both glasses, then set the bottle aside. Lifting one glass for herself, she grabbed the other and held it out for me.

“A toast!” Sheila said, lifting her glass high. “To new beginnings.” She clinked her glass to mine and then took a deep swig of her drink.

I sipped my own, hoping the alcohol might calm my nerves somewhat.

I couldn’t for the life of me understand why I still felt so damn unhappy about everything. Things were finally resolving, which took off a lot of pressure.

Yet I couldn’t stop thinking about Aria, and every time I did, misery seemed to take hold inside of me.

“Oh!” Sheila said excitedly. She’d emptied her glass and set it aside. “We should clean up the house.”

“The maids can take care of it,” I said, somewhat surprised she would want to do such a thing.

“That’s not what I mean,” Sheila said. “Since you and Aria are through, we should remove all trace of her. It might help with your melancholy.”

“Leave it,” I said at once.

“Trust me, you’ll feel better once you aren’t surrounded by reminders,” Sheila said. She glanced around the room. “Like this for instance.” She walked across the room to the far wall. There she plucked a picture of Aria and me from the wall. It was one of our formal portraits, where we’d had to pose standing side by side. “This is trash now.”

I’d never been found of that portrait or our stuffy expressions. It didn’t seem to capture either of our true personalities. So I wasn’t too upset to see that particular portrait go.

However, when Sheila moved onto some of the more candid shots hanging around the room, that was when my stomach started to sink.

Most of the photos were from early in our relationship. Shots from when we had been dating, when Aria liked to capture the moments.

“We’ll want to remember times like this when things get tough,” she’d said back then.

Now, Sheila removed each one from the wall and placed them in a pile on the floor. “This will need to go in the trash,” Sheila told the maid.

The maid looked at me.

I didn’t move.

Sheila studied me. “You have to let this go, Lucian. You’ll feel better, I promise.”

Finally, I nodded.

The maid moved to collect the pictures, perhaps to take them to the garbage can. It took all of my willpower to hold myself back, wanting to stop her.

Satisfied, Sheila moved out of the den and into the hallway. I moved to follow her, watching as she discarded each of Aria’s photos. She went even further, removing the paintings and knickknacks that Aria had picked out for our home.

“Junk,” Sheila said.

While she was working in the living room, I stopped following her, not having the stomach for this anymore.

In the hallway near my bedroom, I plucked a photo of Aria off the wall. It was my favorite of her, a candid shot taken early in our relationship. She was smiling wide, her eyes crinkled with mirth. She was looking straight at the camera, and at me behind it.

She was so happy then, so filled with hope at the possibilities of our relationship.

The Aria in the photo had no idea how disappointed she would become.

Maybe Sheila was right. Maybe I needed to throw these remnants of the past away and focus on the future.

Yet I couldn’t quite bring myself to. Not this one, anyway.

Removing the photo from the frame, I tucked it into my pocket before Sheila could find it.