12. Alexander
CHAPTER 12
Alexander
I rubbed my sore neck with one hand. Everyone in the kitchen was getting a raise, because after several day of helping out, I was sore as fuck. I knew Libby was encouraging Maurice to give me the worst, most backbreaking tasks. But I couldn’t say shit. I had been the one to cheat on Delilah and they were all right to despise me.
With my other hand I scrolled rapidly down my tablet, looking for something, anything to get my wife that would show her I’d changed.
Flowers were instantly given to the castle staff or visitors who came to tour the grounds.
Jewelry was donated to St. Constance’s shrine.
I had started attending services every day, but I wasn’t sure that was helping or not. Delilah didn’t look happy to see me, and her friends openly loathed me. But I couldn’t stop going. I couldn’t give up even that minimal contact with my wife.
At this point, I was desperate for any time with her, even if it mostly consisted of Magnus’ pointed sermons about corrupt rulers and degenerate husbands. Not like I could eat the potlucks afterwards. All food turned to ashes in my mouth. I might as well be eating fucking paste for all the enjoyment I got out of it.
And always in my mind was the throbbing, pulsing regret.
If only I could go back in time!
If only I could have been faithful to her from the very beginning!
My sheer boneheaded stupidity was incomprehensible to me.
How had I not seen this coming?
I had to come up with a better plan, and I didn’t have much time.
As usual, the thought of time running out sent panic spiraling through my body.
It short-circuited my brain, made it impossible to think. But I couldn’t help myself.
Always the same.
I would remember that there were only a few weeks left in the month, the very thought of her leaving sending a heated flush through my body and making my heart pound with panic in my chest. My hands would begin to tremble. Sometimes I could slow down the gut-clenching panic by closing my fists tightly, my nails biting into my palms so hard they drew blood. Other times my arms would shake uncontrollably, too. My stomach would roil, and often I’d have to sprint to a bathroom to throw up, sweat rolling down my face and neck as I’d heave until there was nothing left in my stomach.
Not that I was eating much anyway ever since Delilah told me she wanted to leave.
I was miserable as fuck.
Life without Delilah was absolutely and in all ways dogshit.
I had to calm down, had to think rationally, if I had any chance to get her to love me again. She loved me once, my heart shattering with agony and miserable longing at the memory, so maybe she could love me again. I had to believe it or I couldn’t face each day. If I could only stay calm and make plans!
But I couldn’t with my despairing panic thrumming through my body.
There was a brief knock on the office door and my heart leaped in my throat.
Delilah?
But it was my mother with a frown on her face.
“Has Delilah decided to stay?” she asked abruptly.
“No,” I replied, my voice sounding dull and dead to my ears. “She still wants to leave at the end of the month.”
Unless I can find some way, any way, to convince her to stay!
“What a silly girl!” Mom complained. “All the press are going to be so nasty if she leaves. All those vultures would love to blame you for this embarrassing situation.”
My hands stilled and I looked up at her.
“I am to blame,” I said harshly. “This whole thing is entirely my fault. She’s leaving because I cheated on her.”
Mom waved her hand back and forth dismissively.
“So what? You’re a man. You weren’t cruel to Delilah. I thought you were very kind to her. Especially considering how uninteresting and quiet she is.”
My teeth gritted together.
“Never speak about her like that, ever again . I didn’t appreciate Delilah but that’s all changed now. Now I’m going to appreciate her like she deserves.”
Mom still looked skeptical. “I knew you should have chosen a lady from Norjava. Someone who would understand a king’s needs.”
“I didn’t want any other woman,” I said harshly. “I don’t want any other woman. I want Delilah and she’s the only woman I will ever want. You will speak respectfully about my wife or you will be going to live at our beach house permanently and not allowed back in the palace. Now let’s go to dinner.”
Mom’s eyes were wide as she looked at me, but she bowed her head.
Good . I wasn’t going to accept even the smallest disrespect of my wife.
Dinner was bleak and depressing. As usual, ever since Delilah had given me annulment papers, I barely ever saw her at meal times.
It fucking sucked.
My stomach roiled at the sight of her usual chair empty. I didn’t feel like eating anything, but I knew if I didn’t I’d feel even more like shit later, so I forced some of the chicken baked in cream sauce down.
We ate in chilly silence.
Since everyone knew I had cheated on Delilah, Maurice had not been giving his best with the meals, insisting on strange diets and unusual combinations, and serving all of them with a contemptuous disdain. Even the wine was pulled from the least interesting years, and Mom had once caught him serving some awful wine that had been given to the palace as a present from a visiting dignitary.
When she protested that we wanted good wine, he curled up his lip.
“I was under ze impression that ze King preferred the inferior to the obviously vastly superior ,” Maurice said witheringly, and I didn’t have shit to say in response.
I deserved it all. It stung knowing that my own staff hated me for what I had done to Delilah. Because it was a reminder of how big of an asshole I was.
“Why did you have to send Jewel away?” Mom complained after a long period of silence.
“Because I don’t want to look at her again,” I replied in a clipped tone. “I don’t want to look at Julia or Jewel, or anybody else I fucked. It’s just a reminder of how badly I screwed up. And I don’t want Delilah to feel like I’m at all tempted to fuck them again. Because even the thought of it is nauseating.”
“There are other women,” Mom said, stabbing a piece of Caesar salad.
“No,” I said bleakly. “For me, there is only Delilah.”
“You should have married Jewel or Julia,” my mother moaned. “And so I told Delilah. She even agreed your marriage was a mistake.”
I stilled, hearing a ringing in my ears as I carefully put my fork and knife down.
“You told my wife I should have married someone else?” I asked, my voice sounding strange to my ears.
“Y-yes,” Mom said, and she must have caught the expression in my eyes as I rose to my feet.
“You are hereby ordered to the beach house,” I ground out.
If this is what she admitted to saying to Delilah, what else had she been telling my sweet, gentle wife? What else had Delilah been putting up with because she loved me?
My stomach burned with shame.
“It’s perfectly comfortable,” I said. “You can even take your tennis instructor with you. But I gave you a warning, and you disrespected my wife anyway, so you will be at the beach house until further notice so you can’t bother her anymore.”