Chapter 5
After the foundation gala, Adrian dismissed their driver and drove home himself.
Naomi had drunk two glasses of champagne and spent the evening pretending not to notice how often women watched her husband.
At a red light, Adrian reached across the console.
His fingers brushed her temple.
She looked at him.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“You’re touching my hair.”
“I know.”
The hunger in his eyes silenced her.
Then he kissed her.
Not like the restrained kiss he had given her on their wedding day.
This one felt like three years of starvation.
She kissed him back.
At home, he asked whether she was certain.
Twice.
She answered yes twice.
For a few hours, Naomi believed they had finally become husband and wife instead of signatures on a family agreement.
She woke alone.
A handwritten note rested on his pillow.
Last night was unexpected. Thank you.
Thank you.
As though she had hosted a dinner.
As though he had borrowed her car.
As though the most vulnerable night of their marriage deserved a polite acknowledgment.
She kept the note for one day.
Then tore it into pieces.
By the time Adrian drove her through the private hospital entrance on divorce morning, that humiliation had become the sharpest weapon in her memory.
A physician named Dr. Rachel Monroe met them upstairs.
She was in her fifties, silver-haired, calm, and apparently unimpressed by Adrian’s reputation.
She glanced through the glass wall at the security men gathering in the hallway.
“Mr. Vale, unless Chicago has declared war on the maternity floor, half those men can go downstairs.”
Adrian looked toward the door.
“They stay.”
Naomi closed her eyes.
“Adrian.”
He looked at her.
“Send them downstairs.”
His instinct fought visibly with her request.
Then he nodded.
“Cole stays outside. Everyone else downstairs.”
Dr. Monroe lifted one eyebrow.
“Progress,” Naomi murmured.
Adrian heard her.
“I’m capable of compromise.”
“You once bought the restaurant because they wouldn’t move our reservation.”
“They were rude.”
Dr. Monroe almost smiled.
She began asking questions.
Symptoms.
Medication.
Medical history.
Last menstrual cycle.
Naomi hesitated.
Adrian answered with the date.
May you like
She turned so quickly she nearly pulled a muscle.
“How do you know that?”
