He Kept Postponing Our Marriage for Her Crises… So I Ended It Myself Chapter 14
Last night, after he’d fallen asleep on the sofa, Chloe had come out of the bedroom.
On the screen, her eyes were sharp. Alert. Not a trace of the childlike haze.
She walked to the top of the stairs, paused for a few seconds, then turned and went back to the
room.
From start to finish, not a single thing about her looked impaired.
Julian rewound the clip. Froze it at 3:15 a.m.
Chloe was looking toward the basement door. She smiled.
It was the kind of smile that made his blood run cold.
His hand slipped off the mouse. The room tilted. And then the memories came fast, unbidden,
relentless.
He remembered the first time Audrey came to the Sterlings’ for dinner, so nervous she could barely
hold her fork steady.
He’d thought it was adorable.
He’d loaded her plate himself and said, “Come on, eat up. You’re too thin.”
She’d looked at him like a stray cat that couldn’t believe someone was being kind.
He found out later, that was the first time anyone had ever served her at a table.
At the Crawford house, Mrs. Crawford only ever fussed over Chloe’s plate.
Audrey always ate in silence.
It wasn’t that she didn’t know how to ask for things. She’d just never been allowed to.
He thought about their early days.
She’d been so careful around him, even reaching for his hand took her forever.
The first time he reached for her hand, she went completely still.
It took a long moment before her fingers slowly curled around his.
He’d teased her. “You’re holding on pretty tight. Afraid I’ll disappear?”
She didn’t say anything. Just smiled, the kind of smile that lit her whole face.
He hadn’t understood then how much that tiny scrap of warmth meant to her.
By the time it reached his generation, the Sterling family was running on fumes.
Without a major deal to turn things around, they wouldn’t last.
When the company’s funding collapsed entirely, he hit a wall at every turn. No one would lend him a
cent.
One night he came home and found an envelope sitting on the kitchen table. Inside was a check for
her entire life savings.
Every cent she’d ever saved from her years under the Crawfords’ roof.
He’d asked her later, wasn’t she afraid of losing it all?
She’d ducked her head and smiled. “I just want to help you. It’s not an investment.”
How had he forgotten?
She was never someone who played games.
She didn’t have a malicious bone in her body. How could he have ever believed she’d orchestrate something so vicious against Chloe?
His hands were shaking when he picked up the phone. He dialed. “I need you to look into something
for me. Right fucking now.”
