clearly—and tipped it to the side, measuring a generous amount of liquid into his glass.
“Is that dry tone really necessary? If you were out, just say that you were out, Kairos.” She paused then, her keen eyes landing at his neck. “What exactly were you doing?” Her tone had morphed from glass to iron in a matter of syllables.
“I was at a party. It is New Year’s Eve. That is what people customarily do on the holiday.”
“Since when do you go to parties?”
“All too frequently, and you typically accompany me.”
“I meant, when do you go to parties for recreational reasons?” She looked down, her jaw clenched tight. “You didn’t invite me.”
“This wasn’t official palace business.”
“That is apparent,” she said, standing suddenly, reaching out toward his desk and taking hold of the stack of papers that had been resting there, unnoticed by him until that moment.
“Are you angry because you wanted to come?” He had well and truly given up trying to figure his wife out.
“No,” she said, “but I am slightly perturbed by the red smudge on your collar.”
Were it not for years of practice controlling his responses to things, he might have cursed. He had not thought about the crimson lipstick being left behind after that brief contact. Instead, he stood, keeping his expression blank. “It’s nothing.”
“I’m sure it is,” she said, her words steady, even. “Even if it isn’t nothing it makes no difference to me.”
He was surprised by the impact of that statement. By how hard it hit. He had known she felt that way, he had. It was evident in her every interaction with him. In the way she turned away when he tried to kiss her. In the way she shrank back when he approached her. She was indifferent to him at best, disgusted by him at worst. Of course she wouldn’t care if he found solace in the arms of another woman. So long as he wasn’t finding it with her. He imagined the only reason she had put up with his touch for so long was out of the hope for children. A hope that faded with each and every day.
She must have given up completely now. A fact he should have realized when she hadn’t come to his bed at all in months.
He decided against defending himself. If she didn’t care, there was no point discussing it.
“What exactly are you doing here?” he asked. “Drinking my scotch?”
“I have had a bit,” she said, wobbling slightly. A break in her composure. Witnessing such a thing was a rarity. Tabitha was a study in control. She always had been. Even back all those years ago when she’d been nothing more than his PA.
“All you have to do is ask the servants and you can have alcohol sent to your own room.”
“My own room.” She laughed, an unsteady sound. “Sure. Next time I’ll do that. But I was actually waiting for you.”
“You could have called me.”
“Would you have answered the phone?”
The only honest answer to that question wasn’t a good one. The truth was, he often ignored phone calls from her when he was busy. They didn’t have personal conversations. She never called just to hear his voice, or anything like that. As a result, ignoring her didn’t seem all that personal. “I don’t know.”
She forced a small smile. “You probably wouldn’t have.”
“Well, I’m here now. What was so important that we had to deal with it near midnight?”
She thrust the papers out, in his direction. For the first time in months, he saw emotion burning from his wife’s eyes. “Legal documents.”
He looked down at the stack of papers she was holding out, then back at her, unable to process why the hell she would be handing him paper at midnight on New Year’s Eve. “Why?”
“Because. I want a divorce.”
TABITHA FELT AS if she was speaking to Kairos from somewhere deep underwater. She imagined the alcohol had helped dull the sensation of the entire evening. From the moment she’d first walked into his empty office with papers in hand, everything had felt slightly surreal. After an hour of waiting for her husband to appear, she had opened a bottle of his favorite scotch and decided to help herself. That had continued as the hours passed.
Then, he had finally shown up, near midnight, an obvious lipstick stain on his collar.
In that moment, the alcohol had been necessary. Without it the impact of that particular blow might have been fatal. She wasn’t a fool. She was, after all, in her husband’s office, demanding a divorce. She knew their marriage was broken. Irrevocably. He had wanted one thing from her, one thing only, and she had failed to accomplish that task.
The farce was over. There was no point in continuing on.
But she had not expected this. Evidence that her ice block of a husband—dutiful, solicitous and never passionate—had been with someone else. Recreationally. For pleasure.
Do you honestly think he waits around when you refuse to admit him into your bed?
Her running inner monologue had teeth tonight. It was also right. She had thought that. She had imagined that he was as cold to everyone as he was to her. She had thought that he was—at the very least—a man of honor. She had been prepared to liberate him from her, to liberate them both. She hadn’t truly believed that he was off playing the part of a single man while still bonded to her by matrimony.
As if your marriage is anything like a real one. As if those vows apply.
“You want a divorce?” The sharpness in his tone penetrated the softness surrounding her and brought her sharply into the moment.
“You heard me the first time.”
“I do not understand,” he said, his jaw clenched tight, his dark eyes blazing with the kind of emotion she had never seen before.
“You’re not a stupid man, Kairos,” she said, alcohol making her bold. “I think you know exactly what the words I want a divorce mean.”
“I do not understand what they mean coming from your lips, Tabitha,” he said, his tone uncompromising. “You are my wife. You made promises to me. We have an agreement.”
“Yes,” she said, “we do. It is not to love, honor and cherish, but rather to present a united front for the country and to produce children. I have been unable to conceive a child, as you are well aware. Why continue on? We aren’t happy.”
“Since when does happiness come into it?”
Her heart squeezed tight, as though he had grabbed it in his large palm and wrapped his fingers around it. “Some people would say happiness has quite a bit to do with life.”
“Those
