The longer Amy thought about it, the more she convinced herself that she and Ethan were trying too hard to make their relationship something it wasn’t. She looked down at the enormous diamond on her engagement ring. It was beautiful. It was clear and flawless, and it meant absolutely nothing. She wanted it to mean something, anything other than an agreement to lie. That’s all the ring was: a lie.
That had been Logan’s appeal from the beginning. He was honest. He was immature and scandalous, but he was honest about what he had wanted from her. He had left out the part about leveraging it against Ethan, but it seemed much less of a lie than everything Ethan had done. Even so, she was glad to finally be done with Logan. He would be one less thing to worry about.
Amy had been ready to tell Ethan that she loved him. Now she wondered if she had actually felt love at all. Their whole relationship had been a lie. She couldn’t help but wonder if her feelings had all been fake, too, just a delusion that helped her avoid reality. Ethan was lying to her about so many things, and she was lying to him. Maybe it just wasn’t meant to be. Maybe she just needed to go back and end it.
By the time she climbed into her town car back to DC, Amy was so upset, she felt sick. She looked down at her phone, hoping for some comforting message from Ethan. Instead she had a voicemail from Callie. Instead of listening to it, she called her back.
“You called?”
“You’re getting a divorce?” Callie said. Amy could hear the loud sounds of a bar in the background.
“What are you talking about?” Amy asked. She half shouted. She could barely hear Callie’s voice above the noise on the other end of the line.
“I stopped by the apartment, and Ethan was talking about getting a divorce. Amy, what’s going on?”
He must have seen the photos, Amy thought. “I have to go. We’ll talk about this later.” That was definitely not the reassuring call she had hoped for.
Chapter 23
Amy took a deep breath and opened the door to Ethan’s apartment. It was late, and she hoped that Ethan was already asleep so she wouldn’t have to face him until morning. As soon as she was inside, she smelled the cool musk of his cologne and immediately choked up. She didn’t know what to do. She didn’t know what to say or think. Moments before, she had been so sure that she needed to end their marriage. Now, she didn’t know what she wanted.
She leaned against the wall. She hated feeling this way, angry and insecure. She hated who she had become. She let herself slide down against the wall until her head bowed against her knees. Her whole life, she had been strong and independent. A few months with Ethan had turned her into a needy, insecure mess.
“Honey, is that you?” Ethan called from the kitchen. “There’s something I need to tell you.” She was mad at herself for wanting nothing more than to run to him and kiss him. She just wanted things to be different. She wanted to go back in time and tell him that she wouldn’t take his deal but she would take a date with him.
Amy paused for a moment before pushing herself back up to her feet. “I don’t want to hear it, Ethan,” she said as she rose. Her voice broke as she said his name. He had become the center of her world, and he didn’t respect her enough to tell her the truth. He didn’t even respect her enough to let her know what he was thinking. By the time she reached the threshold of the kitchen, she was angry again.
Amy leaned forward and tossed the photos on the counter. She couldn’t even look at Ethan, instead she stared down at the gleaming countertop. It was perfectly clean, just like the rest of the apartment. Suddenly Amy hated the apartment. She hated everything it stood for. It wasn’t her apartment. It wasn’t their apartment. It was his apartment, right down to the color of the granite and the lack of anything out of place. The only thing that didn’t belong there was her. “I can’t do this anymore. I’m done with the lying and pretending. I’m done trying to force something that just isn’t.”
“What are you talking about, Amy?”
“Do you really have no idea what I’m talking about?”
“Why do you say that?”
“You have divorce papers in that envelope, don’t you?”
“Yeah, I do.” Ethan looked down at the photos. “What do you have?”
“Your grounds for divorce. Its photos of Logan and me on the night you came to the bar. Some website got ahold of them. That was the crisis. It was bush league, the kind of thing I could solve in my sleep. It doesn’t matter. He told me everything, Ethan.”#p#分页标题#e#