by Cynthia Dane
I’ve lost my mind. That’s my problem.
“Sorry,” Alice muttered, shamefully barreling toward the staircase. “Give them everything for free,” she spat at Susan before going down the stairs. Dee held herself to the wall so Alice could go by.
Alice’s less-than-enthusiastic walk in the back hallways was mired with disbelief in herself. I can’t believe I did that. I can’t believe I thought… No, she was angry, wasn’t she? What did she want more than to ram her fist into her husband’s face for letting her believe something so fucked up?
She didn’t bother knocking on the manager’s office door. Alice opened with the last of the strength she had.
Sid looked up from his desk. Before him, Monroe kicked one leg off the other and looked at his wife as if she were a ghost.
“Alice?” Still wearing every piece of his suit and looking perfectly relaxed before Alice walked into the room, Monroe was as confused as his wife was upset. That’s when he caught the looks on Susan and Dee’s faces. How could he not know that something was terribly wrong after that? “What’s going on?”
“Sid,” Alice said through clenched teeth. “Could you give us a moment?” She didn’t care if this was the manager’s office. She was the owner, and she could kick him out if she wanted.
Sid stood from his desk. “I need to make my rounds anyway,” he said with his gravelly voice. “Text me when you would like to continue our conversation.” That was directed to Monroe. To Alice? He gave a wary look that suggested she had majorly overstepped her bounds, owner or not.
“What the hell is it?” While Monroe was certainly not impressed with this entrance, he did not turn away from his wife. If anything, he left one arm wide open for her to dive into an embrace if she wanted. I don’t want to. Not right now. “Is everything all right?”
Alice couldn’t look at him. Embarrassment? Shame? She shut the door in Dee’s face. Sid’s office was better lit than most of the club, but it was still fairly dark in there – her husband looked like an imposing shadow in the corner of her eye.
“You never answered my texts.”
Monroe held out his hands as if to say, “Really? That’s it? That’s the issue? I didn’t answer your fucking texts?” He didn’t say anything, though. His visage commanded her to keep explaining.
“I texted you a hundred times asking you where you were. What the fuck was I supposed to think, Damon?” No, no, she didn’t want to cry. She didn’t even know why she was crying. Was it because she was embarrassed? Because she remembered the terror she experienced, thinking her husband was blatantly cheating on her? “After I saw the pictures your father…”
“What pictures?” Monroe advanced, his cologne smacking his wife right in the face. “What about my father?”
With a shaky hand Alice pulled out her big cell phone and brought up the pictures she snapped in her office while waiting to hear back from him. Monroe snatched the phone from her. “Jesus Christ,” he cursed. “Who gave you these pictures? My father?”
Alice was too humiliated to immediately respond. “Yes. A while ago, but I didn’t look at them until today.”
“Shit.” Monroe tossed the phone back to her. He faced the wall, seemingly staring at a large painting of a yellow daisy against a splattered black backdrop, but Alice knew he was thinking, not looking. “Shit!” There were those ambers. Boring right into Alice as if she were the dumbest woman in the world. “You fucking believed him? You know he’s a megalomaniac who will tell you a million lies until he gets what he wants. He wants you gone, Alice! One of the best ways to make that happen would be to turn you against me!”
Alice slipped her phone back into her pocket. “I know.”
“Do you? Because you were apparently jonesin’ to believe that I would cheat on you. With Natsuko?”
“I kept trying to tell myself that you wouldn’t do that. Except you wouldn’t respond to my texts… and they said you came here with her.” Ah, there were the tears. For a few hours, Alice had descended into madness thinking about her husband, the man she had gone through so much for already. I’ve almost been killed. I’m stressing myself out over how much your father hates me and how quickly we have to make our corporate move. And this baby shit! Alice sank into one of the chairs and covered her tears with her hands. “Tell me what’s going on!”
“Nothing is going on.” Monroe stood before her but did not touch her. “Ms. Matsuda and I have been having blunt conversations about us, yes, but not in the way you’re thinking.” He scoffed. “My father has asked her father for her hand in marriage. My father and a woman younger than me.”
“So you brought her to a fucking sex club?”
“Why the hell not? It’s mine, is it not?”
“Damon!”
“All right, all right. I can see how it looks, but after we had a few drinks I came down to talk with Sid and she met up with her boyfriend. I haven’t seen her since.”
I have. Alice couldn’t wait for her husband to find out about what happened. “I’m so sorry, Damon. I let him get in my head.”
“No, precious.” He knelt before her, taking her hand. Their cursed wedding rings glittered together. I only wear this ring for now in the hopes of freaking Russell out. It hadn’t worked. “I should be the one apologizing. I should have communicated with you better today.”
“No, it’s my fault. I not only let him get in my head, but…” Alice sobbed, her other hand clutching her stomach. “These fucking hormones.”
“We’ve both played a part. But it’s going deeper, isn’t it?”
Alice leaned back in the chair. I’m so tired. She wanted to go home, take a bath, and sleep for the next five days. Yet she couldn’t get those feelings out of her head. She couldn’t shake the images she had conjured of her husband and Natsuko. Compared to what she actually saw? Shit. “I don’t really know you, Damon.” Alice needed to confess the one thing lurking beneath her conscience every time something felt off. “We jumped into this so quickly. I love you. I don’t doubt your love for me. But I don’t really know you.”
He shook his head. “What else is there to know about me?”
“I’m not talking about your general personality or things you like. I mean how you respond to situations. How you get when you’re down or angry.” She shuddered, remembering how he could get when he was upset with a business associate or his own shortcomings. Yelling. Smacking pillows. Scaring me. Never in Alice’s presence, but none of the staff denied that he could get that way when stress was high. A man could only self-medicate with sex and some alcohol for so long. What if it gets worse? What if it’s ten years and three kids later and I’m packing my bags because I can’t do this any longer? Love wouldn’t last her through that.
God, they needed therapy already. They only had themselves to blame.
No, they had someone else to blame. They wouldn’t even be in this situation if it weren’t for Russell. He was the reason they got married so quickly. He was why the moment Alice had a ring on her finger she stopped taking her birth control and fucked her husband like a rabbit. We definitely had sex both for pleasure and to get pregnant. What had she been thinking about earlier that year? Definitely not getting married and having babies. Yet here she was!
“You’re right,” Monroe conceded. “There are still things I’m shocked to find out about you. Like the fact that you snore.”
Alice managed a weak smile. “You snore worse. I had to get up and go to the other room the other night to get away from the horrible noise.”
“I’m giving you practice for the baby.”
Their smiles grew. “I’m sorry, Damon,” Alice apologized again. “I guess I worried that I really didn’t know you. How naïve have I been already? Maybe I was naïve marrying you so quickly and thinking you would stay true to me.”
“Alice,” he said drolly. “Do you think I would be so stupid as to bring my date to The Dark Hour of all places?” His cheeky smile was going to get him slapped. I didn’t even
know he smiled at all until we were nearly married. Smirks and grins didn’t count.
“Do you love me?”
He pulled her against him, stroking the back of her head and rubbing her lower back. “I love you more than anything or anyone I’ve ever loved before. I can’t explain it. Don’t ask me to put logic to emotions like this. You’re a good woman. You’re smart and capable. You have a big heart and, well, you’re gorgeous. Why wouldn’t I be in love with you? Now that you’re my wife and going to be the mother of my children? Life could still be better, but it’s not because of your shortcomings.”
“Yes. We all have our shortcomings.” Alice knew hers without him telling her. I’m brash and naïve. I have little experience in the corporate world. I still have the mind of a lower-middle-class girl. There were others, but those were the biggest ones coming to mind.
Damon wasn’t so perfect either.
He was quick to anger and idealistic to a fault in love. When things didn’t go his way? God, there was a reason the common thread between all these Monroes was the word controlling. Even Clarise Livingston, who married into the family, was called controlling first and foremost. Does that make me controlling too? Was that why Julia ultimately succumbed? Because she wasn’t controlling enough to head off her husband at his worst? Alice knew that wasn’t a fair thought, but the longer she stayed in this family, the more she realized she needed to come around to this whole controlling thing too.
Unfortunately, being controlling went against everything her husband initially laid out for their relationship. Yet Alice had spent her whole marriage thus far taking control of shares and business endeavors. At home? She hadn’t had much time or energy to give her husband what he really desired. Their rush to get pregnant didn’t leave a lot of room for kinky play when the most important thing was making sure all of him went where it was supposed to.
“I haven’t been giving you what you want and need, and for that I am sorry,” Alice said. Her hands toyed with both of his ears, forehead touching his. “You wanted a woman who would be your happy domestic submissive. You wanted a lifestyle that afforded that kind of love and devotion between us. I wanted to go there too. Making sure you’re happy and comfortable is so important to me, Damon. I don’t want you to go home, with or without me, and not be pampered after a long day of stressful work.”
“Do you jest?” Monroe snorted. “I haven’t once thought that you weren’t holding up your end of this relationship. I’ve been pushing you until you almost break. I’ve been so demanding on your heart and body that sometimes I lay awake at night, watching you sleep, wondering if you’ll have to leave me because you can’t take me anymore.” He stopped her before she could speak. “No, Alice. I’ve thought a lot about it. Yes, ideally, I would love to have that kind of relationship that I spoke of. Then I actually got to know you and realized that you’re as important to me in business as you are at home. I don’t want your career to end after we cement our legacy. I don’t want you to go home and have babies and pamper me when I get home unless that’s what you want. If you want to stay working with me during the day and some of the nights, you’re more than welcomed to. I think we’ll be a formidable team the longer this goes on.”
“Really?” Alice had to admit, she was becoming addicted to the rush this new career of hers brought. Who knew she would soon own controlling interest of Monroe Industries? “I mean, maybe things will change once we actually have our baby and have more time to think about our plans and future, but for now… I wouldn’t mind staying in the office with you. Who knows? Maybe I really do have a knack for this stuff.”
“I know you do. I wouldn’t have risked my damn company and reputation if I thought you couldn’t handle it.” He grinned against her cheek. “Yet I have to own up to what I’ve done. I’ve put doubt in your heart and mind. I’ve disturbed the trust between us. It’s unforgiveable. But I can make it right, I think.”
Alice didn’t argue with him. “How?”
“My first mistake was assuming your role in my life would be one of a submissive domestic. Now I know that you’re much, much more than that. I still want to explore that side of our relationship with you, for many years to come. Perhaps we’ll find our ultimate balance. Until then? I have another thought.”
“Oh? What is it?” This would either be really good or… out there. Maybe both, knowing her husband. At least I know that much about him.
“You’re right, my love. We advanced in our relationship so quickly that I didn’t have time to learn the real you. I tried to make you into my perfect woman… when I should’ve seen the woman you already are as perfect.”
“I’m not sure what you mean, but go on.”
“You’re not the kind of woman who will be a lifestyle submissive. Not to that extreme. I love you, my pet, but you’re no Mrs. Warren.”
Nope. I sure am not. “Keep talking like that and I’ll think you have a crush on her. I mean, you’ve apparently slept with half of the Married Women’s Alliance, so…” A personality as big as Lana’s was half.
“Alas, she and I were never fated to be.” That was sarcasm, right? I can’t keep up with his dry humor sometimes. Was dry humor even natural to him? Or had it been beaten into him as the only acceptable form of humor while growing up? Alice could see both. “You and I, though? We can forge our own type of relationship. I won’t lie, Alice, I still want to be your Dom at times, if you’ll have me.”
“Of course I’ll have you.” How could he ask that? Alice knew about that much at least before they got married. “There’s something else though, isn’t there?”
“Isn’t there always?” Monroe chuckled. “Our little sanctuary is almost complete. As soon as it’s ready for us, I want to explore who you really are when the kink comes out.”
Alice cocked her head.
“Life has been so hectic, precious. This Sunday, let’s take the day off and simply enjoy who we really want to be to each other.”
“Sunday. The shares I bought are supposed to come through by Monday.”
“Yes, my love. Monday is another big meeting with the other shareholders. That will be the day we take what’s ours.”
“Shouldn’t we be preparing for that, then?”
He kissed her, his passion so ripe that Alice shuddered where she sat. “We will. In our own way. You will decide who you want to be when it’s all over. You’ll never stop being my wife and the mother of my children, but you can choose what other paths you want to take. Will you be my doting housewife who perhaps chases other ambitions as our children grow? Or will you be as ubiquitous as I am when people hear the name Monroe?”
Alice still wasn’t sure what he meant, but with that look on his face? He knew full well what he was talking about… and Alice was ready to embrace it.
Chapter 20
Alice woke up Sunday morning to her husband smothering her.
Oh, not on purpose. The poor dear had spent most of Saturday attending functions before dragging Alice to a gala for another round of speeches. By the time they got home, they were both too tired to enjoy each other’s company outside of a short shower and some light kisses that petered off as they fell asleep. Alice had spent the past three days constantly apologizing – and not to Monroe, either – for her paranoia. As well-founded as that paranoia was, it didn’t do anyone any good for her to fly off the handle like that.
In turn, her husband was apologizing too – and not just to Alice. Before leaving The Dark Hour Thursday night, they tracked down Natsuko and explained what had happened. Shaken and embarrassed, the heiress accepted their apologies before insisting she fly back to Osaka, sans boyfriend. She did, however, appreciate the gratuity offered after such a huge mistake.
The Monroes then spent the rest of the night discussing the possible marriage between Natsuko and Russell. It seemed so impossible… and yet not outside the realm of crazy possibilities. It would obviously be a marriage of convenience with no love and only enough sex to create new heirs,
but neither Alice nor Damon were excited by the prospect of that young woman being subjected to Russell’s controlling narcissism. When Alice brought up Clarise Livingston again, her husband said, “My father can’t stand not being in control of every little thing. I had enough freedom until I made a decision he didn’t like or I tried to go off the life script he had written for me the moment I was born. I willingly went to Princeton, but for a long while I thought about studying abroad in Europe or going to the west coast for a change in scenery. He… did not take that well.”
All of this was as much for Damon Monroe as it was for his wife. They were not only learning about each other, but themselves. My husband has spent his whole life unwittingly following his father’s script, no matter what he did in his personal time. That all changed when he met me and forged his own path. The Monroes needed an overhaul, all right. It would start with them.
In between meetings and chats about renovations, Alice and her husband finally sat down to discuss the child growing in her womb. Alice was still convinced that she was pregnant, and her daily morning sickness and other changes wracking her body at a mere four or five weeks cemented that in her mind. The first thing she was doing after the shareholder’s meeting on Monday was going for another test at the doctor’s. This time she wouldn’t take you’re not pregnant seriously. She’d find a doctor that was competent.
Now, on Sunday morning, Alice enjoyed a dawn of peace.
Monroe rolled off her, allowing her to breathe. Alice wrapped her arm across his bare chest and felt the quiet power rumbling beneath his breaths and muscles. This is the man I married. She lightly touched the stubble he would shave as soon as he got up. This is the father of my child. Her provider, her protector, the man who had an important role to fill alongside hers.
Alice never thought much about traditional gender roles. She still didn’t. If being a housewife worked best for their relationship, she was open to the idea. She was also open to taking on other roles in her family’s dynamic, as long as she had a husband willing to pick up the slack since she was not Superwoman. Would he be okay with our child needing us both equally? Would he be okay with nannies taking shifts while we’re working? One thing at a time, Alice!
