by Julia Wolf
Built to Fall
Julia Wolf
Copyright © 2021 by Julia Wolf
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Proofreading: My Brother’s Editor
Editor: Word Nerd Editing—Monica Black
Model: Carlos Pereira https://www.instagram.com/capereiv/
Cover Design: Amy Queau
To the creators on TikTok who saved my sanity and inspired me to write this story.
Contents
1. Chapter One: Claire
2. Chapter Two: Dominic
3. Chapter Three: Claire
4. Chapter Four: Dominic
5. Chapter Five: Claire
6. Chapter Six: Claire
7. Chapter Seven: Dominic
8. Chapter Eight: Claire
9. Chapter Nine: Dominic
10. Chapter Ten: Claire
11. Chapter Eleven: Claire
12. Chapter Twelve: Dominic
13. Chapter Thirteen: Claire
14. Chapter Fourteen: Claire
15. Chapter Fifteen: Dominic
16. Chapter Sixteen: Claire
17. Chapter Seventeen: Dominic
18. Chapter Eighteen: Claire
19. Chapter Nineteen: Claire
20. Chapter Twenty: Dominic
21. Chapter Twenty-one: Claire
22. Chapter Twenty-two: Claire
23. Chapter Twenty-three: Dominic
24. Chapter Twenty-four: Claire
25. Chapter Twenty-five: Claire
26. Chapter Twenty-six: Dominic
27. Chapter Twenty-seven: Claire
28. Chapter Twenty-eight: Dominic
29. Chapter Twenty-nine: Claire
30. Chapter Thirty: Claire
31. Chapter Thirty-one: Dominic
32. Chapter Thirty-two: Claire
33. Chapter Thirty-three: Dominic
34. Chapter Thirty-four: Claire
35. Chapter Thirty-five: Dominic
36. Chapter Thirty-six: Claire
37. Chapter Thirty-seven: Claire
38. Chapter Thirty-eight: Dominic
39. Chapter Thirty-nine: Claire
40. Epilogue: Dominic: One Year Later
41. Stay in Touch
42. Playlist
43. Acknowledgements
About the Author
Also by Julia Wolf
Chapter One
Claire
I realized my husband was cheating on me while I unpacked his small suitcase from his latest trip to Chicago. I didn’t find anything as sordid as a lipstick stain or a phone number scrawled on hotel stationery. The realization came from a sudden musing.
The last time I’d traveled to Chicago with Derrick, we’d had dinner with Melissa, his best friend from high school. It had been over a year ago, and he hadn’t mentioned Melissa since. Not once. Before that dinner, Derrick had been beyond excited to see her again, then nothing.
She’d been lovely too. Petite and blonde—the complete opposite of me. When I’d brought up how pretty I thought she was, my husband had gotten cagey and wouldn’t reply.
Then, as I hung up his dress shirt, I wondered why he hadn’t seen her since, which was when it hit me. Of course he’d seen her—he just hadn’t told me. And he hadn’t told me because he was having sex with her. Maybe even falling in love with her. I couldn’t say how I was so sure, I just knew. Certainty had hit me like a wave and pulled me along in its undertow.
Calmly, I walked into Derrick’s office where he was working on his computer. His flop of dark blond hair draped across his forehead, skimming his wire-rim glasses. When we met in college, I had been flattered by his attention and swept off my feet by his all-American good looks and charm. Now, at twenty-eight, most of his youthful boyishness had faded, replaced by hard-lined handsomeness.
“Derrick.” I stood in front of him, knowing this was the end of our marriage.
His eyes flicked to mine. “What’s up?” He gave me the same crooked grin that had won me over in the first place. Now, it did nothing.
“How long have you been having sex with Melissa?”
For a second, he didn’t react, then he shrunk in his chair like all the air had been sucked out of him. “Why would you ask that?”
I shook my head. “I’m not asking if you’re cheating on me. I know you are. I’d like to know how long it’s been going on.” My heart was too frozen to break. I knew this would hurt later, but for now, I was glad for the cold.
“Claire…” He sighed, shoving his fingers through his hair. “A while.”
“Since we had dinner?”
He averted his eyes to his computer screen, then brought them back to mine. “Yes. Since the dinner. I’m sorry, babe. I didn’t mean for it to happen.”
I held up my hand. “No, I don’t want to do this.”
He stood, rounding the desk. When he tried to touch me, I batted his hands away, which made him frown. “I don’t get to say anything?”
“No, you don’t. You’ve been having sex with another woman for a year. I think that’s a pretty loud statement.” I started to walk out of the room, but he caught my shoulders, yanking me against his chest.
“Stop this. I don’t even recognize your voice. Tell me what you’re thinking,” he soothed.
My voice was flat and devoid of emotion, but Derrick was the one who was unrecognizable. Our marriage wasn’t perfect, it wasn’t bliss, but it was nice. We made love almost every night, had a tight group of friends, made each other laugh, and still held hands whenever we went out.
“I’m thinking this is over.” I turned my head to look back at him, my handsome, unfaithful husband. “You know that, don’t you?”
He exhaled a heavy breath and dipped his head to my shoulder. “I don’t want that, Claire. I do love you. I love you so much. I just...I messed up. I’ll end it. I’ll end it right now.”
“No, don’t bother.” I forced his hands off me and spun around to face him again. “If it had been a one-time mistake, I might have been able to get over it. If you’d confessed to me, I might have forgiven you. But this? Me realizing how stupid I’ve been for a year and knowing this would have continued indefinitely had you not been found out? I won’t ever get over this. Our marriage is through. I’m leaving.”
“Claire…” Derrick lurched toward me, and I jumped back, unwilling to allow him to touch me ever again. “Claire, baby, I love you. You can’t leave.” His face had flamed to bright red. His blue eyes were liquid behind his glasses.
“I am. I’m going.” That was never a doubt. What I was doubtful of was my ability to stand on my own two feet. Derrick had propped me up for so long, I wasn’t sure I even remembered how. I didn’t have a job or any skills to land on. All I had was a useless college degree and a sister who would take me in without hesitation.
Those thoughts were for later. For now, my focus was on getting out of our home and away from the stranger who called himself my husband.
I made it to the bedroom before Derrick was on me again, trapping me in his arms. He spoke hot, frantic words in my ear while he held me tight. “You have nowhere to go. You can’t leave me, Claire. You can’t. I messed up, but I’ll fix it. This is not the end. I don’t accept it.”
“Let go of me.” I struggled in his hold, turning and twisting, but his arms were iron vises, and his breathing had reached a fever pitch, ragged and rough. I’d been scared of my husband’s explosive temper before, but not like this. Fear had cr
acked my icy veneer, rushing through my veins like venom.
“I won’t. You’re my wife.”
He held me tighter, kissing every part of me his lips could find. “Don’t leave, baby. Stay.”
I scratched at his arms and hands, yelling for him to let me go, tears filling my eyes, panic taking root in my gut. He only held me harder, kissed me with more fervor. Adrenaline spiked in my blood. If I didn’t fight, I’d lose. I stepped on his bare foot with my heel, digging in hard. He grunted in pain and his arms fell away as he stumbled back.
I whirled around while backing toward the nightstand to my cell phone. Never in a million years had I thought I’d need protection from Derrick, but the wild look in his eyes sent chills down my spine.
He started toward me, and I picked up the phone, dialed 911 before I could doubt myself, but hesitated to press send. When his gaze landed on my phone, shock wiped the snarl and anger from his face. His glassy eyes widened, and he sucked in a deep breath.
“Are you scared of me, Claire-bear?” He held his hands out, pleading. “You have to know I would never hurt you.”
“But you did, Derrick. You’ve hurt me.”
“I know, I know I messed up. God, baby, you think I don’t know? But I’d never hurt you physically.”
I rubbed the sore spots on my arms and took another step away. “You did that too.”
“No,” he rasped. “I didn’t mean to.”
“It doesn’t matter what you meant to do. You did it, and now we’re through.” Conviction still held strong in my voice, but I’d gotten shakier and off-balance.
His muscles bunched, and I knew, without a shred of doubt, I had to get out of there. The second he came for me, I darted for the door, but I never had a chance. Derrick's arm shot out, and that was the last thing I saw before it all went dark.
Chapter Two
Dominic
Naked as the day I was born, I picked up my guitar from beside my bed and laid it across my lap. I strummed a chord idly while staring up at the ceiling. Afternoon light shined in through my open windows, warming my bare skin. It wasn’t a bad way to kill some time.
I could have done without the woman rushing around, redressing herself like the open air was burning her skin.
“Slow down.”
Stopping, she turned her dark brown eyes on me. I knew that look. I’d lived with that look for years. Nothing good ever came of it.
“This can’t happen again.” She hopped around, slipping on her heels.
I leaned my head back again, dragging my hand across my forehead. This wasn’t the first time we’d had this conversation. “Come on, Iz. We don’t need to play that game. It’s no fun.”
Isabela Ruiz, my former wife and now the ruler of my kingdom, marched to the side of the bed, standing over me. She’d gone from the afterglow to sleek and pissed off in the span of five minutes. Her raven waves tumbled over her shoulders, no worse for wear. Her makeup was barely smudged, although her signature red lipstick had vanished.
Most of it around my dick.
She pointed a French-manicured finger from her chest to mine. “You’re right. This isn’t fun, Dom. I came here to talk about a press release—not wind up in your sheets.”
“Don’t act like I had to convince you to be there.”
“You didn’t, and that’s the problem. Every time I’m around you, I forget you’re no good for me.” She flipped her hair behind her back and worked an earring into her ear. “And then I remember two minutes after I come.”
With a harried sigh, she strode from the room, expecting me to follow. Normally, that was reason enough for me to stay put, but I wasn’t done with this conversation.
Throwing on a pair of briefs, I sauntered out to my living room where Isabela stood with her arms crossed, waiting for me. The sun was even brighter here, picking up the chocolate hues in her hair and the golden glow of her perfect skin.
Stopping right in front of her, I lifted a wave and brought it to my nose for a long sniff. “Are we going to talk like adults, or am I going to have to keep chasing you all over my house?”
Isabela peered up at me, and there was no mistaking the pain in her pretty brown eyes. The thing was, when she left our marriage the way she did, she lost the right to seek comfort in me. That pain was hers, and I refused to shoulder any more of it.
“How can I move on if I keep coming back here?” she asked.
I scoffed, letting her hair drop. “Aren’t you dating that lawyer? The slick, boring one? I call that moving on.”
“That ended.” She smoothed her hands down her pencil skirt. “But if I were dating him, wouldn’t I have just ruined it by fucking my ex?”
I winced. Isabella rarely swore, and when she did, it was most often in Spanish. I was screwed when she cussed in English.
“Then what’s the problem? Fucking is the one thing we always got right.”
She sucked in a sharp breath. “You see? I’m going to think about you saying that for days, torturing myself with it. I don’t want this anymore, Dominic.”
I’d said the wrong thing, but I couldn’t take it back. I’d add it onto the pile of wrong things I’d said to her over the years.
“So, go. We don’t need to have some big breakup scene. We already did that when you walked out on me.”
Three years done and gone, and here we were, still in the same place. Maybe she was right. Was it even possible to have casual sex with an ex-wife? It didn’t seem like it…at least not now.
“Fine. You’re right.” She picked up her purse and briefcase from where she’d dropped them beside my couch. “I’ll send over the paperwork to terminate my employment with you.”
That stopped me dead in my tracks. “What are you talking about?”
She adjusted the strap of her purse on her shoulder. “Obviously I can’t continue to do your PR. That means spending too much time together—and when we do, we always wind up in bed. I don’t want that anymore. I have to move on.”
My brows pulled into a tight line. “That’s bullshit, Isabela. I do not accept.”
We’d met eight years ago. I’d been in need of new PR, and Isabela’s company had come highly recommended. A year later, we were married. Four years after that, we were divorced and demolished. Even after everything we’d been through, the way we hurt each other, we’d stayed friends. Distant friends, but we talked once a month or so…fell in bed once a month or so too.
“It doesn’t matter if you accept. I can’t work with you. And I certainly can’t go on tour with you next month.”
She was unwavering, and I thought maybe she wasn’t bluffing. She’d put her foot down with me a lot over the years, but I always managed to work that foot back up. Maybe she wanted to truly sever the rest of our flimsy connection.
“So, send one of your underlings on tour with me.” I crossed my arms over my chest. “I sure as hell don’t trust anyone else to do my PR. Not unless you’re in charge of them.”
She pressed a finger to the spot between her perfect eyebrows. She always got a headache there, especially when she got pissed at me.
“You slept with the last woman I sent on tour with you. I can’t have that, Dom. That is unacceptable. I do not need a lawsuit on top of everything else.”
I threw my hands out. “Then send a guy. As long as you’re telling them what to do and I don’t have to talk to them, I don’t give a shit.”
Isabella puffed out her cheeks, then slowly released a breath. “Fine. I’ll think about our contract.” She held up one finger. “But anything physical between you and I is finished. We’ve been dragging each other along like old baggage the last three years and I’d rather not spend the next three doing the same.”
“Drama, woman.” I shoved my fingers through my hair in frustration. All I’d wanted out of this day was a really good fuck, some music, a nice meal, and a blunt to round it all off.
“You know,” she jabbed a finger at me, “if you didn’t make a mess all the time
, you wouldn’t have such close, personal relationships with your PR people.”
I gave her a long, hard look. The mess was telling nosy reporters to go fuck themselves. Flipping off record execs who didn’t know their ass from a hit single. Getting in fights with jackholes who didn’t know when to stop.
That didn’t make me a mess. It made me a man who didn’t hold back his reactions. No artist worth his salt felt things in small ways. Insults didn’t slide off my back. Injustices didn’t fade into the background. Feelings weren’t something to manage. I liked my life raw and unmoderated.
“Can’t teach an old dog new tricks, Iz. You know that,” I drawled.
She rolled her eyes. “Old is right. At forty-two, you’d think you’d learn some self-control.”
“I’ve got plenty.” I eyed her in that spicy red skirt, letting her see I was looking at her. “If I didn’t, I’d have you bent over, that skirt around your waist, fucking some sense back into you…or fucking you senseless—whichever gets you to keep working for me.”
“Not happening.” She brushed by me, striding to my front door. “I’ll call you, but I won’t be by.”
“Got it!” I wandered back to my room, threw myself back onto my tangled sheets, and picked up my guitar, shaking my head. I couldn’t decide whether I believed Iz, or if her wanting to sever all ties even mattered. We weren’t ever getting back together. There was no question about that for either of us. But she’d been a steady source of distraction for so long, my gut protested giving that up.
