The Comments Said I Was His Fake Wife

Three years into my marriage, the comments told me my husband had been catfished into it.

That night, for the first time, I pulled out of Bennett Ashford's arms. "I'm kind of over it. We don't have to do this anymore." Nobody else can see the comments.

Just me. [He only married her because of that face.] [The girl he actually met online is back in the country now.] [The fake has been playing devoted wife for three years.

Time to give the real one what's hers.] So every night he came to me with that cold face, it was never because he wanted me. In this story, I was the side character.

Chapter 1 "Over it?" Bennett said it like the word didn't fit in his mouth. His eyes dropped. Traveled down. That was when I remembered what I had on. Thin black straps.

Sheer lace across the front. A hem that barely covered anything, with two little bows tied at one hip. The review photos all said the same thing. No man walks past this.

He had stood inside the doorway a long time when he came in. I thought that meant he liked it. The comments told me what it actually meant.

He was tired of me using this to push him into his marital duty again. My nose stung.

I dragged the blanket up and wrapped myself in it to the chin. "I didn't put it on for you." After that, neither of us said anything. Only the comments kept moving. [I'm screaming.

Does the side character really think playing hard to get is going to make him jealous?] [No chance. He wants that divorce yesterday.

The only thing that'd get to him is being made a fool of, and then he'd just freeze her out.] [Keep it up, girl. Keep pushing. Wait till they expose whose life she's been living.

Divorced, humbled, broke, and stuck with some rich old guy.] Bennett looked at me a long time.

Nothing in his face moved. "Fine," he said. "Understood." He turned and went into the bathroom. The water ran. It kept running. I'd expected anger. A question, at least.

That was me giving myself too much credit. He'd rather stand under that water all night than look at me.

I changed out of the dress I'd picked so carefully and shoved it to the back of the closet. Lamp off. Blanket up. Alone in it. The bed was cold on both sides. He hadn't even asked.

Something sat in my chest anyway, wet and heavy, like packed cotton. After that night I moved into the guest room. I stopped waiting up for him. I stopped texting him.

I used to be all over him. Anything for his attention. The smallest thing and I'd text about it. I played hard to get. I made trouble on purpose. I asked for presents.

Mornings, I'd hang off his arm until he talked me down, and only then would I let him out the door.

When he stayed late at the office, I'd send him photos of new dresses just to make him answer me. Me: [Which one do you like, babe?] Me: [It's so late.

When are you coming home?] Me: [Are you sleeping with me tonight, or just sleeping?] His answers never ran long.

Him: [Either one.] Him: [Busy.] Him: [Get some sleep.] I told myself he was cold by nature. Bad at this kind of thing. Turned out he'd probably been sick of it for years.

He just couldn't say so out loud, not to his own wife. Two days in the guest room, and he never knocked once. The comments only got louder. [Countdown's started.

The real one's back in the country. Now they just have to find each other.] [Three years of the fake. About time it ended.] I read those two lines over. If all of it was true.

Then what had the last three years been? Chapter 2 Close to noon, Hattie came out of the kitchen. "No lunch for Mr. Ashford today either, Mrs.

Ashford?" I used to bring Bennett lunch at the office all the time. After we started sleeping in separate rooms, he never came looking for me, so I stopped going.

I was about to say no. Then the comments started. [Does she really think two days of the silent treatment will make him realize he can't live without her?] [I'm screaming.

While she's busy playing hard to get, the female lead is already at his office. They're about to figure each other out.] [He's not cold, he just never wanted her.

Wait till he's in front of someone he actually wants. Calling it now: things get hot tonight and she sleeps alone.] I read the last one twice.

Something pressed down on my chest and stayed there. I'd already decided to step back.

But the thought of Bennett holding Isadora like that, kissing her with a gentleness he'd never once spent on me. My eyes burned anyway.

I looked away from them and changed my mind. "Hattie. Pack it up." "I'm going to the office." For now, I was still his wife. I got there too late.

Through the revolving door I saw him right away. Black suit, that flat expression he wore everywhere, coming out of the elevator with Isadora Hale beside him.

She had on a white pantsuit, hair pinned up, project files against her chest. One in black. One in white. One cold and expensivelooking, one poised and sharp.

Standing together like that, they matched. It hurt to look at. The comments hadn't gotten a single word wrong. They said she'd come back. She came back.

They said she'd be at his office today. There she was. So what about the rest of it. The divorce. The money gone. Give the real one what's hers. That would come true too.

One line at a time. Isadora turned her head and said something to him. Bennett looked down at her and slowed his steps.

I had almost never seen him give anyone that much room. [AAAH the height difference. I'm shipping this first, don't fight me.] [Our girl is finally back.

Careerdriven queen and cold billionaire CEO, that's the pairing.] [Not like a certain clingy wife whose entire personality is bringing lunch and checking up on him.] [Don't you dare walk over there.

Don't ruin their moment. It's honestly nauseating.] [She's not about to pull the wife card, is she?

You stole the marriage and now you want to claim him?] My foot was already through the door. I pulled it back.

The insulated container hung off my fingers, heavier than it had been in the car. Bennett had someone to eat with. What did he need me for.

I dropped my head and turned to go, and somebody called out behind me. "Delaney?" My cousin Ellis, with an intern badge on a lanyard around his neck. He looked at me.

Then at the container in my hand. His whole face lit up. "Wait, what are you doing here? Did you bring me lunch?" He'd been floating for days when he landed this internship.

I never told him who my husband was. I didn't want it hanging over him in this building. I got a smile onto my face. "Yeah. Figured they're working you to death.

It's for you." Ellis took it like I'd handed him something breakable. "Seriously? I thought you only ever cooked for your husband." That landed somewhere under my ribs.

I shoved his shoulder anyway. "Eat it or don't." "I'm eating, I'm eating, I'm starving, thank you." He got an arm around me and squeezed. "I knew it.

Nobody's better to me than you." I know now what was happening on the top floor while I stood down there.

Bennett had already been seated when someone told him I was in the building. His hand stopped on the menu. I hadn't brought him lunch in days, and I was here, and I hadn't come up.

He put the chair back hard enough to knock it into the wall. He was already walking when Isadora started to say something.

Chapter 3 "Bennett, I already ordered for—" "Start without me." He didn't turn around, and he didn't slow down. Downstairs, through the glass, he found me.

Me, handing his lunch to some kid in a white shirt. Goodlooking. Bright. All that easy sunshine pointed at me. The kid took it and laughed and pulled me in against his chest.

I didn't push him off. I laughed too. Bennett stopped a few steps short of the door. Nothing showed on his face. I know now what was underneath it.

That whatever was in his eyes kept going darker. That he'd driven his nails into his own palm hard enough to break skin, and that there was rust on his tongue.

And I know what he decided, standing there. That I was finished with him. That this was what I'd traded him for. Once I stopped hanging on Bennett, he started coming home early.

Every single day. Just like the comments said. All those late nights had been about avoiding me. He came home early and still never knocked on the guest room door. Not once.

I told myself he was waiting on word from Isadora. I was the only one in that house turning every set of footsteps in the hall into him coming to find me.

It sat in my chest and ached. So I stayed in my room, and I wanted to see him even less. Then came a dinner we both had to show up for.

Isadora came at me before I'd cleared the ballroom doors. Long white dress, barely any makeup. Her eyes went pink the second she saw me. "Laney.

It's been forever." She hooked her arm through mine like we were still best friends from college. "When I heard you and Bennett got married, I wanted to come back so badly.

I was scared seeing me would bring up things you'd rather forget." I looked between the two of them. Neither one helped me. Her hand flew to her mouth like she'd let something slip.

She looked at Bennett. "You didn't tell her?" She turned back to me, apologetic, careful. "I'm sorry.

I assumed there weren't secrets between a husband and wife." She pressed her lips together before she went on, and she kept her voice low, the way people do when they're being kind. "Back in college I was insecure.

I couldn't stand to send my own pictures.

So when Bennett and I were talking online, I used that photoshoot you did." Her fingers tightened around mine. "Then he took those photos to campus looking for the girl in them, and he found you.

I meant to explain. But you were so happy.

You came and told me a guy had fallen for you at first sight." Her eyes filled. "I couldn't be the one to take that away from you." The comments lost it. [THIS is the public humiliation I came for.

Otherwise she'd go on believing it was love at first sight.] [Our girl is way too nice.

Gets her man stolen and still worries about hurting the side character's feelings.] [A fake is a fake.

Time to give the real one what's hers.] My fingers went numb around the stem of my glass. Isadora looked at Bennett then, and something moved behind her eyes. "Congratulations.

You really did marry the girl in the photos." His brows pulled down. "Isadora." "Fine. I'll stop." She laughed at herself and squeezed my hand. "We were kids.

Laney, you're not angry with me, are you?" It was an apology. Every line of it was an apology. And every line of it told me the same thing. The woman he fell for was her.

I just happened to have the face from the pictures. Bennett's jaw set. "Enough. Drop it." I looked down at the tablecloth. Of course. He couldn't stand to watch her be embarrassed.

At the table, Isadora ended up in the chair beside his. The food came out and she reached over and lifted the cilantro off his plate without a word about it. "Sorry.

Force of habit." She turned to me like the thought had only just arrived. "You knew that, though. Right?" I kept my mouth shut. He'd never told me. I cook with cilantro.

I like it in everything. Three years, and he never said a word. When I didn't answer, Isadora gave me that sorry little smile again. But I saw it.

Underneath the apology, something else. Chapter 4 "Listen to me, running my mouth. You're married.

You don't need me reminding you of anything." She swapped his ice water for a warm glass while she said it. "Your stomach used to be so bad, and you'd still drink everything ice cold.

I had to beg you for weeks before you'd take anything for it." She tipped her head, studying him. "You're bruised under the eyes.

Are you not sleeping again?" Years I'd had no part in, laid out on the table like she was passing the bread. Twice I opened my mouth. There was no gap anywhere to put myself into.

Bennett's expression didn't change, and he didn't deny any of it. "Old news. No reason to bring it up." Isadora dropped her eyes. "You're right. And Laney takes care of you now.

Better than I ever did." My hand closed around my glass. I didn't know he wouldn't eat cilantro. I didn't know he couldn't have ice water when his stomach was bad.

I didn't know he'd ever had a night of insomnia in his life. He ate whatever I made. All of it. I'd decided years ago that he simply had no preferences.

Every night I burrowed into his chest to sleep, and I never once knew he was lying there awake. She knew all of it.

She smiled at me, warm as anything. "Laney, don't take it the wrong way. Back then it was just the two of us through a screen. We talked about everything.

Some habits are hard to break." So he wasn't cold by nature after all. He just never had a reason to share his life with me.

The comments piled on. [That's what a soulmate looks like. The side character has a face. That's it.

What's she supposed to compete with?] [If he hadn't grabbed the wrong girl, she'd never have gotten near that last name.] [The female lead stepped aside on her own and this one still sits there squatting in her life for three years, acting like she's the victim.

She doesn't know how good she has it.] My hand jerked. Red wine went across my whole lap. Bennett reached for me with a napkin.

I got out of the chair before he made contact and pulled a smile up from somewhere. "Sorry. I need some air." The tears got out of me in the garden.

I couldn't hold them any longer than that. "Delaney?" Ellis had come through the side door.

He took one look at my dress and had his jacket off and around my shoulders. "Why are you crying? Who did something?" "Nobody." I ducked my head and wiped my face.

He sighed and patted my back. "That is the worst fake crying I've ever seen.

Growing up, I was the only one who ever got beat up around here, and it was always by you." He got a laugh out of me. I punched his arm. "Watch it, punk.

I can still take you." Then something clamped around my wrist. Bennett was behind me. He wasn't looking at me. He was looking at Ellis's hand on my shoulder.

Then, one inch at a time, he brought his eyes back up to my face. Whatever was in them, I'd never seen it there before. Ellis hadn't even processed it yet