He lied, he kept a secret. He broke our vows and promises, and we all know that behind secrets and lies, there's a web of destruction.
I hate him.
Moaning, I push myself up, not bothering to look in the mirror as I rinse my mouth, toss my head back and gurgle. Mason’s deceit is swishing around with the mouthwash.
It only makes me gag.
Bitterness. I can’t seem to swallow it down.
Spitting it out and wishing his secret and lies would flow down the drain, I turn off the water and through blurry eyes, make my way back into our bedroom to sit on the edge of the bed and bury my head in my hands.
I hate the paparazzi with a passion. I can honestly sit here and tell myself this might be the only time I’m appreciative of them. Who knows how long I would have been kept in the dark if they wouldn’t have approached us.
I’ve dealt with so much from the press hounding us. The rumors of Mason cheating, the gossip I was a gold-digging trailer trash monster who stuck by the man because of his fame and money, and not once did I believe what they said to be true. I knew who we were. Who I thought we were meant to be.
I’ve kept my head down and walked away from the rubbish talk all because I trusted my husband. I always have. Through it all, we remained tight. Our love, our life, our marriage was never in danger. Now it seems none of it meant a damn thing to him. He’s tossed it out as if I meant nothing the same as my birth mother did me.
Tonight every bit of what they said is the truth. I know it deep in my gut, I do.
What my husband has done is slaughter an unbreakable marriage built on trust, that’s what this is —devastation in the form of crumbling just like that.
“I will never forgive you for this, Mason. Whatever the hell this even is.” I don’t even know the entire story or how this came about, and I can feel the betrayal so deep in my bones that they’ll likely hollow out before this is all said and done.
Many years ago, Mason and I devised a plan that we would stop at nothing to get him the belt he wanted. His big dream was to become the World Boxing Champion. It was a plan that is highly unrealistic to most, but I believed in him, I saw his vision and listened to him try to convince me it wasn’t as big of a dream as me becoming his wife. I told him dreams could be the same because I knew he loved me differently.
We were a team, or at least I thought we were. Back then, Mason’s drive and the heart of wanting to be a champion along with my spirit, and the guidance from Hector made Mason’s dream come true. Of course, Mason was the one putting in the grueling physical hard work. His determination and positivity inspired me in a way I had never experienced, and to this day, I never will. I loved him all the more for it, and now I don’t know what to think.
Spinning.
My head is going around and around enough to make me dizzy.
Concern narrows my throat, making it hard to swallow, my heart going haywire in erratic, hard thumps. My skin is feeling excessively tight.
“Shit,” I choke as my phone goes off and I see Aubrey’s number flashing on the screen. She and Chance must have heard. I doubt there’s anyone in this Godforsaken world who hasn’t, and it’s only been an hour. I’m sure those gambling addicts are placing bets already.
I let it ring. Aubrey might be the only woman I’ve shared my hopes, dreams, and fears with, but she isn’t who I’m ready to talk to right now.
I wait until it stops ringing before shooting off a quick text to let her know Mason and I are dealing with the press, and I’ll explain when she returns. I hate lying to her; knowing lies are what caused this downward spiral in the first place. I refuse to have her spend vacation worrying. They’ve only been there a day.
God, I sure could use her shoulder right now, if only to cry on.
Honestly, I’m not even sure I want to face my husband, let alone Aubrey and Chance. The thought of dealing with Mason chancing his fate at all constricts the flow of air to my lungs.
I stand on shaky legs as the sound of Mason’s car screeches to a halt in the garage. My nerves are fraying a little more at the edges. They began shredding the minute the questions flew. They ripped and blew in the wind from the shocking surprise that barreled me over like a two-ton truck when I escaped through a side door at the restaurant. Now that I’m about to face him, they are hanging on by a thread.
When I hit the air outside the restaurant, I ran as far away as I could. I hailed a cab and turned on my phone, and sure enough, there was my husband standing in front of the cameras explaining that the fight was not in the works, and whoever told them otherwise had the story wrong. He went on to tell them he’d been thinking of coming out of retirement, and that is as far as the story goes.
I saw it though, the strong desire to get back in the ring professionally in his eyes. It was if he was looking into the cameras and pleading for me to hear him out.
I might’ve listened if he wouldn’t have kept it from me. I know there’s not a chance he’ll be able to fight again professionally. So does he, so what in the hell is he thinking? He knows I would never permit it.
“This is dirty, Mason. A blow below the belt. A sucker-punch and you know it.” I whisper, covering my mouth with my hand.
I place my other hand over my stomach as it clutches in pain. The weight of him keeping something as severe as wanting to box again from me punches me in the gut over and over.
The man might as well have hit me himself.
My mind can’t process any of this. It struggles to wrap itself around the fact that Mason would even think about returning after everything we went through. After what we learned could happen if he did. It is forbidden.
This hurts badly. It stings worse than anything.
Because it’s my husband that has unraveled a bond I never thought would become threadbare. He has taken my trust in him and broken it—snapped it in half, just like that.
Unfixable.
The painful deceitfulness leaves nothing but animosity in my mouth.
Rage swallows me whole when I look at my wedding ring, twisting it around my finger. It pulls tight across my chest, trying to seal the pain that this stunt of deceit Mason has evoked in me.
Brutal and unforgivable.
After this, maybe what the scoundrels claim is true. The women who came out of the woodworks claiming they had an affair with my husband — all of it could be the blinding truth. Maybe the man I’ve known for twenty-seven years isn’t the man I’ve known at all.
Oh, God. The questions that arise.
My husband wants to box again. There’s no doubt about it in my troubled chaotic mind.
I should have known. I should have seen the signs that blinked in neon colors every time Mason would stay late at the gym. He wasn’t working with kids. He was bulking up and probably sparring too.
How stupid of me to believe him. I guess I was too caught up in finally fulfilling our dreams to notice he’d been lying to me all this time.
Maybe they weren’t his dreams. If they weren’t, that means he agreed to them all these years to appease me.
Damn it, had I been hurtling toward something the man I love never wanted? Was his love to have a family nothing but lies too?
There’s a big fat chance I’ll never find the answer because with each shattering breath I take, the more the questions pile.
Pain soaks into me. It closes in suffocating and thrashing and hammering until I’m drowning to breathe.