My gorgeous wife is an ex-convict (Grace) novel Chapter 3

“Are you hungry?”

His dark eyes studied her and he tilted his head. “What?”

When he still didn’t reply, she wrung her hands together. “I’ll get you something to eat.”

Grace moved to the tiny stove and threw some noodles and eggs into the pot to make a simple bowl of noodles for him. She didn’t have any meat, but she chopped what vegetables she had and added them too.

She set the tiny table and poured them both a glass of water from the sink. He moved cautiously to take a seat when she set the bowls down.

“Eat, but don’t eat too fast. It’s quite hot,” she said.

She didn’t mean to treat him like a child, but his presence made her nervous even as there was something incredibly calming about him.

He lowered his head and ate his noodles quietly. Grace also stared at him in silence.

Normally, she’d come home and hate the feeling of being alone, confined in a tiny space. For some reason, the loneliness that she’d usually feel seemed to have disappeared. Could it be due to the presence of another person in the room?

After he had finished eating, Grace cleaned up the plates. “I usually sleep with the lights on. I hope you don’t mind,” she said. Ever since she was released from prison, she had gotten into the habit.

“That’s fine.”

Grace took her pajamas into the bathroom and shut the door to brush her teeth and change. Was it weird having a man alone beside where she’d sleep? Yeah. Probably.

But she didn’t feel triggered by his presence of fearful.

If he’d wanted to hurt her, he wouldn’t have defended her on the street.

When she exited and lay down on the bed, he took his position on the floor.

The room was silent save for the sound of the heater. If she listened hard enough, she could hear each breath he took.

It was a steady rhythm, peaceful even.

Grace closed her eyes and focused on sleeping. This was her routine every night because it was almost impossible for her to relax. Even being out of jail, at night she would always dream of her time in prison.

She would be beaten, shamed, and abused… and every finger would burn with the pain of being broken and the nails being torn off…

She’d wake up screaming, fingers curled, terrified, and heart pounding.

However, oddly, that didn’t happen tonight.

She slept until sunrise and was not visited by her usual nightmares.

As she awakened, she rolled over to look at the figure lying on the ground beside her bed.

Still here.

Was it because of him? Because she was no longer alone in this room?

Before she even knew it, she had gotten out of bed, squatted down, and placed her hand on his cheek. Her hand felt warm.

He was real, and not something from her imagination.

Last night, she really had taken a strange man into her apartment.

When she came to herself, she found that he was already awake. His beautiful eyes were fixed on her.

“Sorry.” Her face heated with embarrassment. “I… I just… that… If you don’t have anywhere to go, you can also live here.”

She spoke in a hurry, but after she had said it, she felt relieved.

His eyes widened with a trace of surprise.

“If you don’t want to, just pretend I didn’t say anything,” she added, biting her lip.

His mouth finally opened and he spoke quietly. “Do you want me?”

If this had been said by some other man, it would’ve sounded like they were flirting with her.

But when the words came from him, it was like he was just asking a simple question of “want” or “don’t want” and she assumed he meant it to mean his presence here. She didn’t read any ambiguity into his words, even if there had been, she realized her answer would be the same. Grace pursed her lips. “Yes, I do.”

He stared at her, and a smile slowly formed on his lips. “Good.”

This was the first time she had seen him smile. Although it was very light… it looked extremely beautiful to her.

***

Jason remained at the tiny table while Grace got ready to go back to work. When she left money on the table for him to buy himself some food, he sat staring at the twenty-dollar bill for a long time.

With her gone, the room was eerily still.

None of her light vanilla scent or somewhat nervous energy filled the space. He rolled up the quilt that he’d slept on and then washed out the coffee cup he’d used.

Normally he’d be tempted to look around, maybe snoop a bit. But he didn’t want to intrude on her space.

When he finally left the apartment, there were already people waiting for him outside.

After seeing him come out, they respectfully greeted him, “Mr. Reed.”

“Let’s go,” Jason responded faintly.

A black Bentley was parked in front of him. Jason got into it and looked at the twenty-dollar bill in his hand. It had been many years since someone had given him money like this. On the contrary, for as long as he could remember, people only wanted to take money from him.

Terrence met his gaze in the rearview mirror. “The woman who was with you last night is a contract worker of the Sanitation Service Center. She started renting her current residence here a month ago, and was just released from prison two months prior.”

“Prison?”

“Yes, her name is Grace Cummins. She’s the ex-girlfriend of Sean of the Stevens family. She was convicted of reckless driving and killing Jennifer Atkinson. She was sentenced to three years of imprisonment and had her lawyer’s license revoked,” Terrence said as he carefully observed Jason’s reaction.