HIS STRIPPER, HIS WIFE novel Chapter 102

Chapter 102

I waited six full days telling myself I wouldn’t reach out first, that whatever pride I had left needed to survive at least a week without cracking. It didn’t work as well as I wanted it to.

The flashbacks came at the worst times, mostly at night, when the house was too quiet and my mind had nothing else to occupy itself with. I would be sitting in the living room with a glass of something I barely touched, and suddenly I was back in that moment, her hands moving on my body.

Other times it was worse than that, softer memories coming in uninvited, the sound of her laugh, the way she used to roll her eyes at me when I said something she thought was unnecessary.

I hated how much space she still took up in my head for someone who had walked away so easily. The office wasn’t any better. I wasn’t understanding things well, signing whatever Felix put in front of me because he told me to, not caring about any of it. Work used to be the one place my mind stayed sharp no matter what else was happening in my life, now even that was gone.

Felix noticed, of course he did. He had worked with me long enough to know when something was off, even if I never said it out loud.

“We need to pick someone,” he said this afternoon, standing in front of my desk with a folder in his hand, the third one that week. “You’ve rejected every single candidate we’ve brought in.”

I didn’t answer him, I kept my eyes on the screen in front of me, scrolling through an email I wasn’t actually reading.

“Sir,” he said again, a little firmer this time.

Still nothing from me, I wasn’t trying to be difficult on purpose, I just didn’t have it in me to explain that none of the candidates were the problem, that the problem was that I didn’t want any of them, I wanted the one

who left.

Eventually Felix gave up, muttering something under his breath about how he doesn’t deserve this stress and walked out of the office, the folder still tucked under his arm.

Once he was gone, I found myself looking over at her old desk, empty for weeks now. Someone from facilities had even removed the chair at some point, probably assuming nobody would need it there

anymore.

I called Felix back before I could talk myself out of it.

He stuck his head back through the door, clearly annoyed. “Yes Sir?”

“Find out where she’s working,” I said. “The new place. I want to know if it’s actually Lens and Vale or if that was just something I am assuming.”

Felix stared at me for a long second, like he was deciding whether to ask why I needed that information or just do what I said. He chose the second option, thankfully. “Give me a few hours,” he said, and disappeared again.

Those few hours felt longer than they should have. I tried to bury myself in actual work while I waited, but every time my phone buzzed I found myself checking it faster than I meant to, hoping it was Felix with an answer and not some unrelated notification.

He finally came back a little after two, dropping a small note on my desk with the studio’s name and address written on it. “Confirmed,” he said. “Lens and Vale. She started there a few days ago, apparently doing well already.”

I let go almost immediately after saying it, watching her rub the spot on her wrist for half a second before she nodded once, not saying anything back, and walked off toward wherever she had been heading before we collided.

I stood there a moment longer than necessary, my heart doing something ridiculous for a man my age, before continuing down the corridor toward the director’s office.

The meeting itself went better than I expected, the director, was in a genuinely good mood, more than happy to talk shop with me for a while, and by the time I left, I had gotten exactly what I came for without having to explain my real reason for showing up. My plan had worked out better than I imagined it would when I first thought of it that morning.

The rest of my day made me restless, my mind going back to that corridor more times than I wanted to admit. By the time evening came, I was back home, sitting in my study with my phone in my hand, staring at a blank message box addressed to her.

I typed out something simple, deleted it, typed another version, deleted that too. I went through this cycle more times, second guessing every possible way to phrase four short words. I finally settled on something plain enough not to give too much away.

“How is the new role?”

I sent it a little after eleven that night, then immediately set the phone face down on the table beside me, I picked it up again within three minutes, checked, nothing and set it back down. I picked it up again a few minutes later, still nothing.

This continued for close to an hour and just when I had almost convinced myself she wasn’t going to reply at all, the screen lit up.

“Good sir. How is the office?”