HIS STRIPPER, HIS WIFE novel Chapter 104

Chapter 104

Adrian

“What has she told you this time?” I asked, already feeling my patience thinning.

My mom straightened up in her chair, folding her hands the way she always did when she was about to defend someone she had no business defending. “What has that poor girl done to deserve everything you are doing to her?” she asked, her voice sharp, like she was the one owed an explanation instead of me.

I let out a laugh, more out of disbelief than actual humor. “She should come and let us take the divorce in peace. I signed my part years ago. She’s the one who has refused to sign hers.” I leaned forward slightly, resting my arms on the desk. “And honestly, it doesn’t make sense to me why you keep supporting her over your own son.”

“Because she’s the best for you,” she said like it was some kind of fact everyone else in the room was supposed to already know.

She tilted her head slightly and studied me for a second before changing direction entirely. “How’s that project with the Kellz account? The one you were working on?”

I sighed, already knowing where this was going before she even finished the question. “I haven’t closed the deal yet.”

“You see,” she said, sitting back with a satisfied look, like she had just won some argument I didn’t know we were having. “If you were still with her, she would have helped you close that deal with her uncle by now. You know how close she is to him.”

“I don’t need anyone to help me do my project or speak to anyone on my behalf,” I said, keeping my voice low even with the irritation building underneath it. “When it’s time, I will chase it myself and do it right. I don’t need Victoria’s uncle, and I don’t need Victoria.”

“Adrian, I…” she started, but I wasn’t in the mood to let her finish.

“Mom, that’s a dead end,” I said, cutting her off before she could build any more momentum. “She cheated, forgiven, but she cannot be taken back.” I paused right after saying it, the words felt strange in my mouth the moment they left.

“What did I even mean by forgiven? I hadn’t forgiven anything, not really. There was nothing forgiving about the way I still get angry whenever her name came up, nothing forgiving about how quickly I shut down any conversation that tried to bring her back into my life. She could get out, permanently, and stay out.”

My mom studied me for a moment like she was reading something on my face. “Do you have someone?”

For a few seconds, I genuinely didn’t have an answer, my mind went somewhere I didn’t give it permission to go, the message thread with Bianca from the night before.

“That shouldn’t be your concern at the moment,” I said finally, keeping my tone light, almost teasing. I knew exactly what that answer would do to her. She had been trying to push me toward one of her friend’s daughters for months now, dropping names at every family dinner like she was casting a net and hoping something would stick. This was the easiest way to bait her without giving anything away.

“You’re lying,” she said, narrowing her eyes at me, “and you better not make me find out the hard way.”

I knew she meant every word of that, my mother had her own ways of finding things out, she always did, whether through the staff, through Felix, or the cousins who worked two floors down. But for the first time in a long while, that threat didn’t rattle me the way it usually would have.

Bianca wasn’t working for her anymore, there is no shared office, no shared meetings, no space left for rumors or careless mentions that could somehow find their way back to my mother’s ears.

She stood up from her chair, smoothing her skirt down again out of habit, and started walking toward the door without another word. I watched her go, waiting for her to say something else, some final comment before she left, but she just kept walking.

“No goodbye?” I asked.

She paused at the door, her hand resting on the handle, and turned to look back at me, “Ask me that,” she said, “when you bring a woman home.”

And with that, she walked out, leaving the door slightly open behind her, the sound of her heels fading down the hallway as she went to say her goodbyes to whoever was left on the office floor.

I sat there for a moment after she left, part of me was now annoyed. I didn’t like the way every conversation aside from work still finds his way to Victoria. My mom never listens and I doubt she’s ever going to.

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