The Officer's Runaway Wife & Secret Son novel Chapter 102

He worried about whether Margot Johnson could breathe, but he didn't care if Clara suffocated in the ocean.

The cold realization that she was nothing more than an afterthought had been a slow-burning poison in her veins.

But Rhys wouldn't understand, and he didn't care. In his mind, she was the one who should be understanding. As long as she wasn't accommodating him, she was being difficult.

"Rhys, you still think I'm using divorce to scare you, to make you coddle me, don't you?"

Clara laughed softly, tapping her finger on the papers. "There's a mandatory waiting period after we file. If you manage to win me back during that time, or if I change my mind, the papers become void if we don't finalize it. Treat it as a formality. You don't need to be so stressed. Just sign it so I can see your sincerity."

"Sincerity? Sincerity for a divorce?" Rhys scoffed, a dark, incredulous laugh escaping his throat. "I'm not signing."

"Clara, if there's a problem, we can communicate. If you don't like me contacting Margot, I can minimize it. But don't threaten me with this. It's childish."

Clara countered, "Minimize it? Or just minimize the times I see it? Minimize the times I know about it?"

"Can you stop fixating on this?"

Rhys grabbed the agreement, folded it carelessly, tossed it into a drawer under the coffee table, and slammed it shut.

"If you really wanted a divorce, you wouldn't have come to the airport with me, and you certainly wouldn't have gotten on this boat."

He was so certain.

It was like he had taken a handful of salt and rubbed it vigorously into the tattered remains of her heart. Clara was in so much pain she swayed on her feet.

As long as she followed him, as long as she was willing to appear in his line of sight, he assumed she was showing weakness, compromising, playing hard to get.

Clara felt utterly exhausted. For five years, what was she to him?

"And I don't want you either. Rhys, haven't you realized it yet? I don't love you anymore."

Rhys steadied himself. The smile vanished from his face, his eyes turning cold. "Don't say things you don't mean out of anger. I don't like hearing it."

He ignored the "I don't love you" part and turned toward the door. "I'll have lunch sent to the room. Cool off. And don't mess with that drawer—you'll only pinch your fingers."

"I'm not joking!" Clara shouted at his back.

Rhys didn't look back. His footsteps paused for a fraction of a second, then he opened the door and walked out.

Clara stood there, looking at the door, then at the drawer.

"Fine. Once she left, everything would be over. In reality, the terms of their ending were already in play.