Chapter 238
CMWMBB 40
VENUS
The first morning passed without incident.
That was how I knew everything had changed.
I woke before the alarm, body already tense, mind cataloguing the day ahead with mechanical precision. The house was quiet, early enough that even the security shift change hadn’t stirred yet. I lay still for a moment, staring at the ceiling, listening to the familiar cadence of Aaron’s breathing on the other side of the bed.
He was awake.
I knew because he was lying too still.
We didn’t look at each other. We didn’t speak. Eventually, he got up first, moving carefully, as if sound itself might be intrusive. He dressed without the usual easy intimacy: no shared glances in the mirror, no absentminded touch as he passed behind me. When he left the room, the door closed softly.
Not gently.
Softly.
There was a difference.
I got up ten minutes later and dressed in silence. When I reached the kitchen, Aaron was already there, pouring coffee. George sat at the table, his legs swinging faintly beneath the chair, eyes rimmed with shadows that hadn’t been there a month ago.
“Morning,” I said.
Both of them looked up.
Aaron nodded. “Morning p>
George smiled faintly. “Hi, Mama p>
That was it.
No follow-up. No shared moment over the coffee pot. Aaron set my mug beside my plate without comment and moved away to answer a call that had just come in.
I noticed then-absently at first-that he didn’t sit.
He rarely did anymore.
He stayed standing, leaning against counters, doorframes, walls. Ready to move. Ready to leave.
I filed the observation away and focused on the children.
That became my pattern over the next few days.
I stopped initiating conversation.
1/5
Not out of spite. Not even strategy. It was simply… easier.
I responded when spoken to. I smiled when required. I said please and thank you and excused myself when the room grew crowded with unspoken things. I became efficient. Polite. Almost professionally distant.
When Aaron asked what time I wanted to leave for George’s next appointment, I told him the schedule had changed.
“Oh,” he said. “When p>
“Tomorrow. Earlier p>
“Do you want me to p>
“I’ve already arranged it p>
He paused, then nodded. “Okay p>
No argument.
When I rearranged Sabine’s nap schedule and let Rosemary know, Aaron noticed-but he didn’t ask why.
When I told security I’d be stepping out with Colton later in the week, I didn’t explain the purpose.
Aaron didn’t ask.
That was the strangest part.
He was trying-quietly, awkwardly to reach me.
I saw it in the way he lingered near doorways when I was in a room, as if waiting for an opening that never came. In the way he’d ask small, careful questions about my day and accept my clipped answers without pushing. In the way he sometimes looked at me like he was memorizing my face, committing it to memory in case. something shifted again.
But he didn’t talk to me about Iris.
Not once.
At first, I thought it was mercy.
Then I realized it was restraint.
The updates stopped coming from him entirely. If I wanted to know anything, I had to hear it from Connor- who always spoke in generalities, careful not to overstep-or from Colton, who grew increasingly tight-lipped with every passing day.
“No confirmed location yet,” he told me quietly one afternoon as we stood in the garage, the hum of generators masking our voices. “We’re still following leads, but Andrea’s been careful. She’s not working alone Venus, she’s got people behind her p>
Careful.
That word had started to feel obscene.
2/5
Aaron stayed out late most nights.
Not drinking. Not disappearing. Just… not here.
He came home after the kids were asleep, sometimes quietly enough that I only knew because the bed shifted an inch beside me. Other times, I heard him moving in the study until dawn, the low murmur of phone calls bleeding through the walls.
He was always there for the children.
That was the constant.
He attended George’s sessions without fail, sat beside him during dinner, read to him at night with a patience that bordered on reverence. When Sabine cried, he was there before anyone else, lifting her easily, murmuring nonsense until she laughed again.
With me, he was present.
But not with me.
And that distinction hollowed me out in places I hadn’t known could ache.
George’s nightmares returned on the third night.
I heard him before Aaron did-small, broken sounds leaking from his room like a cracked dam. I was already out of bed when Aaron stepped into the hallway, eyes alert.
“I’ve got it,” he said quietly.
I stopped.
Something in his tone-not dismissive, not territorial-just certain.
“I know,” I replied. “I’ll make some tea p>
He nodded once and went to George.
I stood in the kitchen, hands wrapped around a mug I didn’t drink from, listening to Aaron soothe our son through the walls. His voice was low and steady, anchoring George back into his body with practiced care.
“I’m here,” he said. “You’re safe. It was just a dream p>
I pressed my lips together.
When George asked for me-softly, almost apologetically—Aaron hesitated.
Then he said, “Mama’s right here p>
And he called me in.
George clung to me as if afraid I might vanish if he loosened his grip. I held him until his breathing slowed, until sleep crept back in reluctantly, like an animal testing the ground before settling.
When I laid him back down, Aaron was standing by the window.
3/5
We didn’t speak.
We didn’t need to.
I cried myself to sleep that night.
Silently. Carefully. On my side of the bed, back turned, shoulders shaking just enough to let the pressure out without waking him.
I cried because Colton still hadn’t found Iris.
I cried because Andrea kept sending pieces of her like offerings.
The first was a drawing.
A crude sketch of our house in bright, impossible colors. A stick-figure family. Iris’s name written at the top in
uneven letters.
The second was a sweater-one she’d loved, the same one she was wearing when she was taken, pink and soft, folded neatly in a box that appeared in my car without explanation.
The third was a video.
Iris sleeping. Thumb tucked into her mouth. Hair fanned across the pillow.
Each delivery came without commentary. Without threats.
Just reminders.
Andrea was pleased.
And the worst part-the part that made my hands shake even as I locked the burner phone away each time- was that the act was working.
Aaron was pulling back.
Not because he didn’t care.
Because he did.
Because he was choosing stability over confrontation. Choosing the children over uncertainty. Choosing to protect what was left rather than fight for what felt volatile.
And I couldn’t blame him.
That was the cruelest truth of all.
By the second week, the house felt like a museum of our marriage.
Everything intact.
Nothing touched.
We moved around each other with quiet respect, careful not to disturb fragile exhibits. Conversations were logistical. Touch was incidental. Love was implied, never expressed.
4/5
One night, I found Aaron asleep in George’s room, sitting upright in the chair beside the bed, one hand resting lightly on the blanket as if anchoring our son to the world by sheer will.
I didn’t wake him.
I stood in the doorway and watched for a long time, my chest aching with love and grief in equal measure.
This was what Andrea had wanted.
Not chaos.
Not destruction.
Distance.
Controlled erosion.
And I was complicit.
Later, alone in the bathroom, I stared at my reflection-eyes rimmed red, face composed, posture unbroken.
I wiped my face, turned off the light, and slid back into bed beside a man who loved me enough to give me the space I needed to lie to him.
I closed my eyes and whispered the only truth I could afford.
“For Iris p>
And let the silence take the rest.
日
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Ruby Walker
Ruby Walker is a rising voice in the world of romance and spicy fiction. With a gift for weaving deep emotions, sizzling chemistry, and unexpected twists, her stories are a blend of passion and drama that captivate readers from start to finish. Ruby’s writing style is bold and irresistible—perfect for those who crave intense, addictive love stories.