The Wife Next Door by Amanda Brooke

Author:Amanda Brooke [Brooke, Amanda]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollinsPublishers
Published: 2022-10-31T12:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 28

While Evan was in the bathroom shaving, Ashleigh sneaked downstairs. She was filling his travel mug with coffee when he appeared, having already made sandwiches for his packed lunch.

‘What have you done all this for?’ he asked, unable to accept this small act of kindness without questioning Ashleigh’s motives.

‘Nothing,’ she said as she came over to rest her hands on his chest. ‘I just wanted to show you how much I love you.’

He kissed her forehead, and kept his mouth pressed against her skin. ‘You’re like an addiction, do you know that?’

Sensing he was about to pull away, Ashleigh gripped Evan’s work fleece and hung on to him. He needed to say he loved her back, but instead he clamped his hands around her wrists. He held the power to snap bones, but she felt the soft pads on his thumbs stroking the bruises that were yellowing after their fight four days earlier.

‘I love you too,’ he said eventually.

Ashleigh stood on tiptoe, but before her lips could find his, Evan extracted himself.

‘No, Ashleigh, I have to go to work.’

She didn’t understand. He loved her one minute and pushed her away the next. He left her, and then he came back. He told her it was over, and then he was ripping her clothes off. That was what had happened when he came home on Monday. He had gone upstairs to pack his bags, knowing she would follow. He had ignored her as he shoved his things into a holdall, but in the next moment he was covering her sobs with his mouth, pinning her against the window where they became entangled in the blinds as he lifted up her dress and tore at her knickers.

At least he had stayed, she reminded herself. Evan claimed to have spent Sunday night in his car after their fight, which had immediately sounded suspicious. Where were all the friends he supposedly met up with for football twice a week? Admittedly, he no longer had his best mate, Reece, to watch his back. A few years ago, Reece had become a little too touchy feely with Ashleigh on a night out, and Evan had broken his nose. Ashleigh had also been given a lecture afterwards about being overfriendly, but back then, their arguments hadn’t evolved into physical fights.

She liked to think that she was his addiction, but did she hold as much power over him as he would have her believe? What was it Jane had said the day before? ‘When the person you love and trust is feeding you a warped version of reality, you have to trust your instincts. What do you see?’ She saw someone who hadn’t wanted to tell her where he had actually spent the night. Evan would call that paranoia.

Not wanting to sour the moment, Ashleigh pushed all thoughts of the photo her neighbour had shown her out of her mind.

‘I want us to have a baby,’ she blurted out as Evan reached for his packed lunch.

He turned slowly to face her.

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