His Ring Her Rules

I didn't go straight up to confront Ethan.

I brewed on it, no. stuffed inside of it. I let his mother's comments to linger in my mind until they became bitter and weighty. That night, I grinned during dinner. Even nodded when he brought up the impending merger and quarterly predictions. In the meantime, the storm steadily grew inside of me, awaiting its eruption.

It took place over eggs and in silence the following morning, because it did, of course.

I stabbed at my food as if it had personally offended me and muttered, "I barely slept."

Ethan lifted his phone and looked up. "Again feeling queasy?"

"No. Just reliving your mother's welcoming ceremony for me. It truly made me want butterflies and dreams.

With a groan, he put down the phone. "Grace—"

I interrupted him and added, "She called me a mistake." "In your living room. before you. And you remained silent.

"I didn't want to make things worse—"

I yelled, "You didn't want to annoy her." You also refused to stand up for me. Let's simply refer to it as such.

Tension began to creep up his shoulders as he folded his arms. "Grace, you have no idea what she's capable of. She is brutal. tactical. And I'm working to keep you safe from that.

"By remaining quiet while she makes fun of me?" I stood there, my voice clearer than it had been in days due to my rage. "Ethan, is that how you define protection?"

At that moment, he gave me a serious look. Something flickered in the back of his eyes. Perhaps guilt. or fatigue. However, it was insufficient.

I held my little bump in my hands as I moved in the direction of the window.

I whispered, "I knew what this arrangement was." "I assured myself that I could manage it." that I was able to keep feelings apart from everything else.

With a steady voice, I turned back to him.

However, I'm beginning to feel like just another Blackwood annoyance. Something that needs to be controlled, kept silent, and positioned carefully for visual effect.

"That's not—" he began.

"No?" I interrupted. Then, Ethan, tell me who I am. Not to the press. Not to your board. To you.

Quiet.

The kind that makes you feel foolish for even asking and makes you clutch your chest.

He got up slowly. "I still don't know the answer."

I gazed at him. "Then perhaps I should give up waiting for the answer."

It appeared as though he had something to say. Instead, he passed me by, stopping momentarily in the doorway.

"Grace, you are not nothing," he remarked. "Even if I'm too damaged to understand what you mean to me at the moment."

With that, he was gone.

With a mixture of anger, pain, and fatigue, my heart was performing backflips as I pushed my hand to my chest.

What I desired from him was unclear to me. However, I was aware of what I didn't want to be.

Disposable.