Ten Years a Stand-in Wife—Old Money Only Recognizes Me Chapter 18

Ten Years a Stand-in Wife—Old Money Only Recognizes Me Chapter 18

On the other end of the line, the music faded.

She had stepped outside.

“Derek Grant ran away,” she said suddenly, her voice hollow enough to be unsettling. “He took the

last of my money and disappeared.”

“I don’t have a husband. I don’t have a kid. I don’t have money. I don’t have a home.”

“I’m thirty-six.”

“I’ve got nothing.”

A night breeze slipped through the window crack, brushing against my bare ankles.

“Valerie-”

“You know why I came back?”

“It’s not because I miss Ethan.” Her voice shook. “And it’s not because I miss Adrian Shaw.”

“It’s because-”

“I had nowhere else to go.”

A muffled sob came through the phone.

Short.

Like a line snapped mid-sound.

Then Valerie sucked in a sharp breath and forced it back down.

“Sloane.”

“Hmm.”

“You won.”

The call ended.

I stood in the hallway, listening to the dead line hum for a long time.

The floor under my bare feet had gone cold.

Footsteps came from behind me.

Adrian walked out in a robe, hair slightly mussed, eyes half-lidded with sleep.

“What happened?”

“Nothing. My sister called.”

He looked at me.

Then he bent down, took off his slippers, and placed them beside

my

feet.

“Put them on. The floor’s cold.”

I looked down and slid my feet into them.

They were two sizes too big.

Still warm from him.

“Go back to sleep,” he said.

“Okay.”

On the way back to the bedroom, he followed behind me.

I could hear his bare feet on the floor-taps-louder than my slippers.

Once we got into bed, his hand came back.

This time it wasn’t on my waist.

It wrapped around my hand.

Five fingers locking in, one by one.

Like pieces fitting together.

“Winning or not winning,” he murmured, already half asleep, “is all nonsense.”

“You’re here. That’s enough.”

I closed my eyes.

The warmth from his oversized slippers was still fading from my toes.

Outside, the three-day autumn rain finally stopped.

After that, things didn’t unfold in any dramatic way.

Valerie moved out.

Not back to the Mercer family home.

She rented an old apartment in Sunrise District for $3,000 a month and signed a one-year lease.

I heard it from Linda.

“Valerie said she wants to start over. She found a translation job-her French is decent.”

Linda’s tone was careful, like she was testing the surface of water with a leaf.

“Hmm.”

“She asked me to ask you-if Ethan ever wants to… maybe meet her. Not to fight over anything. Just… meet once.”

I didn’t answer right away.

The trees outside had already shed their leaves. Only bare branches were left, but faint new buds had begun to show-preparing for next year.

“When Ethan wants to see her, I won’t stop him.”

Linda gave a soft “okay” on the other end.

Then paused.

“Sloane.”

“Yes?”

“I’ve done a lot of stupid things in my life. Some things I can’t even say out loud, but in my heart…”

She didn’t finish.

Just like David.

Stopped right before the edge.

Not because she didn’t want to speak.

Because she didn’t know how.

Some debts were too heavy for even a simple “sorry.”

“Mom.”

“Yeah?”

“Ethan’s school has a sports day next month. If you and Dad want to come, I’ll have Nancy reserve

seats for you.”

Silence on the line.

Then I heard Linda crying.

Not loud sobbing. Just broken, restrained crying that had been held in for too long. Everything tangled together-breath, tears, words.

“Okay… okay… I’ll tell your dad…”

“Alright. I’m hanging up.”

I put the phone down.

Leaning back in my chair, I let out a long breath.

On the windowsill, a vase held a few dried clematis branches Ethan had picked up last week, saying he wanted to make a specimen. The petals had curled and yellowed, but a faint, almost impossible sweetness still lingered.

Someone knocked on the door.

“Come in.”

Adrian entered, holding two cups of coffee.

He placed one in front of me and sat across from me with the other.

“Your mother’s call?”

“Yeah.”

“What did she say?”

“She wants to come to Ethan’s sports day.”

He took a sip, saying nothing.

But his brow relaxed slightly-a barely visible shift, subtle enough to miss if you weren’t looking

for it.

Satisfaction.

Not with my decision.

But with me.

Adrian never expressed emotion in words. Everything he felt showed up in details-two taps on a table, a pair of slippers placed at my feet, walking out barefoot at two in the morning.

Ten years.

It took me ten years to learn how to read that language.

“There’s one more thing,” he said, setting the cup down. “Grandma said she’s personally coming to cut the ribbon for the Spine Cultural Foundation opening.”

“She’s eighty-three. Standing that long-

“I told her that. She said, ‘I stand steadier than all of you.””

I laughed.

That was exactly the kind of thing she would say.

“Fine. Put a chair beside her. She can stand if she wants, sit if she’s tired.”

“Already arranged.”

Of course it was.

Adrian was always three steps ahead of what he said.

I picked up my cup.

The coffee was a clear, gleaming amber. As it touched my lips, a bright, floral note spread across my tongue-smooth, clean, and settling deep in my chest.

“Adrian.”

“Hmm?”

“Thank you.”

He lifted his eyes.

Behind the gold-rimmed glasses, his gaze was steady and deep-like a well. Calm on the surface,

but unfathomable underneath.

“For what?”

“For ten years ago. When you said, ‘Since you’re here, stay.’

He didn’t move.

The cup rested in his hand, knuckles sharp and defined.

“That wasn’t out of courtesy,” he said.

“I know.”

“Nor pity.”

“I know.”

“It was-“He paused, eyes holding mine for a beat.

Then he set the cup down.

Stood up.

Walked around the desk.

Stopped in front of me.

Leaning down slightly.

Hands braced on the armrests of my chair, enclosing me in his presence.

Too close.

Close enough that I could see the faint scar along his jawline-left from rugby twenty years ago. He

had mentioned it once, and never again.

“It was my luck,” he said.