Page 25 of Out of Bounds (Atlanta Demon Series #4)
This is it. After everything… this is how it ends.
I was holding the pen. My hand was steady, but my heart—my heart was shaking as if to shatter again for the one thousandth time since learning about Kreed’s junior.
Kreed and his attorney were sitting across from me, waiting for me to seal our fate.
My husband suddenly felt like a stranger, but I still felt compelled by him.
There was a time when I knew every detail of his face and every shift in his mood.
I could tell you how many times that vein in his neck pulsed depending on the day.
I’d studied him, memorized his moves, used to look at him, and felt safe.
Now, when I look at him, all I feel is pain, sorrow, disappointment.
I thought being here at the table with our lawyers present would make me feel relieved.
Shit, maybe even free, and while a part of me does, the other part is wondering if it’s too soon to make such a permanent decision. My mind was now questioning my heart.
Did I give up too fast? Is it possible for all of this to go away? Could we get past it if I tried harder?
The grief I felt was heavy all of a sudden.
We had built a life together—shared a bed, a last name, and memories that only the two of us would ever understand.
He knows me more than anyone has ever in my life, and yet here we are.
We were on the brink of ending a story that we promised to keep writing.
Feeling his eyes on me, I knew he was willing for me to look at him.
I knew without looking that he was pleading with me not to go forward.
Staring at the line marked with an ‘X,’ I’m willing myself not to cry.
After all, this is what I wanted, so why does it feel like the minute I sign, I’m going to hurt myself more than I’m going to hurt him?
Why do I even care how he feels? He’s the responsible one for everything that has led to this.
I don’t want to be the one to break down; not now, especially when I’m supposed to be strong and hold my head up high.
Memories of the day we vowed forever to one another played over and over again in my head.
I didn’t walk into this marriage expecting it to fall apart.
I don’t believe he did either. But here we were, and now, I have to sign it all away. I had to seal our fate with conviction.
This would be easier if I hated him. However, I don’t hate Kreed.
It’s impossible to hate someone whom I once loved with every fiber of my being.
I’m not even angry anymore. I’m tired. I’m tired of questioning myself.
Tired of feeling like maybe if I had done just a tad bit more, he wouldn’t have stepped out.
The truth was, I was tired of beating myself up.
Glancing up at him one last time, I smiled sympathetically before putting an end to us . One stroke at a time, I sign. Name. Date. Initials. It’s just that simple as if the paperwork can somehow measure our love or our loss. And now my part is done.
My lawyer grabbed the paper and placed it in front of Kreed.
When I looked up from the table, his eyes were on me.
Kreed looked like he wanted to say something.
Shit, so did I, but I refrained. My words were lodged at the back of my throat, threatening to spew out like vomit.
Throughout this entire process, we’d said enough.
Maybe not the right things, but we’d gotten shit off our chest on several occasions; me more than him.
Instead of seizing the opportunity, I watched him pick up his pen and sign.
With every stroke of his pen against the papers, a tear fell from my face.
My eyes were zoned in on the paper, so I didn’t miss when his own tears began to fall on the document.
The moment his tears saturated the line he’d just placed his initials on, I stood.
I couldn’t sit there any longer and watch the ending of my marriage.
Instead, I walked away—floated all the way out of the building on autopilot.
I didn’t look back. Looking back would’ve had me undoing everything that we’d just done.
Looking back would’ve had me throwing myself into his arms, begging him to come home.
As hard as it was not to look back, it had to be done.
We were done.
And God did it hurt.
The minute I slid into the driver’s seat of my car, I broke down and sobbed.
That surreal feeling of ending my marriage, letting go, and no longer being able to roll over and wrap my legs around the love of my life was hitting me.
The despondent feeling of fear about what the future looks like began to hit me too.
There was a strange stillness in the atmosphere, and it was not peace.
At least, not yet. I was at peace with my decision to move forward with the divorce, but not at peace with the reality that I was done with Kreed Dolla.
At least, not yet. Deciding to leave, I begin to drive around and people-watch.
Seeing people out for their daily strolls as they laughed, shopped, and ate with those they loved, shit began to feel unfair.
I’m carrying the ghost of my marriage inside, and everyone else was enjoying their fucking day.
The minute that I started to feel like my life was over, like I was dying from a stab wound to the heart, it happened.
The skies opened up and sheets of rain started to pelt down from the sky.
I took that as God’s way of saying that the sun doesn’t always shine, and even in the midst of a storm, the pain will subside, and eventually, I will smile again. I would heal from all of this.
Healing doesn’t mean forgetting or pretending that the shit didn’t hurt.
It meant learning not to carry such a heavy burden.
It meant that one day I would feel light again, and not because my marriage didn’t matter, but because I mattered enough to put myself first and move on from something that caused me a great deal of hurt.
I can’t say how long it would take for me to feel that lightness, but I knew it was coming, and for that reason alone, I simply dried my eyes and pushed forward.
Today was the last day I would allow myself to mourn my marriage. When the sun rose in the morning, so would I. I would rise with a renewed spirit and a fresh start. Because after all, I didn’t go through all of this to continue walking through the darkness.
Turning in my seat, I pointed at the Four Seasons and asked, “Now, explain to me what we’re doing here?”
“Okay, so… I know the last few weeks have been tense, so I booked us a spa session.”
“In other words, you lied to me, Koya Wright.” I laughed.
“Guilty.” She batted her lashes and placed her hand over her heart.
Before I had the chance to leave the house for work this morning, Koya was on my line begging me to take the day off.
She claimed we needed to go to the hospital and check on Jream, and since her ass had barely been around, I was down for the ride.
Koya and Jream had both tried to get me to celebrate my divorce, but I kept stressing that I’d celebrated enough.
I hadn’t, but they didn’t need to know that.
My way of celebrating was throwing myself into work, and I was okay with that.
As long as my children were okay, then so was I.
It had been fourteen days, three hundred thirty-six hours, and twenty thousand one hundred sixty minutes since my divorce was finalized.
I was better today than I was on day one.
My girls hardly let me out of their sight, and my baby boy was clinging to me like he knew something had changed.
All in all, I was trying to focus less on that and more on everything else that I had going on.
In the midst of my grieving, I was also working with the party planner for my baby’s birthday party that was happening next Saturday. Kreed had done a lot of shelling out cash and agreeing to whatever I wanted, as opposed to speaking or protesting.
His game on the field had improved, so maybe he was coming to terms with everything as I was. We spoke about the kids when necessary and did our exchanges without any hiccups. Life was looking up.
“I knew you were lying!” I fake fussed. “Something told me to call Jrue to confirm, but I just had to give your ass the benefit of the doubt.”
“Ummhmm. Now, come on because Jream is waiting on us, and if she texts my phone one more time, I’m going to scream.”
“Your ass knew she was impatient.”
“God, how I tend to forget.” Unlocking the door, Koya grabbed her bag off the back seat and exited the truck. Following suit, I did the same and walked around to the driver’s side.
“Before we go in here, I want to say, ‘Thank you.’ I probably needed this more than I let on.”
“I know you did, babe. This is our way of taking your mind off things for a little bit.”
“And we all know I can use the reprieve.” I teased.
“Yes, we do.” She smiled.
The two of us made our way into the hotel and met Jream by the front counter.
After checking in, we were ushered to the spa, where we undressed and put on the robes they provided for the day.
While Koya and Jream settled for facials, I decided to get a full body massage.
It had been a minute since I’d had the pleasure of relaxing and allowing myself to be pampered.
Once we were done, the three of us met up for manicures and pedicures.
The two of them had gone out of their way to make sure I received a full day of pampering.
Any service I wanted, I received, and I genuinely couldn’t thank them enough.
When we finished at the spa, we changed into our swimsuits and went to the pool area to have lunch.
“Jream, is this your first time having caviar?” Koya asked.
Downing her glass of champagne, she shook her head. “No, Masai made me try it that time we went to dinner at Nikolai’s Roof.”
“I did?” I pondered.