chapter2087

Later that evening, after dinner, Cecilia stepped into the vast living room of Rainsworth Manor and was greeted by a wall of raw, pungent alcohol fumes.

Cecilia paused in the doorway, a tight furrow pinching the space between her brows. "What on earth happened here?"

She hurried across the room. Only then did she see Nathaniel sprawled bonelessly across the couch, his jacket half-open, his tie twisted in his fist like a tourniquet.

He kept yanking at the silk, muttering words lost in a fog of liquor.

After setting the grocery bags on a side table, she leaned in and spoke his name as gently as she could. "Nathaniel."

He slept fitfully, head lolling against the cushions, too drunk to register the voice that had guided him home for years.

The reek of whiskey hit her hard. Cecilia grimaced and turned toward the hallway, ready to call for Theresa and have a pot of sobering soup started.

Before she could move, Nathaniel's fingers shot out and closed around her wrist, startlingly strong despite the stupor.

"Ceci... Ceci..." Her name spilled from him again and again, each syllable sticky with slurred devotion.

She felt the vowels of her own name melt in his mouth, turned to honey by need.

"I'm right here," she murmured, shifting closer so he could feel her presence rather than merely hear it.

"Ceci..." The chant continued. Then, abruptly, his voice scraped into a question. "Do you love me?"

"What?" Cecilia blinked, completely thrown. Did he seriously just ask that? That's the sort of insecurity teenagers wrestle with during first dates. We've been married for years with four children, joint mortgages, and shared insomnia. Love is assumed, or it should be.

"Yes, yes. I love you," she answered, the words more placating than tender. "Now sit up and take a shower. You reek, Nathaniel. Can't you smell yourself?"

His brows knitted even tighter. "You don't love me... You're disgusted by me..."

Cecilia stared, momentarily speechless. Unbelievable. This pitiful drunk is the CEO of Imminence Corporation. If his employees saw their polished, unreachable boss like this, their jaws would hit the marble lobby floor.

Unable to resist, she fished out her phone, thumbed the camera into record mode, and pointed the lens at him.

“Nathaniel, repeat that for me. What did you just say?"

"I said you don't love me... You despise me..."

The words were slurred yet eerily precise, the tragic clarity of a man drowning in his own cocktail. N?w ?ovel chapt?rs are published on FιndNovel.net

Ensuring the recording was rolling, Cecilia patted his shoulder. "All right, enough. Quit talking nonsense. I do not despise you."

"You do."

He fought to pry his eyelids open, but they remained stubbornly shut, as though weighed down by lead.

"Ceci, I feel awful."

"Uh-huh, I heard you. Who asked you to guzzle halt the bar in broad

.n

daylight? Whatever misery you feet now, you earned it," Cecilia said, patting Nathaniel's shoulder in gentle yet admonishing taps Be good. I'll have someone simmer a hangover broth. You'll feel human again soon." With that promise, she straightened and turned toward the door.

The exit never happened. Nathaniel's fingers closed like a cuff around her wrist and yanked.

Momentum toppled Cecilia. She landed square against his chest, breath knocked from her lungs, the scent of whiskey thick in the air.

She braced both palms, tried to rise, but his arm, heavy as an iron gate, would not budge.

“Nathaniel, let me go now." The plea met silence.

His grip only tightened, a wordless refusal.

At last, exhaustion trumped liquor. Nathaniel's breathing evened, fingers

slackening until her wrist slipped free.

Pins and needles stung her waist as she crawled out of the human vise. She eyed his sleeping face, so peaceful it was infuriating. This will remind you not to day- drink again.

A conspiratorial grin unfurled as she produced her travel-size makeup kit, every brush gleaming with mischief.

The world tilted when Nathaniel finally pried his eyes open, pain hammering behind his temples.

He kneaded the bridge of his nose, swung his legs over the bed, and forced himself upright.

Down the hall, Theresa, the

housemaid, was dusting a vase.

When Nathaniel appeared, she froze

deswip

mid swipe eyes widening as though she'd seen a ghost. "Sir... What happened to you?"

"Nothing." His voice was glacier-cold. "Just a little alcohol. Keep cleaning."

Theresa dipped her head and resumed work, though her mind buzzed with a single, scandalized observation. Rich people have the strangest pastimes.