From Deadbeat To Doting; Something Is Wrong With My Husband!-Chapter 35: What a hypocrite!

The door to Room 10 hadn’t even fully settled into its frame before the "Sweet Wife" mask dissolved. Brianna pushed Lucian’s arm as if he were made of spiders and began frantically trying to smooth her hair in the cracked vanity mirror.

Lucian, meanwhile, walked to the sagging queen-sized bed, tossed the yellow file onto the nightstand, and sat down. He began unbuttoning his coat silently.

"I’m taking the bed," he stated dryly.

Brianna spun around, a tuft of static-charged hair still sticking up. "Excuse me? You’re taking the bed? I am the wife here, Lucian. In what world does the lady sleep on a floor that looks like it hasn’t been swept since the nineties?"

Lucian stopped mid-button, looking up at her with his dark eyes. He didn’t look guilty. He didn’t look like a man who had just been caught with a "mistress." He looked tired.

"Do you really consider yourself below me, wife?" his tone dropped. "Since when did you start caring about traditional gender roles? If we are equals, then the bed belongs to the one who claimed it first."

Brianna opened her mouth, then closed it. She was momentarily speechless; a rare feat. He was using her own "independent woman" logic against her. Before she could recover, he took off his shoes and climbed onto the bed, turning his back to her.

"No," she snapped, marching over to the bedside. "I am not sleeping on the floor. My body is far too soft for that kind of life. I have skin care routines, Lucian. I have a spine that requires ergonomic support."

He didn’t respond.

Fuming, Brianna reached down and grabbed his hand, dragging him back into a sitting position against his will.

"What are you doing?" he groaned, cocking his brow in genuine confusion.

"We’re going to play for it."

Lucian looked at her like she had finally lost her mind. "Play for it? It’s 7:00 PM. I’m not playing hide-and-seek."

"Rock, paper, scissors," she said firmly, though he still looked at her like she was insane. Grabbing his large cold hand, she forced it into a fist, folding hers into a fist against his.

"Best of three. Winner gets the pillows. Loser gets the rug."

Lucian stared at their joined hands, then at her determined face. He looked like he wanted to argue, but he had a rough day and just wanted to rest.

"Fine," he muttered.

"Rock... Paper... Scissors!"

Brianna threw Scissors. Lucian, with an effortless flick of his fingers, threw Rock.

Her eyes widened. "One more time. That was a practice round."

"It wasn’t a practice round," he had said, but he didn’t pull his hand away.

"Again! Rock, Paper, Scissors!"

Brianna threw Rock. Lucian threw Paper.

"What? I can’t believe I lost again." She sighed frustratedly, dropping her face into her palm. "Let’s play again. One last time."

"I’m not playing again. The floor is yours." he said, finally pulling his hand back and laying down.

"The hell it is," she whispered.

Ignoring his protests, Brianna climbed onto the tiny sliver of mattress left. She tried adjusting, but Lucian refused to shift an inch, his body was a solid wall of muscle.

Growing desperate and cold, Brianna turned her back to him and gave an indignant shove with her hips, trying to reclaim some territory.

She pushed her butt up against him with a forceful thump.

"What the..." Lucian, caught off guard by the sudden "attack" of her "soft body," against his groin, dodged instinctively to the side to avoid the contact.

But in the tiny, cramped bed, there was nowhere to go.

THUD.

The bed creaked as Lucian vanished over the edge, landing in a heap on the thin carpet. He rose up as fast as he fell, with dark eyes, rolling her over to the side before falling on the bed.

It was awkward sharing a bed with Lucian.

The bed kept sagging in the middle so for that, any movement sent them rolling toward each other like two magnets with the wrong polarity. Having Lucian crawl back onto the mattress after his undignified fall was one thing; having him stay there was another.

For three years, she hadn’t been in the same bed with him. In that reasoning, suddenly sharing a bed became a serious war. After fighting like middle-schoolers for the duvet, Brianna laid stiffly, staring at the water-stained ceiling.

She couldn’t be asleep because her mind was plotting the exact moment Lucian’s breathing would even out so she could snatch the yellow file from the nightstand.

Not because she snores and doesn’t want him to make fun of her!

Just as Lucian shifted beside her, the bed groaned in protest. He turned his head, sweeping his gaze over her.

Even in the dim light, he could see she was still fully dressed and her arms crossed tightly over her chest.

Upon the sight, he couldn’t help but laugh softly. "Are you planning on sleeping in your armor, wife? Or are you expecting a board meeting at 3:00 AM?"

"I’m perfectly comfortable, thank you. This blazer is structured. My spine appreciates the support."

"Isn’t it a bit... restrictive? You haven’t even taken off your heels."

"I am staying prepared," she spoke arrogantly. "There are a lot of creeps in places like this, Lucian. I’m not about to make myself vulnerable in a room that smells like cheap bleach and rape."

To emphasize her point, she reached down and tightened the belt of her blazer around her waist, cinching it so tightly she almost lost her breath. If she could have found a padlock in her purse, she would have snapped it onto the buckle.

Lucian let out a huff that might have been a sigh or a muffled chuckle. "You can relax, wife. I’m fairly certain the lock on the door is sturdier than your belt."

"Forgive me if I don’t take the word of a man who spends his evenings in ghetto shacks," she snapped.

Lucian rolled onto his side, facing her. The movement forced Brianna to stiffen even more to avoid touching his bare chest.

"If anyone breaks in," he dropped his tone into a serious, protective cadence that made her heart do a treacherous little skip, "they’ll have to get through me first. You don’t have to worry about being harmed. I’ll protect you."

Brianna finally turned her head, her eyes flashing with a cold, mocking light. "You? Protect me?"

She scoffed ridiculously.

Lucian was the type of man who would probably just sit back and watch a ’Confidential’ file on his lap, taking notes on the efficiency of the intruder.

"I’ll stick to my blazer, thanks."

Lucian stared at her with his dark eyes searching hers for something—perhaps a sign that she was joking. "We’re not betting your safety on your blazer. I’m the type of man who won’t run away from protecting my woman. Even if it means risking my life for her."

Brianna turned her head again to look at this idiot with an arched brow and a glare. "You? When have you ever risked your life for me? Or do you mean you’d risk it for your women? Plural."

Lucian’s expression didn’t shift into guilt. If anything, his eyes darkened as he wondered how she could lay there and sound so righteously reproachful.

Did she think he didn’t know? Maybe she thought he was blind to the secrets she kept. She was acting like the wronged wife, yet, she was the one with a secret lover who is still in high school.

What a hypocrite!

"Is that what you think I am?"

"I think you’re a man who treats a stranger in a shack with more tenderness than he’s shown his wife in three years," Brianna bit back. "So please, save the ’hero’ speech for the girl you were hugging in the street. I’m quite capable of protecting myself. I don’t need a man who plays Saint in the ghetto and a Statue in the villa."

Lucian stared at her for a long beat. Was she jealous or just calling him out? For a woman like this one, who is always arrogant to him, he’d say she’s just calling him out.

"Go to sleep, wife." he said eventually as he rolled onto his back, staring up at the same water-stained ceiling. "The wind is getting worse. You’ll need your energy for the ’exploration’ you have planned for tomorrow."