The Heart I Married For

Hazel POV:

The collective gasp around the table was sharp enough to cut the thick, smoke-filled air. Bianca's jaw dropped, her drunken smirk wiped clean off her face. Todd stared at me, his eyes wide with a mixture of shock and morbid curiosity. My declaration, a blade of truth in their world of carefully constructed lies, had stunned them into silence.

Before anyone could recover, Alex returned. He must have just dropped Bianca off and come back. He took one look at the frozen tableau, at my defiant expression, and his face darkened.

"What did you just say?" he ground out, his voice a low growl that vibrated with barely suppressed fury.

He strode toward me, his presence overwhelming. "You're making a fool of yourself, Hazel. Of both of us."

He thought I was playing a game. A desperate, pathetic attempt to make him jealous. He couldn't conceive of a world where he wasn't the center of my universe.

"Let's go," he said, grabbing my arm again. This time, I didn't resist. Arguing here was pointless.

The ride back to the penthouse was a suffocating blanket of silence. Alex drove with a white-knuckled grip on the steering wheel, his jaw clenched so tightly I was surprised it didn't crack.

When we were finally inside the apartment, the door clicking shut behind us, he whirled on me.

"What the hell was that?" he demanded. "Humiliating me in front of my friends? Lying about not loving me? Was that supposed to make me jealous?"

He was so certain. So arrogant. He stepped closer, crowding me against the door, a faint, condescending smile on his lips. "It won't work, Hazel. I've told you before, these games are childish."

I didn't say anything. I just let him believe his own version of reality. It was easier. It didn't matter anymore.

His anger seemed to soften slightly at my silence, mistaking it for submission. "I told you I'd make things up to you," he said, his voice dropping. "I will. After Bianca's birthday, we'll go away. Just the two of us."

"Okay," I said, my voice flat.

He seemed satisfied with that. He leaned in, intending to kiss me, a victor claiming his prize. I turned my head, and his lips brushed against my cheek.

He froze. "What's wrong?"

"I'm tired, Alex," I murmured. It wasn't a lie. I was bone-deep weary of him, of this life, of the ghost I had been chasing.

His face hardened again. Rejection, even one so small, bruised his massive ego. "Fine," he snapped, stepping away. He went to the guest room and slammed the door. We hadn't shared a bed in over a year.

The next morning, he was gone before I woke up. He was always gone.

That afternoon, I got a call from his assistant, a frantic young woman named Clara.

"Mrs. Higgins," she said, her voice trembling. "Mr. Higgins collapsed in a meeting. He has a terrible fever. We're taking him to the hospital, but he's refusing to go. He keeps asking for you."

In the past, these words would have sent me into a blind panic. I would have dropped everything, rushed to his side, held his hand, and soothed his brow, grateful for the chance to be needed.

Clara continued, her voice filled with a desperate plea. "He always listens to you when he's like this, Mrs. Higgins. He gets these fevers sometimes, ever since the transplant, and you're the only one who can coax him to take his medicine."

I listened to her, my heart a placid, still pool. The Alex she was describing-the one who was vulnerable, who needed me-was a phantom. An illusion I had helped create.

"I'm sorry, Clara," I said, my voice calm and even. "I can't."

There was a stunned silence on the other end of the line. "What? But... Mrs. Higgins, he's asking for you."

"That's his problem, not mine," I said. "From now on, his health is your responsibility. Or better yet, call Bianca Bernard. I'm sure she'd be thrilled to take care of him."

I hung up before she could reply.

Alex stumbled into the penthouse late that night, looking pale and haggard. His suit was rumpled, and his eyes were glassy with fever. He glared at me, his body swaying slightly.

"Clara called you," he accused, his voice hoarse. "She said you refused to come."

"That's right," I said, not looking up from the book I was reading.

"Why?" he demanded, his voice cracking with a mixture of anger and disbelief. "For four years, you've dropped everything at a moment's notice. You hover over me like I'm made of glass. And today... nothing?"

I finally closed my book and met his gaze. His confusion was so genuine, so absolute. He truly had no idea.

"You're right, Alex," I said. "For four years, I did. But people change."

He stared at me, a dawning horror in his fever-bright eyes. It was the look of a man realizing the ground beneath his feet was not as solid as he'd always believed.