The Perfect Wife's Unwritten Past

mnesiac wife to the tech mogul who "

just her ultrasound; it was a news clip showing my real fianc

fire to the vineyard he built for her, he

eporters she had called, he publ

some time," he announced, his

the cameras, I traced a secret symbol over my

humiliation into a call to arms. "Caleb

pte

Mulli

a news clip from five years ago showing the burning wreckage of a helicopter, that finally broke the dam in my mind.

into a sickening b

thought to question it. Evan Mcmahon, the tech mogul who "rescued" me from the crash, the man who

to my exact tastes. A world of possessive, almost pathological love. He chose my clothes, my food,

earing beam, had started to wander. He was bored. Bored of his perfec

ike a shield. I' d seen her around the office, her eyes always lingering on Evan, a hunger in them that I recognized beca

tacle. He paraded her around, mentored her, built her a go

te, malicious strike from Candid

loop. A reporter with a windswept face, the mangled metal of the helicopter behind her. "...tragic loss of renowned art curator Elia Mullins, presumed dead alongside the

le

a room in my mind that had b

We were in the helicopter, laughing, champagne flutes in our hands. He was telling me about the house he was designing for

lls, Elia," he' d whispered, his

Caleb' s arms wrapping around me, his body a shield. The last thing I

on the phon

Pale, gaunt, my eyes hollow. The wom

oman w

e in my veins, sharp and clear. Evan hadn't rescued me. He had stolen me. He had seen a pri

l, a cheap imitation desperate to take my place. She

almost mad

as thirty. The woman who could dismantle an opponent with a single, well-placed sentence. The woman who tr

again. A new mes

his way to you now. Try not to make

lips. Oh, there would be a scene. B

every bit the Silicon Valley king-impossibly handsome, a predatory grace in his moveme

's wrong? Are you

orehead. I didn't flinch. I let him touch me,

I said, my

rmy sea, scanned the room, looking for the source

w videos," I said cal

es before being replaced by a mask of weary resignation. H

ling. It means nothing. You are my wife. You are the only one who m

I just looked at h

, Elia. Yell at me. Scream. Throw someth

she still pregnant?" I aske

him off guard. His j

keep it," I stated.

ut. It doesn't have to ch

expensive floral arrangement sat. It was delivered this morning, with

w," I said, turning to face him. "An

lly constructed world he had built around me began t

g about?" he asked,

ne you 'rescued' me from. The one that killed the pilot and was supposed to

, his hands clenched into fists. "You don't know what you're sa

I'm saying," I whispered.

me. To pull me into his arms and whisper more l

vase held steady in my hand. H

he command was sharp, edged with the desper

his time, but it held no warmth

said softly, my eyes locking ont

ing not at him, but at the multi-million dollar Jackson Poll

h of water against canvas was the mo

from the ruined painting to me, and for the first time in fiv

ons

ertainty, that I was about

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