#CHAPTER 5: An Empty House
Arthur POV
I woke up in my office lounge, my neck stuck to the leather and my whole body cold. My mouth tasted like stale champagne and way too much small talk.
A gentle knock on my office door got me sitting up on the couch. “Come,” I said.
My assistant, a solid beta named Jose, entered my office and smiled. “Congratulations, sir. The news is buzzing about your engagement to Selina Willford. You’re being called the perfect couple!”
I smiled and thanked him, all the while silently cursing Selina for deciding on her own to tell the world about us. She’d kept the news of our betrothal to herself for years, but she couldn’t have waited a couple days so I could break the news to Iris?
“I’ll bring you some coffee,” Jose said before turning to walk out.
I was going to tell him to bring a pot when he suddenly came back, holding my personal phone.
“Sir, I rejected Iris’s call earlier, like usual, but I think you need to take a look at this….”
I always had Jose filter my personal calls when I was working. If he thought it was important, it must be.
I started to feel a little uneasy. What had happened with Iris?
I grabbed the phone from him, and my heart sank as I saw the message from Iris: Let’s break up now.
“What the hell?” I growled, hackles raising. Was this some sort of joke? Break up?
I quickly called her back, but the phone went to voicemail. What was Iris thinking? What was she doing?
I ended up grabbing a cup of coffee from Jose’s hand as I rushed out of the office. “Get my car!” I called back to him.
I made it outside and waited for the car to be pulled around. Standing there, I dialed Iris again and again ended up with voicemail.
“Iris,” I said into the phone, “call me back immediately. I’m on my way home now.”
The car arrived, and I got behind the wheel with a low growl. I couldn’t drive in a panic. It was bad enough I was being seen in a formal shirt and tuxedo pants in public in the morning. I looked like I was taking a walk of shame.
No, I told myself, there was no way Iris really wanted to break up. I wasn’t going to marry her, true, but I was still rich and powerful, and she needed someone to help with that baby she was insisting on having.
No, she would be there at home waiting for me, and when I got there we would talk. I would make her see reason, offer her more money, and everything would be find.
I said it aloud in the car: “Everything will be fine. I’ll explain, and it will all be fine.”
Money. I knew that was the key. Iris had many wonderful qualities, and she was by some cosmic joke my fated mate, but I knew money was her top priority.
We’d met at a restaurant when she’d come to my table and asked if I wanted something to drink to get lunch started. I’d looked up and known, and she’d done pretty much the same. Fortunately, I’d been dining alone.
In those early days when we were getting to know each other, I’d come to the restaurant often enough to become a “regular,” often getting kidded by other servers about my relationship with Iris, who had told me she was an art student.
About two weeks in, I’d been sitting at my usual table waiting for her when I heard her talking in the passage between the kitchen and the dining area. She hadn’t known I was there yet, and they were all congratulating her on “landing” such a catch. Many of them had artistic careers, mostly actors, and they were talking about how I could support her.
To my discomfort, she’d agreed, laughing about how I would give her a secure future so she wouldn’t have to starve for her art. The servers had all laughed until the manager came over and told them to stop congregating in the passage and get back to work.
Iris had emerged then, tray in hand, and shot me a casual smile of greeting when she saw me sitting there. I knew my place in her life then and though it was almost as disappointing as when I’d realized my mate was human, I just left without saying anything.
At home, however, I’d realized her desires to be secure financially were reasonable. Relationships could be transactional; it was just my reaction that was excessive. I even realized I should have been relieved because Iris wouldn’t mind that I was marrying for political reasons as long as I kept her bills paid.
Knowing money controlled Iris meant I only needed to give her enough to keep her. I didn’t think about children, particularly that she would have a human fetus, but that just meant more money.
All would be well, I told myself, and my shoulders relaxed a I pulled into the driveway of our house.
But the moment I opened the door from the garage into the foyer, I knew something was wrong. To begin with, the house was empty with no other heartbeat but my own. Next, there was a staleness to the place, as though it had been deserted.
I walked into the living room where something tiny on the coffee table caught my eye. I picked it up and saw it was a SIM card. Had Iris left this? Had she done it so I couldn’t trace her location?
Had she really, actually left me?
My phone rang, and I reached for it eagerly, but it was only Selina.
“Yes?” I asked her.
“Why aren’t you here?”
“Where?” I was looking around to see if anything were missing. I decided to check upstairs.
“At Tiffany’s, of course. We’re supposed to be choosing the engagement ring, remember?”
“What did you say to Iris?” I demanded.
“What?”
“She’s gone. You did this. What did you say to her?”
“Well, didn’t have to say much. I just gave her some money and told her to end the pregnancy and never come back. She seemed happy to go.”
I stood halfway up the stairs. There was a watercolor hanging on the wall, a school project of Iris’s. “Happy?” I repeated.
“Yes. She jumped at the money, actually. We signed a contract, and we don’t have to worry about her bothering us again.”
The watercolor blurred, but it wasn’t tears that filled my eyes, only fury. That gold-digger had taken the fastest route out of our relationship despite my wealth, despite my care of her. Had she even hesitated before agreeing to leave?
Had she ever really cared about me at all? Let alone love me, the way she kept insisting?
Well, I wasn’t going to get any answers out of the damn watercolor.
“I’ll be at Tiffany’s soon,” I told Selina and ended the call. Then I dialed a new number.
“Yes, sir?” Jose asked.
“Iris has left. I need you to find her. I don’t care how much it costs.”
