Her eyes widen slightly, and she can't quite suppress the look of shock that crosses her features. She gets herself back under control in the blink of an eye, but for that one moment, her mask slipped, and I saw all that I needed to see.
“I – I don't know what you're talking about, honey,” she says sweetly. “I don't know who this Travis Waltham person is.”
“Oh, really?” I ask. “No clue?”
She shakes her head. “None,” she says. “What's wrong, baby? You seem really tense. How about we go home, and I make you feel all better?”
That's another of her tells, I've come to learn. When she feels put on the defensive or wants to worm her way out of something, Brittany never fails to use sex as her weapon of choice. It's difficult for me to say no. Even now, with this dark blend of rage and pain boiling in my gut, I want nothing more than to take her home and fuck her.
Brittany oozes sex appeal. Tall and thin, she's got the kind of body that makes men do stupid things. Her long blonde hair is lush and thick, and her cornflower blue eyes can seem bottomless. It's easy to get yourself lost in them. She's a stunning, sexy woman who never fails to draw attention whenever she enters a room.
And in the bedroom – well – let's just say, the woman knows what she's doing.
As much as I'd like to take her home and bang her senseless, I know that it's not going to change a thing. After getting off, the problems are still going to be there. She and her lover will still have conspired to either steal my company or bleed my bank accounts dry. And they'll still be fucking each other – while fucking me over at the same time.
No, as much as I'd like to give into the lust that still fills my heart whenever I look at Brittany, I'm not about to let her get out of this simply because she's a great lay.
“Are you really going to sit there and pretend that you don't know Travis Waltham?”
She shakes her head again. “I really don't, baby,” she purrs. “Why don't we go home –”
I sigh and reach down into my satchel, pulling out the file Adam had prepared for me. Brittany eyes it with trepidation as if it's a bomb ready to go off. And I suppose, in her case, it is. I flip open the folder and take out the sheet of paper that happens to be on top – one of the emails I'd discovered.
I look Brittany in the eye and then back at the page and start to read from it.
“Travis, baby,” I start reading her own words to her, “L is leaving town on business tomorrow. Can't wait to spend the week worshipping your glorious cock. Can't wait to feel it deep inside of me. You always know how to make me cum so hard and so good, baby. Looking forward to being your fuck-bunny for a whole week! Love and kisses, Brit.”
I set the paper down in the folder and pick up the next as I watch the color drain from her face. She looks at me with her blue eyes, wider than I've ever seen them. Those eyes I used to love staring into, shimmer with tears as her body trembles. She raises her shaking hands and covers her mouth as the dam of her resolve breaks and fat tears begin to roll down her smooth cheeks.
Feeling vindictive and like I want to grind her down even more, I start to read the next email. “L is gone for a few days and you know what that means, baby,” Brittany wrote. “In case you don't, it means that we are going to spend every minute of every day fucking each other's brains out. I can't wait to have you fill me up. Have you in my mouth. I can't wait to do all those dirty things you make me do – things I never thought I'd do before. Just to whet your appetite, I'm including a photo for you to get yourself off to until you can have the real thing. Love and kisses, Brit.”
I set the page down and pick up the next but look up at Brittany. Her face is streaked with tears and she's trembling so bad, it's almost like she's having a seizure.
“Stop,” she says, her voice barely more than a whisper. “Just stop. I don't need to hear any more.”
“You sure?” I ask, my voice hot with anger. “Because I've got hundreds and hundreds more we can read together if you still can't quite recall who Travis fucking Waltham is.”
Brittany looks up at me, her eyes still leaking tears. “I'm sorry, Liam,” she says. “I never meant to hurt you –”
“Spare me,” I cut her off. “I know everything, Brittany. I know that you and your boy toy here were trying to steal my company. I know that you were going to embezzle millions from me if you couldn't pull that off. I. Know. Everything. Which also means, I know that you are not sorry for shit. So please, you can spare me the tears.”
And as if on cue, the tears dry up. Brittany sits up a bit taller in her seat and her body magically stops trembling. She looks at me through narrowed eyes and the soft, gentle woman I'd fallen in love with all those years ago is gone. In her place is somebody I don't recognize. Somebody harder. Someone infinitely crueler.
Now that the need for pretense is gone and she no longer has to play her role, the real Brittany is free to come out. Seeing her – the real her – for the first time, I have to say, she is not very attractive. And once again, I'm forced to ask myself – how could I not have seen through her facade sooner? How could I have been so blind?
And the only answer I can come up with is that it's because I was in love with her.
“I haven't been happy for a long time now, Liam,” she spits.
“You've been plenty happy to keep spending all of my money on your shopping trips.”
She shrugs. “I called it the putting up with Liam tax.”
“Oh, you have a name for it,” I say. “How sweet. I'm flattered.”
“You're never around,” she says. “And it got to the point that when you were around, I was wishing you weren't. You just don't do it for me, Liam.”
“And I suppose Travis does?”
“In more ways than you can ever imagine,” she says, a cruel smile tugging at the corners of her mouth. “He satisfies me in ways that you never could. Travis is a real man – unlike you.”
I chuckle and drain the last of my wine, setting the glass back down on the table. I look up at Brittany for a long moment and am surprised to find that when I look at her – at least, this new version of her – all the love I'd had in my heart is gone. As I look at her now, at this new woman sitting before me, all I feel is contempt and disgust.
Like I said, I'm not overly-sentimental to begin with, but this is actually going to be a lot easier than I had initially thought.
“Well, since we've gone and skipped ahead to the portion of the program that calls for the hateful verbal barbs that are designed to be hurtful,” I say, “we can go ahead and get down to brass tacks.”
She chuckles. “Brass tacks?” she says. “Since we're going to divorce, obviously, I'll be taking half of everything. That's how the law works, sweetie.”
I narrow my eyes and give her a predatory smile. “That is how the law works, you're right,” I say, “if you're not smart enough to have a prenup.”
I slip the prenuptial agreement we'd both signed out of the folder and set it on top of the emails, letting her see it with her own two eyes. The prenup provided her with a generous alimony payment in the event of divorce as well as a few other perks.
I'm now determined that she isn't going to get any of it. I had my lawyer draft up a new document, one that she is going to sign before we leave this restaurant. It's a document that relinquishes her claim to any of my money or properties. I am done with her and I'm done supporting her lifestyle.
“Forgot about that, didn't you?” I ask.
She shrugs as if she's not concerned. “I'll challenge it in court.”
“No, you won't.”
“Oh, I won't?” she asks, a small chuckle escaping her. “Then you obviously, don't know me very well.”
“If we go to court,” I say, “you and your boyfriend both are going to prison for a very long time.”
“How do you figure that?”