Ch. I can hear my cold husbands dirty thoughts 8 I can hear my cold husbands dirty thoughts 8

Chapter 8 

Chapter 8 

+45 Coins 

Lacey vanished. I want it noted for the record: the woman who begged me for help evaporated like steam, leaving me alone in a fairy-lit garden with a jealous apex predator in black tie. 

Damian descended the steps slowly. Behind him, the party glittered on, oblivious. His thoughts arrived before he did, 

and they were not calm at all. 

“I like you.’ She said ‘I like you.’ To the woman who POISONED me. In the dark. In the garden. In that dress.” A pause. 

“Is my wife being seduced by my would-be assassin? Is this happening? Is this my life?” 

“Honey,” I said brightly. “Great toast. Very moving. The part about integrity-” 

“What,” he said, stopping one breath away from me, “are you doing out here?” 

“Networking.” 

“With Lacey Monroe.” His voice could have frosted the champagne. “Who drugged me.” 

“Funny story-” 

“You told her you’d leave me.” The gold in his eyes flared, and underneath the controlled fury his thoughts cracked open, raw: “First the divorce papers. Now this. She’s leaving and I can’t even be angry, I have no right, I gave her two years of closed doors-but not for HER, not for the woman who-” 

“She’s cursed,” I blurted. 

He blinked. 

“Witch contract. Brooklyn bar. Narrative Service Agreement-it’s a whole predatory gig-economy thing, apparently. She has to act out homewrecker scenes or she gets struck by lightning. Actual lightning, Damian, I watched it happen, it was honestly a little cathartic. Marcus found out about her contract and blackmailed her into dosing your coffee. She’s a victim with great line delivery. I was playing you so she could finish her scenes and get out of our lives forever.” 

Silence. Above us, the fairy lights buzzed. 

“…Witches,” he finally thought, with the weariness of a man adding a line item to a long list. “Of course. Marcus 

always did like using other people’s hands.” Then, sharper, zeroing in: “Wait. ‘Our lives’?” 

He’d caught it. Of course he’d caught it. The man could hear a heartbeat across a ballroom. 

“Slip of the tongue,” I said. 

“You said ‘our lives.” He stepped closer. The garden suddenly felt very small. “You carry divorce papers in your bag, 

Chapter 8 

+45 Coins 

Sienna Three weeks now. The folder’s worn at the corner from how often you take it out.” His voice dropped. “But you don’t sign it. You came to my office in your most dangerous skirt. You sat with the wolf. You stayed. You’re out here doing favors for cursed strangers to protect a marriage you claim you want to end.” 

“Say it, his mind begged, even as his face stayed composed. “Please. I’ve been reading every signal for two years and I can’t trust my own hope anymore. Just say it out loud.” 

And I almost did. The words were right there. 

Then a cheerful voice shattered the garden. 

“Mrs. Blackwood! THERE you arel I’ve been looking everywhere!” 

Kane Foster jogged down the steps, dimples blazing, holding a gift box with a ribbon on it, radiating the survival 

instincts of a golden retriever in traffic. 

“Kane,” I said, through a smile, “this is really not-” 

“It’ll only take a second!” He thrust the box at me, beaming, directly in front of my husband. “Remember at the office party, when you’d had the wine, and you said your husband was a total dud in the bedroom?” 

The fairy lights flickered again. 

“So I designed something!” Kane barreled on, a dead man narrating his own funeral. “It’s from my side business -exclusive line, very tasteful-guaranteed to wake up even the coldest husband! And if THIS doesn’t work, I’ve got 

spicier- 

He finally registered the six-foot-three silence beside me. Looked up. Met a pair of molten gold eyes. 

Damian smiled. It was the single most frightening thing I had ever seen, and I had watched this man turn into a wolf. 

“A dud,” my husband repeated softly. 

“Tonight, his thoughts rumbled, low as thunder, “we’re settling this.”