The Tyrant's Wife

Chapter 364: The elephant in the room (1)

By the time the doorbell rang, Natalie was almost done making dinner and was braising the pork. She knew who it was just by checking the time. Devonte was home.

She turned the burner on low and ran downstairs to open the door, then gave him a quick peck on his cheek. "Dinner’s almost ready." She winked and rushed back up.

Usually, he would take that as an invitation to the kitchen to have some of his dessert before dinner—he had made it clear what he preferred for dessert and the thought of it made her flush a little as she finished up cooking.

Tonight, he didn’t come to the kitchen. When he emerged from their bedroom, she realized he had decided to take a shower before dinner. He was now wearing his pajamas, which was also unusual. When they weren’t expecting any guests, he only wore boxers or shorts around the house.

It had been months since they moved in together and she still couldn’t stop herself from checking him out every chance she got.

She set the table and called him over. "Dinner is ready."

He finally pulled her into his arms and kissed her lips. "Thank you, my love."

She smiled with a nod, finally calming down. Her mind had gone all kinds of places from the only two things she noticed that were unlike what he always did if he got back home later than she did.

One taste of the food and she scrunched her nose. "Salty." She grabbed a glass of water and gulped it to wash the salt down. Then she frowned at him. "Doesn’t the salt bother you?"

He raised a brow. "I think it’s perfect."

That was the problem. She could cook like she was trying to poison him and somehow he still enjoyed her food. She slammed her glass down on the table with more force than she intended and got up. "I’m full."

"You had literally one bite." Devonte pointed out, but she was already halfway out of the dining room. By the time he caught up to her, she had just disposed of her food and was washing her plate at the sink.

"Natalie?"

"I tried, okay?" Her voice choked and he realized she was crying.

He walked up behind her and held her shoulders. "Baby, what’s going on?"

"Just one meal. I just want to cook one proper meal but somehow I always mess it up! What’s so hard about cooking, anyway?" her chest heaved in anger.

He frowned. "You’ve cooked many nice meals, and you now that. The chicken breasts yesterday..."

"Were too spicy!" she interrupted.

He was about to say they were the best of his life, but he couldn’t say that with her feeling so furious with herself. He knew something was wrong as soon as he walked in through the door. Actually, something had been wrong for the past few days but knowing Natalie, she needed some time to herself before opening up is something was bothering her, so he didn’t ask before.

But now he couldn’t help himself. "I told you we could hire someone to do the cooking or eat out every damn day of the week. You don’t have to cook yourself." He used her shoulders to turn her around to face him. "This is not about the food, is it?"

"I just want to be a good wife when the time comes." She sniffled. "But if I can’t even be a good girlfriend, how will I ever be a good wife?"

He blinked in confusion. What was she going on about? "Baby, you do know you’re the best woman I could ever ask for, right? We’ve been together for all these years, surely you already know you’re good enough—no, you’re too good for me."

She took a long sigh and turned away from him.

He racked his brains. Her job was going on perfectly. Since Dawn was launched, it exploded into popularity and she even got a raise from it, and now she was collaborating with Lucy on another app. So her job was out of the question.

That left only one thing that could be bothering her, the very thing he had tried to convince himself this wasn’t about. "Did you get your period?"

She broke down at his question. "No."

He let out a sigh of relief. If it wasn’t about that, anything was bearable. "Then what’s going on?"

"It will be here soon anyway. Do you know how I know that? I’m not pregnant!"

The silence that followed felt like a sledgehammer in his chest. It was unbearable.

She looked at him for the first time, tears filling her eyes. "I took the test. I’m certain of it."

"You’re beating yourself up for a slight error in the food you cook...because you’re not pregnant?" He asked in shock and disbelief, but he should have expected it. Natalie had a way of worrying about a dozen little things if she couldn’t move the huge elephant in the room.

He turned on his heel and headed upstairs.

"Devonte? What are you doing?" She ran after him and she had a pretty good idea what to expect. Still, she grabbed the box of ovulation tests from his hand before he could drop it in the trash can.

"What are you doing?" she asked. His face was full of fury.

"Getting rid of them." He took a deep breath. "We should never have started with these ovulation tests."

He saw the hurt on her face and knew she had misunderstood him. He was frustrated. "When I said I wanted to have a baby with you, I didn’t mean it had to be immediate. I still want to come home and fuck my woman without thinking about whether or not she will get pregnant this time!"

He grabbed her arm before she could leave. "Don’t get me wrong, Nat. I do enjoy making love to you when you’re ovulating—something about possibly getting you pregnant makes me primal. But I don’t want that to be all our relationship is about. I hate seeing you break down every month."