Second Wife To A Murderer

Things We Do For Love

Whitney’s POV

I woke up gasping, I leaned back and closed my eyes to be sure it was just a dream.

For some minutes, I still felt the sticky warmth of blood on my hands. I could still see Anna’s empty eyes staring at the ceiling. It felt so real I could hear the siren. But the morning light coming through the curtains forced its way in, and brought me back to reality.

It was only a dream.

“What kind of dream is this?” I asked myself, trying to sit up. “This isn’t a mere dream. It’s a warning, maybe the universe is telling me to stop monitoring Robert before I spoil things for myself.”

My phone rang on the nightstand. Robert ofcourse. The same way his call woke me up from the nightmare.

I answered, still trying to slow my breathing. “Good morning honey.”

“Your mother called me again,” he said without greeting. His voice was tight, he never talked about my family nicely even when he’s living off my family’s money. “She’s been asking questions about the Q3 Bills that I already approved, Whitney, I need you to handle your family. I’m getting tired of this, I have enough to deal with without your mom breathing down my neck about almost everything.”

“It’s not my fault she’s bedridden, you know?” He sounded arrogant.

I closed my eyes and rested my fingers on my forehead. “C’mon… She’s just being protective. You know how she is. Can't she ask questions anymore?”

“Protective?” He chuckled briefly, but it wasn’t funny. “I’ve been running those companies for years. If it wasn’t for me, Kirkwood-Ashby would’ve collapsed after your father died. Your family should be grateful.”

Robert always finds a reason to gloat over my inability to run my family’s business as the heir. Meanwhile he manipulated me into believing he’s the best person to run our businesses.

I swallowed. “My family built those companies. You’re successful because of the foundation they gave you.”

There was a small silence on the other end. Then his voice changed.

“Whitney. Be honest with yourself for once. If I hadn’t stepped in, do you really think you could have managed everything alone? You freeze every time there’s pressure. Don’t take it as an insult. But you’re weak so tell your mom to back off and stop interfering.”

I stared at the sunlight on the floor, sad for the woman I have turned out to be. My father will cry in his grave if he sees me.

Robert keeps forgetting he could barely afford a meal when my family took him in. Now he acts like he’s untouchable.

“I’m tired of you talking down on my family.” I said almost in tears.

Maybe I should stop looking for trouble. Maybe I should go back to being the composed, graceful, quiet wife that Robert has turned me into. A wife who didn’t ask questions and even when her honor was at stake.

Maybe the dream was a warning to leave things alone.

“I have a meeting,” Robert said. “We’ll talk later.”

He hung up.

I sat there holding the phone, the dream still clinging to my head. Anna’s blood on the floor. Her lifeless body. The sound of Anna’s head hitting the table.

I swung my legs out of bed and forced myself to stand.

It all started six days ago. If I am being honest with myself.

Six days earlier I was folding Robert’s shirts for laundry when I saw a smear of lipstick on his collar. I don’t wear that shade of lipstick so it’s not mine.

I stood there for a long time, staring at the pink stain, telling myself it was nothing. Probably a mistake or a transfer from a cheek kiss at some charity event. Robert walked in right in time so I asked him and he said it was nothing, I believed him.

But after he left, I found a hotel receipt in the pocket of the same shirt. dated the same weekend he told me he’d been in Atlanta for a supplier meeting.

The hotel was thirty minutes from our own house. Out of curiosity I checked the bag he left the house with the day he wore that shirt and I found a gym membership slip I didn’t recognize, charged to a card I thought had been closed years ago.

All this can't be nothing. Robert is surely hiding something from me. So I became more alert. I started to notice small inconsistencies that I overlooked.

The late meetings that weren't on his calendar. The second phone he sometimes forgot in his gym bag. The way he started leaving the room when certain calls came in.

I told myself I was being paranoid. I kept on convincing myself not to snoop but you can’t hit a child and expect her not to cry.

So I followed him.

I watched him park outside a quiet apartment on the other side of the city and marched inside with a bottle of wine. I sat in my car until the lights went on in a third-floor window. I was about to leave when I saw his shadow with a woman’s silhouette move past the glass.

That was the night something inside me shifted.

I started monitoring him closely, after much digging. I found the extra set of keys and a house document under a strange company name.

My husband had been living a second life miles away from the house we shared. I didn’t confront him or tell anyone because I wanted to catch him red handed.

I was still sitting with my coffee going cold, turning Robert’s words over…. “where would Kirkwood-Ashby be without me?” when I heard his voice again.

I must have sat here for so long that I didn’t know he was back. I moved quietly to the balcony.

His voice was low, and soft. He’s never talked to me that sweet since we got married.

“I’ll see you tonight,” he said. “Same place. Don’t wear any undies, I want easy access.”

I heard a woman’s laugh.

“…told you not to call the house,” he continued talking. “I know. I know, Anna. Just, not now. Don’t worry after tomorrow, I’ll come to the house on Friday. You’ll have me all to yourself the whole weekend.”

“Anna. That’s her name?” I nodded as I stood there, listening to my husband make plans with another woman.

Jeez, now I remember. That’s the same name from my dream. The cup of coffee slipped from my hand but I caught it right on time.

I set the coffee down very carefully, remembering every detail of my dream. Then I thought about how Robert has always belittled me, how he’s spent years sowing seeds of discord between me and my family and making everyone including me see myself as unfit to handle our family’s business.

Something I was handling perfectly well before he walked into my life.

Dreams are just dreams. They don’t manifest in reality. My dream wasn’t a warning. Rather it was fear, dressed up in disguise, and I refused… I refuse to let fear be the reason I let my husband keep making a fool of me in my own house.

I turned around, walked back into the bedroom, and opened the drawer where I had hidden the spare key to Anna’s apartment. The apartment my husband bought without telling me.

By Friday, I’d know who Anna was and I’d catch her red handed with Robert. Nothing about my dream would happen, it’ll just be a harmless confrontation.