Protect Me From Myself

-Chapter-Two

Aimee

Kory drags me to the men's room, of all places! He pushes me through the restroom door and angrily slams it behind him. With my arms folded over my chest, he stalks toward me like some crazed killer. His eyes are like burning balls of fire.

What's his deal?

“What do you want, Kory?”

“What do you think you're doing?”

“Excuse me? What do I think I'm doing? It's none of your goddamned business, Kory! You don't get to keep walking in and out of my life and ruining everything!”

“You think running around with men old enough to be your father every time my backs turned is...”

“What?!” I yell, cutting him off. “I do not run around with anyone, asshole! God! Who the hell do you think you are?”

“I'm your husband! That's who I am.”

“My husband when it suits you!” I rub my hands over my face frustratedly. I can't handle it when he acts like this. “Why do you keep doing this to me, Kory?” I ask more calmly. “Whenever I try to move on with my life, you walk back into it and ruin everything. Do you expect me to be alone forever? Is that it?”

“No,” He says sullenly. “But I won't have what's mine screwing around behind my back!”

“Are you for real right now?” I think I'm in shock; I've never seen him this het up about anything. I can tell from the look in his eyes that he's deadly serious right now.

What the hell has gotten into him?

He's always been a jerk where I'm concerned, always staking claim to me when he thinks I'm moving on. But right now, he looks like a man possessed!

“I can't live like this anymore. You're driving me crazy!”

I jump when Kory grabs my shoulders. I didn't even know he was standing so close to me. “Look at me.” His voice is suddenly calming. Again, this is confusing.

What the hell does he want from me?

With his finger beneath my chin, he tilts my head back. Our eyes lock, and I know I must stay strong, but I'm melting inside.

“I know that I haven't been the best husband in the world,”

“You haven't been any kind of husband, Kory. You asked me to marry you one drunken night in Seattle. I said yes, even though we weren't even dating,”

“Yes, we were.”

“No, Kory, we fu.cked a couple of times.” He breathes deeply through his nose, anger pulsing from him. But he needs to know I won't let him push me around any longer. “Regardless, I married you the very next day because you told me that you loved me, that you had for a long time. I loved you so much that I would have done anything for you. It was impulsive and stupid, but it meant everything to me. But what did I get out of it, Kory?”

He takes a step back from me, raking his fingers through his short, dark hair, and I'm glad for the space.

“Two weeks is all I got out of our marriage. Two weeks, where I thought I was everything to you. Two weeks where I thought everything would be okay. I should have known it wouldn't be when you wouldn't allow me to tell anybody we were married. I thought you were ashamed of me, you know?”

“I have never been ashamed of you, Aimee.”

“You say that, but I know that you are. You've never told another living soul about you and me. Yet you refuse me a divorce every time I ask for one. Why would you do that when I'm nothing to you but the girl you pull back into your selfish web whenever you're in town and want to fu.ck?!”

That is all I am to him, and I'm just the stupid fool who allows him to walk in and out of my life. I'm the one who lusts after him and wants him to notice me whenever he's in town. I'm the one who allows him to use me, and I'm the one who sleeps with him because that's where I feel safe and happy, in his arms. And he's the one who walks away from me every single time like I'm nothing but some slu.t he picked up at a bar. And every time, I'm left a complete mess.

Why do I put myself through it all?

I'm worth more than that, and I know it. I'm a strong woman, I am. But Kory is my weakness; he has always been my weakness.

“What are you even doing here, Kory?”

He lives in Seattle. He only comes here for family functions. I don't know about any family function. If there was one, I would know. I'm friends with all four of his sisters. One even works with me. His mother and my mother are best friends. There's no way I wouldn't know if his mother was planning a family thing.

I watch with fascination as Kory straightens his blue tie. He looks so good in that navy blue suit. God, I can see his naked form in my mind's eye. The way his chest feels beneath my fingers. His thick thighs, his huge biceps, and his massive co... “I'm here for my wife.”

I shake my head from side to side for a second as if shaking away thoughts of his fantastic body. Did I just hear him right?

“What?”

He walks toward me again. I step back and into the washbasin. I swallow hard as he leans into me, bending at the waist slightly with his hands pressed on either side of me. My eyes flutter closed; the feeling of his breath in my ear has every inch of me throbbing with want. I hate that he has this power over me. I hate even more that he knows it.

“I'm here for you,” I fist my hands tightly by my sides. I won't fall for this; it's all talk, just as it always is. “And I'm not leaving here without you.”

Why does your voice always leave you when you have so much to say?

I can't seem to find my voice; it's gone and left me. My insides are all knotted up, and I feel really sick.

“In all the ways I have wronged you, I will make it right.” He whispers before kissing my cheek and walking away from me and out the door without another word.

I turn and look at myself in the mirror. I won't do this with him. I won't allow him to barge into my life because he has nothing else going on right now. I know for a fact the only way he'd come here is if he's just finished with a big case. There's no way he'd walk away from his job unless he had.

Kory is an outstanding lawyer, but I don't know much about his job other than he owns his own law firm and his brother works with him. That, and they're both fantastic at their jobs.

Kory and Greg are criminal lawyers. Very good ones. I know that Kory is good at his job because I have spent the past six years trying to divorce him with no success. The asshole always refuses to divorce me. I know he does it because it's his way of holding onto me, but I'm done. I am so fu.cking done; it's unreal.