Chapter 3. He’s a Nine

Even when Alexander heard Isabella’s approaching footsteps, he ignored it, focusing on the files before him. Isabella was beautiful, he had to admit—from her doe-shaped eyes and carefully carved brows to the luscious sunset gold hair that caught the sun. But she was the devil’s incarnate. So, that was the ultimate turn-off.

It had been alarming at first when she asked him for help, but Alexander knew that if he truly wanted nothing to do with her, he would not start anything in the first place. So, with a calmness that infuriated the she-devil, he refused her.

The glare that she sent him was deadly enough to make him drop dead on the spot, but he was Alexander Sinclair, and he was not easily intimidated. The glint in her eyes, though, made him falter just the tiniest bit. Perhaps he had gotten married to a psycho.

Alexander was proven right when she walked in holding a kitchen knife.

“What on earth are you doing with a knife?” Alexander asked, eyeing the sharp object glinting in the morning sun.

“Oh, this,” Isabella chuckled darkly. “It’s for me, of course.”

Isabella felt the tiniest bit of triumph when Alexander showed the first emotion of puzzlement. It morphed his features to be more human than some beautiful statue.

“And what do you plan to do with that?”

“Completely dismember you,” Isabella felt the urge to say, but she held her tongue. Lifting the knife, Isabella bunched up the gown before slicing. Fabric after fabric pooled at her feet, but she focused solely on the task at hand while Alexander watched her with surprise.

Most of the fabric making up the puffy part of the wedding dress was gone by the time she was done, and she ended up looking like a bride gone rogue. Holding the knife right in the middle of the plunging neckline, she sliced all the way down until it gave way. Alexander used a file to cover his eyes right before the fabric left Isabella’s body.

‘So he does have some manners left.’

Isabella could breathe a bit better with the heavy dress off her back, so she huffed with her nose high in the air before leaving the sitting room.

Alexander heard her receding footsteps, and that was deemed a safe code for him, so he slowly brought the file obstructing his vision down. The floor was littered with white shredded nets, linen, silk, and the kitchen knife.

He still found it hard to believe that he had just witnessed his crazy wife’s antics. Alexander reacted very little to situations, but this had brought out an extra level of shock in him. How cuckoo was she exactly?

Isabella smiled in victory as she peeled off the rest of the fabric from her body, walking into the adjoining bathroom. The warm water softly caressed her skin as she washed off the grime and sweat that clung to her sticky skin. Isabella found her tense muscles relaxing at the water therapy until her muscles became like a well-oiled machine.

Stepping out, she thought back to Alexander and their entire episode. It poked at Isabella’s brain that he was so stoic and mostly expressionless. She was used to people who wore their emotions like an exaggerated hairdo, but Alexander hid his. It unnerved her that she could not incite any emotion or expression until she tried hard enough, and it only made Alexander seem less human. That did not sit well with her.

The boredom got to her brain, and she did a little programming up there, so Isabella made it her life’s aim to make Alexander show some emotion.

If he detested her existence, it would be less unnerving if he actually showed it.

***

“I can’t believe you are married,” Jane, Isabella’s best friend, stated with wide eyes.

“I can’t believe I am married too,” Isabella shrugged, tracing the bedsheet pattern absentmindedly. “Two days ago, I would clutch my sides in laughter if anyone told me that.”

“Yet, here you are.”

“Here I am.”

Jane had always been understanding in every single plight that Isabella had faced. They had been friends for as long as Isabella could remember. During her study in Business Administration, Jane enrolled in the same university to keep Isabella company while juggling her modeling career.

“But how is he?” Jane leaned forward with interest shining in those baby blue eyes.

“Rude,” was the first word that crossed her mind.

“Well, that’s oddly specific,” Jane straightened herself on the bed. “Physically, though? Rate on a scale of one to ten,” she drummed her fingers on her thigh.

“I’m not rating him,” Isabella protested.

“Which means he is attractive,” she cackled.

“He is infuriating; that’s all you need to know.”

“Rate him, though. Come on,” Jane whined.

“He’s a nine.”

Jane squealed in delight, leaping from her position. “The Isabella Monroe, pardonez-moi, the Isabella Sinclair rates a human a nine? Are we in some parallel universe?” she dramatically exclaimed.

“Shut up before he hears you. His ego is already inflated enough; I don’t think I can deal with any more,” she rolls her eyes, but the smile soon fades from her face.

“You aren’t happy,” Jane settles back down.

“I am not. Everything aside, he’s a total stranger. I always imagined my married life to be happy and comfortable with a man I actually love,” she sniffs. “I don’t want to be with a stranger my entire life and especially not to generate some wealth for my greedy parents,” Isabella felt the familiar prickle of tears, and as much as she tried to blink them back, it only seemed to further encourage it.

“Come here,” Jane spread out her arms, and Isabella melted in them, allowing herself to finally be vulnerable. She cried for all she had lost, all the years and sacrifices she gave up to please her insatiable parents, and this was the height of it.

Isabella prayed it was a bad dream and that soon, she would wake up.