As soon as Cordelia pulled back, the covers were thrown off by Ronan, his lips finding hers as his hand roamed over her body.
With his closeness, Cordelia started to feel a bit suffocated, gasping for breath.
"Reverse psychology?" he asked.
"Not really. It's genuinely difficult to investigate," Cordelia knew she couldn't even touch Alana's doorstep. She didn't understand what Alana was up to and could only proceed cautiously.
"What were you doing in that guy's arms?" he asked, "You really know how to keep me on my toes."
Cordelia didn't have a long list of men she'd been with, so when Ronan said this, she knew who he was talking about.
"Did you know I had depression?" Cordelia asked him, "After I moved to England, I got depressed. I couldn't see my kids, didn't know who my real mom was, and felt like I was adrift. I had always wanted to get a PhD, it was my life-long pursuit, but the academic pressure was immense. Standing on a foreign street, no familiar faces, not knowing when I would return home, I felt like an abandoned child. I was often out of breath. That's when he counseled me, and helped me analyze my problems. He was my only pillar and friend."
As Cordelia spoke, tears fell onto her knees. Before, she had thought life was full of endless possibilities. But after returning home and getting entangled with Ronan, she began to believe in fate. No matter how many people you met, in the end, there was only this one person in your destiny.
Ronan remained silent.
"If it was so hard, why did you leave in the first place?" he asked, a mix of sympathy and anger in his voice. He was angry that he wasn't there when Cordelia went through all this.
"I had to leave, no matter how hard it was. I can't rely on you for my whole life. I couldn't get over what happened to my mom. And then there's the thing with Tabitha. Everything just piled up." Cordelia cried and spoke. There was also Alana and her in-laws, all adding to her pressure.
"And now added the deaths of Deanna and Tabitha?" he asked again.
"Why are you asking when you already know? Every day I feel like I'm lying next to a cold, emotionless person. I feel like you could kill me at any moment and then tell the police I killed myself."
"Stop crying. Just go to sleep." Ronan said, visibly irritated. He did all these things for her, but she didn't appreciate it. Instead, she put all the blame on him. Could he not be angry?
That night, Cordelia turned to sleep on the other side, but Ronan pulled her back by the waist, rubbing his head against the back of her neck, "Don't you appreciate what I do for you?"
Comments
The readers' comments on the novel: The Contracted Ever After