Just One Kiss Before Divorcing Me (Martin and Calvin) novel Chapter 17

CH 17

Calvin

He stood listening to that message on his answering machine inside his apartment, once more. He’d just gotten home from holding her funeral and the wake. There was no caller idea, but he recognised Rin’s voice, as he always did. It was just her stating his name and then her screaming and the sound of crashing. He’d checked the date and time on it many times. Was she so ticked off at him that she would do this to him? That had been his first thought when hearing the message for the very first time.

That she would call him and act like she was on that plane, in that crash, all just to get away from him. He’d listened to it nearly every day, thinking about it, how could he not? She actually sounded worried, just one word, and he’d heard the worry–filled inflection in it. If he’d not looked into her himself, he would honestly believe she was dead and that was her calling him in her final moments. That scream that had been cut off, had actually sounded like she was utterly terrified and fearing for her life, and the sound of the accident had gone on for at least another 30 seconds before there was just nothing.

He honestly couldn’t believe she was the type of person to do this to him. She would have to know he would blame himself for putting her on that flight, yet here she was alive out there somewhere. God only knows where because he couldn’t find her. She just didn’t bloody exist anymore, had likely used her computing skills to vanish.

But she had wanted to leave him with the thoughts that he had caused her death. The more he listened to that recording, the more angry he got with her. The woman he loved was not the woman he thought she was. Apparently she was a spiteful, vindictive woman that had not only done this to him. He now realized that she had only wanted more money from him. She wouldn’t take the house, no she had insisted on being given its monetary value instead.

For three years they’d been married, and not once did she use the card he’d given her for anything other than purchases he told her to buy. She’d played him really good, it seemed, and had portrayed herself as not

wanting any of his money. She’d never asked him for a single thing in the entir e they were married. He’d

willingly given her everything she needed to play the role of his loving wife. She didn’t need to ask for

anything; she had everything she could possibly want.

She’d put on a hell of a show, he now realised, her attitude with Wil, her sudden being upset after Wil’s engagement party, her dismissive yet sad demeanour at Cliffside the day he’d gone to the house to collect

his things.

Then at the airport, all those tears, and the words, how hurt she’d looked, and she’d made him feel guilty, and made him wonder if he was doing the right thing, he’d had to talk himself into believing it was the right way, on that day. Only now did he understand it was all just an act. She’d played her hand so very well.

She’d likely been hoping he’d change his mind with all those tears and faked sadness. To keep herself in the life of luxury she’d been able to have while married to him. But she’d also had a back–up plan in case it didn’t work, and he wouldn’t take her back. So she still got a hell of a payout from him. Everything she’d done was just to suck more money from him, and it had bloody worked.

That house was worth 12 million dollars, and he’d stupidly paid it to her on top of the four million he’d decided was a good enough amount for playing the role of his wife. Because he thought they would only be

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separated for all of a day, that she would see him when she got to Italy, and know he’d only divorced her to show her he wanted a real marriage with her.

She’d left her car and the house keys at the house, given him everything back, even dumped the engagement ring and wedding band in his car before getting out of it. She’d let him know that very day he’d taken her to the airport. She was severing all ties with him, but he’d been so blinded to it all. Because he’d fallen in love with her, his heart had belonged to her, but in the end she was just a gold digger that had gotten her hooks into him, and hadn’t she; she’d taken him for 16 million dollars in the end, she would never have to work a single day in her life.

He’d already tried to access her account, but it was gone. Everything in her world was just shut down. There was no social media, no email accounts, no bank accounts, just nothing and, from what he could find, she’d done it that very afternoon that she’d supposedly gotten on that plane.

Wil was not as skeptical as Calvin was. He had frowned at hearing the recorded message; he didn’t think it was staged. Had stated it correlated with the time they all learned of the plane crash, just a few hours after it happened. That maybe she’d called to tell him she wasn’t on the plane.

That maybe, just maybe, something had actually happened to her, that the call was real, and she was injured out there somewhere or even worse, had actually died in some accident. The man was delusional. Calvin now realised, he was her next of kin and no one had called him to notify him she was in a hospital or dead somewhere and her body needed collecting. Wil was wrong, and he was right.

Today he’d had to hold a funeral for the bloody woman. Everyone around him knew he’d been over there in Italy, that she’d been on that flight that had crashed in Rome, seen him frantically searching for her. He’d not realised it was all a lie until he’d come home and listened to that message; the one he was now replaying, notching up his anger.

Everyone around him knew how much of a happy loving couple they were, and so all he could do was hold a funeral with an empty casket. Because he was not telling them she had robbed him blind, and vanished into the night. He understood her meaning, she was never coming back, she’d made him into a fool. His own heart was now cold, he would not let himself be made out as a fool. No, he was not standing for that.

So, instead, he’d held that stupid funeral and stood there and tried not to seethe through it, had spent

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