Avery's Game Of Revenge
Chapter 150: His Wife.

Chapter 150: His Wife.

Archie had settled himself in, locked his door, and had started the car before Avery finally got there, panting and totally out of breath.

"Hey..." she started, but he cut her off with a, "I have to listen to the recordings of an important meeting. Do you mind?"

"No, I don’t..." Avery shook her head, though her expression turned sour. "I don’t mind."

The drive back home was so silent and the atmosphere so tense that every now and then, Avery was tempted to lean forward and unplug the recorder playing the proceedings of the meeting to the man beside her. But she convinced herself every single time that she couldn’t afford to annoy him more than she already did.

Why the hell did he have such a fragile mood today though? At first, he had been annoyed that she said last night was boring and the date he planned would be unexciting, then he was angry that she said she would be feeling the opposite of bliss if she carried his baby, without even letting her conclude her statement and explain why he said that. And now, she had no idea if the anklet she lost had added to his anger or not.

She looked out the window, and her brows creased when she recognized the direction the car was heading towards.

"Where are we going, Archie?"

"Where does it look like we are going?"

"Home? I thought we were going on a date... Weren’t we?" she asked.

"Just like you had classes earlier when we were suppose to be out as a couple, I have a flight to catch in thirty minutes," Archie deadpanned.

Eyes shrouding with confusion, Avery said, "Wait, let me get this straight. You have a flight to catch or we have a flight to catch? You didn’t tell me our date would be outside the country."

He scoffed, "I didn’t tell you because it isn’t. No one has time for an unexciting date."

"You’re going to keep on mentioning that, aren’t you?" Avery sighed. "But I already apologized and you also I didn’t mean it."

"Well, sorry doesn’t change shit. It doesn’t change the fact that immediately after listening to the voice message you sent, I offered to attend the general conference meeting abroad in place of Neil. It also doesn’t repeal the tickets that were bought almost immediately after that."

Avery blinked, disbelief evident in her eyes.

"So you cancelled the date without letting me know and planned a business trip after that? Why did you come to the campus then? If you already decided you were leaving just because of a silly joke I made, why come?!"

"Didn’t come specifically for you. I told you. Had to check something out for a friend, Dom," he replied without sparing her a glance.

"Then you should have just left without reaching out to me! What’s the difference anyway? You drive me home and if I didn’t ask, you wouldn’t have told me you were going on a business trip." Avery fumed, biting down on her lower lip as if to keep the words in. However, that tactic was only effective for ten seconds before she gave in to the anger. "You aren’t even going to say anything? You are not a broody man, Arch!"

"I learned how to be one," Archie deadpanned.

In a bid to control herself, Avery closed her eyes, inhaled deeply, and exhaled.

"No, you didn’t learn shit. I’d rather have the jerk I’ve known for four years over the broody man I’ve known for what? One hour. So tell me, what did I do wrong? Was it really the voice message I sent? Or the bracelet I lost? I promised I will find it. You’re still not going to answer me?" At this point, she knew she was already blabbering but she couldn’t find it within herself to stop.

How had it taken her this long to realize she didn’t like a broody Archie? That him having a sour mood, especially when it was highly possible that she caused it, would automatically put her in a sour mood too. That she would be so uncomfortable and guilty that it would make her feel like she was suffocating.

She continued to stare at Archie’s face as if her prolonged stare would force him to reply, but the latter continued to ignore her.

"Is this how marriage is supposed to be?" she asked, after five minutes passed by without a word from him.

"I don’t know. It’s my first marriage too," Archie deadpanned. Silence ensued in the car for the rest of the journey to Dove’s Luxury Building, until they arrived at the entrance to the underground garage.

"You can stop here. You have a flight to catch after all," Avery murmured.

"Doesn’t matter."

She scoffed. "It sure does. You’re in a hurry to get away from me. I’m giving you the chance now so why not take it?"

"I am your husband. No matter how much I want to stay away from you, I can’t drop you off like I would do to an ordinary outsider."

Avery laughed dryly but didn’t say anything. It was ironic that he was talking about how he couldn’t treat her like an outsider when that was exactly what he was doing.

She stared out of the car until it pulled up in the empty space between two cars, one of them being the car Avery used to commute with during her first few weeks of being here, and the other, the limousine that took her to and fro the Smith’s Manor on the charity ball she attended on her first night here. The memories were just from a few months ago yet they felt like they were from years ago.

As soon as the engine stopped idling, Avery pushed the door open and stepped out of the car. Without a second glance back at the car. She used one hand to fish out her elevator card as she headed straight to the elevator. She was just a few feet away from the elevator when his words echoed in her ears.

’I am your husband. No matter how much I want to stay away from you...’

Avery stopped dead in her tracks, the words resounding in her mind. A sinister smirk formed on her face as she turned around and retraced her steps back to the car. She let out a sigh of relief on seeing that it was yet to pull out of the spot she left it.

Seeing her approach from the distance with her long skirt flowing after her, Archie’s brows hiked up the slightest bit. He pushed the car door open and put one foot out.

"Where are you going?" he asked. "You should stay home for the—"

"No, you should stay home!" Avery cut him off.

Tilting his head slightly sideways, he asked, "What are you doing?"

"What does it look like I’m doing?" Avery retorted, the sinister smile on her face widening. "Get out of the car, Archie."

Archie’s eyes darkened, obviously not taking well to the command, demand, order, or whatever it was that she just did.

"I told you I have a flight to catch. I don’t have the time for whatever joke this—"

"I am your wife," Avery interrupted. "No matter how much you want to stay away from me, it’s my job to make sure you don’t leave. Don’t you think?"

"Ava—"

"Don’t Ava me, Archie. You’re getting off or not?"

In place of a reply, Archie pinned her with a deadly glare which Avery had no problem returning. With him sitting in the car, and she standing outside and staring down at him, they maintained that position until the sound of a car honking in the distance broke the silence between them.

"I should listen to you," he conceded.

"Good." Avery stepped outside, her hand still on the car’s door to pull it open in case Archie decided to pull a trick on her.

As she watched him duck out of the car, a myriad of thoughts filled her mind. Not once in her wildest imagination had she thought she would one day become a wife forcing her husband out of his car and obstructing his job, and neither had she ever thought of Archie as a husband who would immediately abandon his business, albeit grudgingly, because his wife pulled a ’wife card’ on him.

"Hey... you look pale," his worried voice pulled her from her thoughts.