Chapter 55Ian's eyes traced Ashley's face over and over, as if trying to memorize the features, even though it was permanently inscribed in every cell of his nerves.She had been out cold for two hours already and he was steadily losing his mind. He was certain Yu Zhen was too, as he was trying to field off a hysterical Rita as one of Chloe's colleagues stayed to monitor Ashley's condition all through.The doctor and nurses didn't need to stay, but Ian would be damned if she didn't have constant medical surveillance.He had tried using the power of his mind to will her over to consciousness several times, but it seemed that when it mattered most his hopes failed him."Sir, would you like to sleep somewhere?", A nurse asked him carefully. Yes, he would like to sleep with Ashley, but of course, she was unconscious."No.""Would you like something else si-""No."He added a glare for good measure. She was distracting him from monitoring his wife's condition."O-okay sir", she shivered a
"Oh my goodness! Ashley are you o- LEAVE ME ALONE YU ZHEN, Ashley are you okay?!", Rita bounded over to Ian the moment he got out of the door."Am I actually married to this asshole?", Ashley asked seriously, not removing her head."I take offense at that", Ian grumbled.“Yes you are, how are you feeling?”, Rita asked frantically.“I’m great, there’s nothing wrong with me!”, Ashley glared at everyone at the same time.Yu Zhen threw a look to Ian in confusion.“Short term memory loss”, Ian said simply, still holding the strangely calm woman. Ian walked down to the elevator and pressed the buttons after Yu Zhen, Chloe and Rita came along.“Prove you’re my husband”, she looked at him calculatively.“How?”“My husband would know!”, she exclaimed triumphantly. She didn’t actually expect him to know. She was convinced she was actually married to him because those photos were absolutely not photoshopped, she took one, she could remember taking one of them, but why would she get married to Ia
Yu Zhen rushed over to Ian’s wing, Chloe and Rita hot on his tail. The servants had frantically rushed over to him yelling something about their boss losing consciousness. Yu Zhen had had enough of today, every single thing that could have gone wrong went wrong and he was sick of it. He rounded over to Ian just in time to see him being crushed in a hug by Ashley, thankfully, he was breathing and his eyes were open, so he wasn’t dead. Although, if Ashley kept on hugging him that tightly, Yu Zhen wasn’t sure Ian would see the next minute.He moved to remove Ian from Ashley’s hold when he was evilly glared at by the both of them. Ugh! Couples!“Let him breathe Ashley”, Chloe knelt to Ian’s eye level.“I can breathe”, Ian said, like a loyal soldier. The thing that tickled Yu Zhen was the fact that he in fact sounded winded.“Just a little Ashley”, Rita coaxed her.Ashley wanted him to breathe, she really did, but her brain was on a one way road and her blood had started flowing backward.
‘Spoilt brat’, Ashley thought and buttoned her top fully again. She was a little glad that she didn’t have to sleep with him. It was jarring to be carried by her worst enemy – fine, exaggeration – and even more jarring to be married to said enemy.“We don’t get intimate”, Ian said calmly. The day had been one of the most horrible days for him and he was ready for it to end. Ashley being stubborn was counterproductive to the quick end of the day.“I can see why”, Ashley taunted and leveled him with a ridiculing gaze that seemed to be aimed pointedly at his lower half. Ian did not respond to taunts. Ian was dignified. Ian would lay on the bed and wait for her peacefully.“What’s that supposed to mean?”, he asked, standing at his full height, towering over her easily. The height difference was so large that no one could even see that Ashley was in the room if they were looking from behind Ian.Ashley, never one to back away from challenges, stood to her full height too. Unfortunately it
Ian ran his hands through his wet hair. Ashley with memory loss was a dangerous experience for him. He knew she had entered, and left immediately. But he couldn’t afford to make her uncomfortable, so he’d pretend like nothing happened.She had actually never seen him naked. He had to take another shower, but it helped to calm him down a little so it wasn’t a completely horrible thing.He took off a towel from the towel rack and wrapped it around his waist, opting to put the other one on his head. This was his go-to method of drying, and his wife seemed to like it whenever she saw him. He walked out of the bathroom, throwing a casual glance at his wife only to nearly break down into laughter. Several years of being two faced helped him to press his lips together tightly so as not to let any sound escape. She was the color of ripened tomatoes as she desperately tried to read the magazine that was very obviously upside down.Ian smirked instead and walked past her into the walk-in clos
Ashley came out of the bathroom, peeking first to see if Ian was in the room and sped into the closet he had walked into previously, she would at least find something she could wear there. Cementing the fact that she was apparently married to the man was the amount of female clothes in her size in the closet. She gaped and rotated as she looked up and rows of clothes met her line of sight everywhere she turned. She had never seen so many clothes at once. The big sized shirts dwarfed the female ones and she furrowed her brows at the fact that she and Ian shared the closet.Ian didn’t seem like someone anyone voluntarily shared anything with, she wondered what possessed her. She wondered even more what possessed him. Ian Hills and Ashley Toma, the weirdest pairing alive. She wondered how he even wooed her to acceptance with his soily attitude. She picked out what looked most comfortable and sat on the bed, successfully subsiding her unbidden thoughts of her best friend’s brother – her
“I have good news and bad news”, Yu Zhen proclaimed from the front of the door he aggressively banged open. Ian took a deep breath and lowered his gun. That was honestly an entrance punishable by death – and the main reason Yu Zhen didn’t sleep in the same house with him most times.He looked to Ashley and on seeing her face he knew he was in for trouble. Her eyes were wide and she looked between him and the gun still in his hands – stupid decision on his part – with something akin to pure terror.“I can explain”, he started, he couldn’t explain in a way she would understand, but it was better to say anything than to leave her wondering about her husband being a murderer or something.“You absolutely can not! You have a gun on the bed I sleep on?!”, she shrieked like he knew she would. She tried to get out of his grip but he firmly secured her from running away.“It’s for security purposes-”“Yeah, to kill me if I ever made you annoyed over the night!”, Ashley interrupted him in a lou
Ian's body sunk into the bed, the worn upholstery offering little comfort as he processed the weight of his recent actions. The echoes of the adrenaline-fueled confrontation reverberated in his mind like a relentless drumbeat, each thud reminding him of the choices that had led them to this precarious moment.Ashley, still reeling from the shock, sat opposite him. Her eyes, wide and wary, held a mixture of fear and confusion. The silence between them was palpable, pregnant with unspoken words that hung heavy in the air. The room that was filled with warm and fuzzy feelings before felt more like a battleground, he accepted the fault.With a heavy sigh, Ian broke the silence again, his voice carrying the burden of self-reproach. "I didn't want you to feel unsafe, but I should have handled that differently."Ashley's gaze lingered on him, her eyes probing for a deeper understanding. The room seemed to contract around them as they grappled with the repercussions of his impulsive decision.