Chapter 5 Crumbling

Olivia

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"What the fuck?" I seethed angrily through gritted teeth. Amanda looked at me with a puzzled expression while Sandra had a sympathetic expression on her face.

"Why are you so upset?" Amanda asked but I ignored her question. She had no clue what was going on.

"When was this taken?" I asked curiously, my voice filled with urgency.

"Yesterday," Amanda responded in a confused voice.

I looked at the picture again and my face twisted in disgust. Alexander's ex-girlfriend, Tricia, was in town. Everything started making sense. It became clear why he asked for a divorce.

"I ran into her at the mall and I took photos just so you would believe me when I tell you," Amanda added when I didn't say anything else.

When I first met Alexander, I looked into his life and discovered he had just left a serious relationship months before he met me.

Their photos were everywhere on the internet. They looked like the power couple everyone would dream to be. I could recognize Tricia anywhere and at any time.

Even if their relationship had ended, I always felt insecure when it came to Tricia. I felt Alexander never stopped loving her because of the way he spoke about her initially.

They ended their relationship on good terms because Tricia had to move away to Paris to focus on her modeling career. They couldn't do long distances so they had to move on from each other.

"Olivia, calm down," Sandra said when she saw that my legs had started shaking. "You just have to get through this event. We'll deal with it later."

I was more than ready to confront Alexander in front of everyone. "What's the problem?" Amanda asked. She was still confused because she had no idea I was getting a divorce.

Sandra explained everything to Amanda.

"Olivia, you have to calm down." My sister advised when Sandra was done with the whole explanation.

"He fucking lied to me," I said, trying to hold back the tears that were threatening to fall down my face and ruin the makeup I spent hours on. "He said it wasn't because of his ex. Shit, he said he hadn't seen her in years. So the expensive necklace was also for her, he got it for her."

I ran my hands through my hair in annoyance as I realized my marriage was crumbling because of his ex-girlfriend. All these years, I wasn't wrong about him still being in love with her. If he wanted her so much, why did he marry me then?

"I'm not saying I'm on his side, but can you just ask for an explanation from him before doing anything?" Sandra suggested in a calm voice.

I took a deep breath, then another one, and another one. I needed to stay calm or I was going to do something drastic.

"I need to leave here right now," I said as I picked up my bag and stood up from the chair. Sandra held me back before I could move.

"You have to stay for the couple's dance." She said and I rolled my eyes at her.

"If I don't leave here now, I'm going to cause a scene and it is going to be bad." I tried to beat back the anger in my voice.

Sandra understood, so she just asked Amanda to stay back while she walked out with me. On our way out, we bumped into Alex and he tried to stop us but I ignored him and walked straight to the entrance.

I knew my absence during the couple's dance was going to raise questions but I didn't care at that point. We were getting divorced after all, so it was better they knew something was wrong already.

Sandra and I walked to the parking lot where her car was parked. We got into the car and I asked her to drive off quickly before Alex would send somebody to try and stop us.

One thing about Alex was that he didn't like embarrassment and he was certainly going to be embarrassed when the time for the couple's dance came and I wasn't present.

On our way back home, Alex started blowing up my phone with multiple calls and texts but I didn't care to respond. I just switched it off and placed it back in my bag.

When we were getting closer to the house, I asked Sandra to stop for a moment. "Can we go back to your place instead? I don't want to have to deal with him tonight." I pleaded with Sandra.

Sandra nodded and started the car again. "Sure, we can go back to my place." She reversed the car and we drove back to her house instead.

"I can't believe he would lie to me about it," I said as we got inside the house. "The least he could have done was to be honest with me about the whole situation."

"Olivia, you have to calm down," Sandra said, giving me a pat on the back. "Just change your clothes and sleep, we'll deal with this in the morning."

I doubted I was going to be able to get any sleep with the news I had just heard. I certainly was going to be up all night thinking of how I just got hurt and betrayed by Alex.

I nodded my head and Sandra escorted me to the guest room where I always slept whenever I spent the night at her place.

"Alex is calling me," Sandra said as we walked into the room.

Of course, he was going to call her too.

"Ignore him," I instructed and she nodded in agreement.

After Sandra helped me settle into the room, she left me alone and went back to her room. When I was alone, I turned on my phone and the first thing I saw was a text from Alex.

[We agreed to wait until after the party but you embarrassed me in front of my guests.]

I felt a little bit guilty about what I did, but my anger overshadowed the guilt, so I didn't care about it. I turned off my phone again, then I changed out of my dress before going to sleep.