Love Is Patient || Book Two

Chapter Nine

The next ten minutes seemed to be a blur for Marinette; Cole and Adrien were staring at one another silently while she sat on the couch with her hands covering her face. She wanted to cry... to scream out all the pent up emotions, but here she sat, hiding from two important people; her husband and new lover. It all seemed scripted to Marinette, like she was on some trashy sitcom where the audience at home were yelling at their TV screens when the cast came into contact with drama. The only difference was, there weren't any cameras and she didn't have to memorize a script which seemed to be what she needed as she sat by herself silently.

The front door opened suddenly to reveal Alya and a few others. Marinette looked up from her hands and blinked a few times.

"Alya...? What are you doing here?" Marinette croaked our, her throat starting the throb. Alya's gaze shifted from Marinette to the figure standing by the door. Adrien.

"Well well well, looks like we made it back just in time huh, Eileen?"

Eileen and Nino stepped inside and while Nino's eyes grew wide at the sight of his best friend, Eileen turned her gaze away as her face turned red.

"Welcome back." Eileen mumbled quietly.

Alya then noticed Cole standing on the other side of the room. "What's he doing here?" She said through gritted teeth. If there weren't children with them, Alya would've had Eileen pinned to the floor, yelling at her for all she had done. Now that she thought about it, all Alya had to do was drag her away from the house but in that moment, there were questions still unanswered.

"He came over to... talk." Marinette glanced at Cole before sighing.

"Just talk?" Cole raised a brow and walked over to the girl, Adrien keeping both eyes on the other intently.

"What about that ki—" Marinette quickly clamped a hand over his mouth and shook her head, telling him silently that it wasn't the time nor place to tell everyone, including her husband, that they had shared a kiss.

"Look, the only reason I dragged her here," Alya pointed towards Eileen. "Was because she has been keeping something... big, from all of us."

Marinette turned to Eileen with a raised brow. "Eileen... is that true?" Eileen nodded silently, keeping her eyes on the floor.

"Marinette, I'm sorry for not calling you or sending a letter, or even trying to contact you. But you have to believe me when I say that I had nothing to do with my... death. It was all planned!" Adrien was the one who spoke up, both brows furrowed in frustration. He hadn't expected Marinette to be with some other guy when he returned but to be fair, she had no idea he was even coming back. In her mind, Adrien was buried six feet under with a heart wrenching note from her placed in his shirt pocket so he couldn't really blame her for moving on. Still, it hurt when he noticed her flushed cheeks after opening the door and with the way this Cole guy acted when Marinette insisted they had only talked, Adrien had a feeling the two were closer than just friends. He knew what was at stake if Marinette chose to turn her back on him and end things right then and there, he knew he had fucked up and that there was a slim chance of coming back from all of this and Adrien was worried that it would all come crashing down right in front of his eyes.

Marinette blinked a few times as Adrien pleaded with her. She looked at Alya who was just as shocked as she was. "Adrien, I—"

"How do you expect her to forgive you after all she's been through?" Cole narrowed his eyes at the other blonde as he stepped closer. "If I were Marinette, I'd divorce your ass and take every penny you have!"

"Marinette isn't like that." Adrien tried to reason, keeping his voice calm when his head was screaming. Who the hell did this guy think he was? Coming into his home, stealing his wife, then speaking for her! It took all the self control Adrien had not to punch him directly in the mouth.