“At least you’ve accepted it, although I don’t know how long that will last,” Diana responded, unsure of exactly how long the peace would last before he began to ask her again. “Amelia is my step-fathers pride and joy, he’d protect her against my mother and would always put her before that witch. When he once again denied that anything was going on, Diana forcefully rolled her eyes at him. Sometime he made it so difficult, but she always got it out of him. “You can tell me after you’ve checked on Cristian,” she added, before standing up. “I’m going to run myself a bath. I’ll leave the en-suite door open, so you can either talk to me from the bed or sit beside it - but you will tell me.” With those final words, Diana let out a heavy, tired breath. Every step she made felt heavy, her entire week pressing deeply into her mind and exhausting her. She would never admit that perhaps her husband was right, maybe she was taking on too much. But she refused to be weak, not anymore. As she entered the bathroom, she begun to run the tap as she selected her favourite Jo Malone bath oil and poured a generous amount in. Whilst the tub began to fill, she discarded her clothes and placed them in the hamper - something that she wished Rodrigo would do, instead of leaving his clothes around. A relieved sigh escaped her as she sunk into the water, waiting for her husband to tell her whatever the hell he was hiding from her.
Diana's assurance that Amelia would be well taken care of under Joseph’s supervision set Rodrigo's mind at ease. Amelia was a second sister to him and he knew it had pained his wife to leave her when she relocated to the other side of the Atlantic. The feelings would have been the same for him if he had to live far away from his own sister. Rodrigo respected Joseph, however. The man never gave him any reason not to and he actually seemed to genuinely care about his step-daughter. If Diana entrusted him with Amelia's well-being then there was no reason to question it, so he moved off the subject. "Stop rolling your eyes." He scowled, watching her stand up from the bar stool. The scowl only deepened when Diana dictated to him. Without causing another row, Rodrigo moved off in the opposite direction of his wife and into Cristian’s bedroom. Much to his relief, he found his son half hanging off the bed, toothpaste lining his mouth, and fast asleep with a stack of books strewn across the end of the bed. It wasn’t as if Rigo hated reading to his son at night, but lately Cristian always fought for one more story and then another and another. He always gave in and he hoped he wasn’t spoiling his son and turning him into the one thing he and Diana hated. After tucking Cristian in, putting away his book and flicking on the nightlight, Rodrigo entered their bedroom and paused for a moment--- he heard the water cease and then the splashes of Diana getting inside of the tub. The conversation was inevitable. It was like slowly ripping off a band-aid when he knew he should just tear it clean off to get it over with. Even after eight years together, he still had the habit of keeping things to himself and bottling it up until it clawed at him to get out. With slow, easy strides, Rigo walked to the master bath and opened the door cautiously. When he entered the room, he eyed Diana in the tub, staying quiet for a few moments before focusing the conversation on their son. “He’s asleep. I was thinking, should we start looking into enrolling him into a pre-school? He’ll be four next month.”














