ConVictions

II. Happy Wife...

Emma Holmes hummed to herself as she dusted off the picture of her and her fiancé before placing the silver frame back in its place above the fireplace. Her long honey brown hair was pulled back into a high pony tail as the former model cleaned the house she and her fiancé had just moved into. She played the good future housewife while he was at work cleaning their three story home from top to bottom as a chicken thawed on the kitchen counter that she intended to roast. Being a high ranking Lieutenant at Johnson City Police Department, Richard Clark made more than enough to sustain them in their small town of Johnson City. Emma intended to play her role to the fullest to secure the pampered, cushiony lifestyle he worked eighty-four hours a week to provide. She was way out of his league. She knew, and he knew, and Richard intended to do whatever it would take to keep her.

Emma's green eyes drifted back to the picture of them taken a few weeks after their first encounter and her arrival in Johnson City, Oregon at a neighbor's barbeque. Richard wasn't an ugly man. He was just a few inches above her five-nine frame, with a strong jaw line, golden blond hair, and bright ocean blue eyes that crinkled in the corners as he grinned. Stubble covered his face giving him a rugged handsomeness, a perfectly white straight smile, and built physique. The man had an attractiveness to him bigger than a city with less than six hundred residents, but a small town mentality that made it easy for her to captivate and keep his interests.

She'd planned this since the day she first lay eyes on him as she walked past the local diner. He was by far the most attractive of the men she'd seen since she stepped foot in the town, and in that moment she decided she couldn't have cared less about who the blonde was with her hand on his chest gazing at him like he was her world... He would be hers. She smirked at the memory. That was well over three years ago and she still had him wrapped around her finger like a dog on a leash. As long as she pretended to be the perfect housewife that small-town Richie wanted, she'd never have to work a day in her life. Her phone ringing brought Emma from her thoughts. Checking the caller ID, her sly smirk grew.

"Benji." She greeted shortly, "Where is my money?" She asked, her tone calm and even.

"Emma, listen, I can't do this anymore. I don't have the money to pay that much every month." He sounded tired. Emma expected he would've been. Being in his second term as a Florida State Senator, welcoming child-number-five from wife-number-three.

"That isn't my problem, Senator." Emma drawled as she inspected her fresh French manicure, "Unless you'd like the world to watch our, I mean, your dirty little secret, I suggest you figure something out. Your darling little wife comes from money, doesn't she? I'm sure you cheating her of fifteen grand would be nothing compared to you fucking me in your closet while she slept very peacefully and very pregnant ten feet away. You have forty-eight hours Benji. Otherwise you're going viral." She warned before hanging up on her ex-boyfriend.

Emma rolled her eyes as she walked to the kitchen stopping short as her eye caught a small security box that was supposed to have been separated from the rest of the boxes on the moving truck. Actually, she was almost positive she'd secured it in one of her suitcases.

The black box contained parts of her past that she both couldn't part with, nor could she allow Richard to accidentally stumble across. She picked up the box and entered the pin that opened the box.

Inside lay news stories stapled together, pictures of her and a ruggedly handsome latino man, one picture of herself with a tall gorgeous man with a milk chocolate complexion, and one of herself with another devastatingly beautiful woman who shared her every feature, four huge glittering diamond engagement rings, Driver's licenses for the states of New York, Nevada, and Florida each with a different name, her actual birth documents, and a cd with three capitalized X's written in black sharpie on it. At the sound of their front door opening, Emma shut the box quickly and placed it on the highest shelf of the bookcase to her left in an attempt to feign normalcy. She made a mental note to move it later and turned to see Richard walking in, four hours early. Signs of stress wore heavy on his face, she turned as if he behavior were completely normal and smiled.