PROMISED TO HIM
CHAPTER 21
MAYIBUYE SMITH
I stood in the hallway for a few seconds, frozen.
My heart was still pounding so violently I could hear it echoing in my ears.
What just happened?
Every inch of my body trembled. My pulse was wild. My skin still remembered his touch — that rough, deliberate touch that made my soul stutter. The great Roy Smith had just kissed me like he was starved… like he’d been holding his breath for years and I was his first taste of air.
And then — he stopped.
Just like that.
Like he’d woken up from a dream he wasn’t supposed to have.
The silence after that moment was deafening.
The way he stepped back, his hands still halfway in the air like he didn’t trust himself to touch me again — that hurt more than anything.
I pressed my back against the cold wall, trying to breathe. The air felt heavier in my lungs. The scent of his cologne still lingered on my skin — whiskey, smoke, and something darker, something purely him.
My fingers trembled as they brushed across my lips. They still burned from his kiss, a memory that refused to fade.
But what burned more was the look in his eyes when he pulled away.
Regret. Like I was the sin he was trying to repent from.
I bit my bottom lip, forcing myself not to cry.
Not here. Not in his damn company building, surrounded by walls that carried his name.
When I finally stepped into the elevator, people greeted me with their usual smiles —
“Good afternoon, Mrs. Smith.”
“Ma’am, your car is ready.”
None of them knew what had just happened in that office — how I had been both kissed and rejected within the same breath. How their cold, powerful boss had looked at me like I was both heaven and his personal hell.
As soon as the elevator doors closed, I let out a shaky breath. The tears I’d been holding back spilled anyway, warm and silent.
“Get it together, Mayi,” I whispered, my voice breaking. “You’re a Smith. You don’t break in elevators.”
But the words didn’t hold anymore.
Not when the ache in my chest felt like it was splitting me open.
By the time I reached the parking lot, I’d fixed my face — or tried to. My lipstick was gone, my eyes were red, but at least I could still pretend.
The driver looked at me through the mirror.
“Home, ma’am?”
“Just drive,” I murmured, barely audible. My throat burned from holding everything in.
The drive home felt endless. The city outside blurred into colors I didn’t care to name. My mind replayed every moment — his eyes on me, the tremble in his hands, the way he lost control and looked like he found home in me . And then the way he stopped when I told him the truth.
It’s my first time.
The words echoed inside me like a curse.
Maybe I shouldn’t have said it. Maybe if I’d stayed quiet, he would’ve kept going, wouldn’t have remembered whatever moral code he suddenly decided to have.
But I didn’t regret being honest.
I only regretted the way he looked at me afterward — like I don’t deserve him
By the time the car stopped, I didn’t even wait for the driver. I opened the door, kicked off my heels halfway through the hallway, and headed straight to our bedroom.
The house was too quiet. Too perfect.
Like it didn’t know I was falling apart inside it.
The mirror across the room caught me off guard. My reflection looked… unfamiliar. Hair undone, mascara smudged, eyes swollen. I looked ruined. Not because he touched me — but because he stopped.
I sank down on the edge of the bed, fingers twisting the ring on my hand. The diamond sparkled mockingly under the light. I wanted to rip it off, throw it somewhere he couldn’t find it.
He’d told me once — “This marriage isn’t about love, Mayi. It’s about business.”
And I’d believed him. Until today.
Because the man who kissed me in that office wasn’t thinking about business. He was thinking about me.
Then why did he pull away?
Maybe I was stupid for reading between lines that weren’t even there. Maybe he didn’t stop because he cared — maybe he stopped because he didn’t want to stain his perfect record with a mistake like me.
I wiped my tears angrily. “You’re not woman enough, that’s what he thinks,” I muttered.
“Still the little girl he was forced to marry.”
I stood up and walked to his closet. The smell of him hit me again — dark, masculine, expensive. I grabbed one of his blazers and held it to my chest, breathing him in like it could calm the chaos inside me.
But instead, it broke me even more.
My tears soaked into the fabric as I whispered,
“Why does it hurt this much?”
I threw the blazer on the bed and stumbled into the shower. The water was hot, almost burning, but I needed it. Needed to wash away his touch, his scent, his voice.
I stayed there until the steam filled the room and my tears blended with the water.
When I finally came out, I put on a PJs— pale cream, soft against my skin — and crawled downstairs i was going to watch tv i was not intending to go somewhere that why i wore my PJs. The house was silent again. Too silent.
I turned on my side, staring at the empty space beside me. The sofa he sit in was cold, untouched. I traced my fingers over it, whispering into the dark.
“Why did you stop, Roy?”
The tears came again, heavier this time.
And I didn’t fight them.
Because for the first time, I realized what terrified me most —
It wasn’t that he’d rejected me.
It was that I had fallen for the one man who could destroy me and who dont love me.
And somewhere deep down… I already knew he would.