Chapter Four
S he felt breathless still the next morning, and all the way through taking the girls to school, and definitely when she walked cautiously into Boone’s house to begin the day’s chores.
There was quite a bit to do because the man wasn’t settled into his house at all. There were boxes to unpack and things to organize and it was nice to lose herself in the satisfaction of a small task, easily completed in a short amount of time. Each little section—kitchen utensils, plates, cups, clothes, toiletries—was its own kind of satisfying.
It was also intimate, though, and she had to stop herself from running her fingers slowly over his T-shirts as she put them away.
Which was perverse behavior and she needed to quit.
She needed to focus on the fact that at least today, right now, there were small things she could make better.
Because Lord knew everything else felt like too big of a mess to even look at right now. So she closed the door on what she’d left behind, and what was up ahead, and she focused on folding Boone Carson’s laundry.
That should demystify him.
He was the sexiest man she’d ever seen, and when he’d looked at her last night across the kitchen island and taken a step toward her, in the space of a breath she’d gone from being in that moment, to imagining what it would be like if he took her in his arms and...
Folding his socks should make that go away.
It was all fine and good to look at a man and think he was a sex god when you weren’t handling his woolen boot socks.
Though here she was, socks in hand, still breathless.
This should be exposure therapy. She and Boone had had no choice but to try and avoid each other through the years. There were moments where she’d felt guilty for sharing a long look with him, because sometimes those looks were so sexually charged, they left her feeling more aroused than actual sex with Daniel.
It was a terrible thing to admit—or at least it had been.
And so she’d done her best to avoid ever acknowledging that sticky truth.
Part of her had wondered, though, if some of his appeal was that he was a fantasy. Daniel had always seemed affable and easy. She’d never thought of her husband as a bad boy—ironic—but Boone had seemed...edgy.
Raw.
There was something about him that called to unhealed places in her. To darkness she’d never felt like she could express with Daniel. He wanted his life to be easy. They had money and security in the grand scheme of things, so he didn’t much want to hear about the way hunger pangs sometimes gave her flashbacks to a childhood of occasionally empty pantries.
How she’d had to mend the holes in her hand-me-down clothes.
How she’d spent her summer days alone in an overheated house because her mom had to work and there was nowhere else for her to go.
How, on those long hot days, she’d gotten good at hiding when the landlord came trying to chase down rent.
Daniel didn’t like to hear about those things. They didn’t matter. They were in the past.
She’d thought—more than once—that Daniel couldn’t handle the idea that there were issues inside her that weren’t solved by being married to him. He wanted to be everything to her. To have fixed everything.
It had never really occurred to her what narcissistic nonsense that was until that very moment, with Boone’s wool socks in her hand.
She thought of Boone. The way he had looked last night. Intense and close. He was always intense. But there was usually something between them. Something other than a countertop. Her marriage. Her dedication to her vows. Her love for her husband. Because for all that she had wanted Boone from the first moment she had laid eyes on him, for all that it had felt significant and real and like something bigger than she was the first time she’d seen him, she had always loved Daniel.
She sat there, feeling the silence of the room pressing on her. Did she love Daniel?
No.
And it wasn’t the infidelity that had done it.
Suddenly, it was like the truth was raining down on her, as if invisible clouds above had opened up and let it all come down.
They had been disconnected for a long time. She loved her life. She had loved their house in Bakersfield, even though it was hot there. Even though there was a big empty field across from them.
She had loved her routine of taking the girls to school. Of bringing them home. Cooking them dinner. She loved the freedom she had, the financial security that had come from his career as a bull rider and the way she had managed it. She had loved that her daughters didn’t have empty pantries and long days at home by themselves. In that sense, she had been the happiest she’d ever been. But she didn’t think she had been the happiest she’d ever been when he was home. It wasn’t that she’d been unhappy when he was around, she just didn’t think he was the main part of that happiness.
When he was away she could do whatever she wanted. She got to binge-watch TV shows and wear ratty pajamas. She had ice cream out of the carton and she took up the middle of the bed.
She was content with her fantasy life when he was away, and she didn’t mind being by herself.
And none of those things were signs in and of themselves that she didn’t love her husband. It was only that she could be a little bit more honest in this moment than she’d been able to in those first couple of days. She wasn’t heartbroken. She had felt deeply wounded by the fact that she had lost her life. That she had lost these things she cared about so deeply. That her life had been compromised and shaken.
That she was thrown back into the space where she didn’t know how she was going to survive. And she had never wanted her daughters to experience that.
She had never wanted them to feel any instability, and she was the most upset about that. And being betrayed. That had been a knife wound straight to her chest. That had been unconscionable. She really and truly hated it. She didn’t like that she had been lying next to a man, making love to a man, telling a man she loved him, while he was able to take those hands, that mouth, that body and make love to another woman.
She would never have cheated on him. Not ever. She would’ve coasted along in this marriage that functioned primarily because...
Even though she had never betrayed him, she was in many ways functioning as a single woman when he was gone. And she had a feeling that was part of why their marriage had worked as well as it had.
He pretended she didn’t exist when he was away, and she sort of did the same to him.
That didn’t make her feel guilty, it just made her recognize that some fundamental things were missing from her marriage. And maybe that was why Boone had loomed so large in her fantasies.
She had done her best—her very best—to never fantasize about Boone.
She was attracted to him. But she didn’t lie in bed when Daniel was away and think about Boone intentionally when she lay there and put her hands on her own body while imagining they were his.
Now sometimes he popped into her head, and she replaced him with Captain America because it was totally fine to fantasize about a man you weren’t married to, but he really should be a man you also didn’t know in real life. At least, that had been her arbitrary set of rules.
Every woman needed an arbitrary set of rules.
She did not need to follow those rules now.
Daniel had rendered them void.
That made her feel hot. She shifted, and she put Boone’s socks down a little bit too quickly. Yes, she could fantasize about Boone now if she wanted to.
She didn’t love her husband.
Suddenly, she felt dizzy. She didn’t know if she was elated or if she was crushed by that realization. But she had been living a life she hadn’t intended to find herself in. Daniel’s betrayal was not the biggest issue with her marriage.
The problem was, they had met and they had fallen in love quickly. And Wendy had always been guarded. But he had gotten through her defenses with his charm. She hadn’t been one for casual sex. She’d been waiting, and not because of any great moral reason, but because she was afraid.
He had gotten past all of that, and when he had asked her to marry him two months into their affair, she’d said yes. She didn’t have anything else. Her mother had passed away the previous year, and she’d just felt so alone. So being with someone... To make a family, she had loved that.
And she had to wonder how much of it had always been loving that. Loving that she had someone. Someone she was attracted to, someone she genuinely liked—most of the time—but perhaps someone she had never actually been head over heels in love with.
She didn’t want him back. She wanted the stability back. She wanted to be comfortable. But...
But if she were being perfectly honest with herself, she was thinking about more than comfort. That moment with Boone in the kitchen last night had been so electrically charged. And the way he had responded to it was... It was unlike anything else she had ever experienced.
Because he had been watching her. And more than that, he had seen her. He had responded to the way she had stiffened up, the way she had resisted.
And it was only because she knew if he had gotten any closer she would’ve kissed him. And more than that, she knew the minute she and Boone touched it was never going to stop at a simple meeting of mouths. Their clothes would be off instantly, and...
That terrified her. Because she was trying to start over, and she was trying to find something new. Because once she had imagined herself in love with a man because she had been at a crossroads in her life, because she had been afraid and insecure. Because she had thought it would be preferable to grab hold of the first man she slept with rather than be by herself.
And she didn’t want to go from one relationship straight into another.
It doesn’t have to be a relationship...
Now she really was being an idiot. She had to stop thinking about that. She had to.
She picked the socks back up and started folding again, and then she heard a sound downstairs. She stood up from the bed, the socks still clutched in her hand, and went down the hall, looking over the rail of the staircase down to the front door below.
Boone was in the doorway. He looked up at her, a cowboy hat placed firmly on his head. And right now, at this point in her life, the sight of a cowboy certainly shouldn’t make her tremble.
“Hi,” she said.
“Hi, yourself.”
“What are you doing here?”
“I decided to come back for lunch today.”
“Oh. Let me... I’ll make something for you.”
“You don’t have to do that.”
“I’m not taking charity from you,” she said.
“I didn’t ask you to.”
“All I’m doing is very slowly folding your laundry,” she said, holding up his socks.
“All right. Well, I hate to interrupt the very serious business of sock folding. But if you really want to make me a sandwich...”
“I really do.”
She went down the stairs, and every step she took closer to him made her heart start to beat just a little harder.
Damn that man.
And damn her for being so...thrilled by it. She felt like a teenager. The kind of teenager she had never been. Because she had never indulged in flirtations, and she had certainly never experienced that wild, reckless feeling she heard people describe when they were in situations where no one was there to stop them from doing something stupid.
She felt it now. There was nothing to stop her from closing the space between them and wrapping her arms around his neck. There was nothing to stop her from touching him.
Nothing. Except for good sense. And the fact that there was no way she could carry on a physical-only affair under the watchful eyes of her far-too-perceptive daughters.
And there was no way she was going to put them through something like that when their lives had just been upended.
So yeah. Nothing stopping her.
It made her want to laugh.
She had behaved for her mother, of course, who had been deeply afraid of her becoming a single mom and struggling the way she had.
And now she had to behave herself for her daughters. Caught in between a mother-daughter relationship always, she supposed.
It can be a secret.
No. They would figure it out. That was just asking for the kind of sitcom hijinks she did not want to be embroiled in anymore. She’d reached her limit. Dirty pictures being texted to her of her husband’s affair, and her busting out his headlights, were either a police procedural or high comedy, depending on how you looked at it, and she wanted no part of either.
“What’s for dinner tonight?” he asked.
“Spaghetti,” she answered.
He grinned, and she felt like he’d touched her.
She looked away and beat a wide path around him to the kitchen.
“I could get used to this,” he said.
“I probably shouldn’t stay more than a month,” she said, reiterating what she’d told him before. On the phone. Before she had agreed to come.
“The cottage is awfully nice, and it’s there for you as long as you want. Don’t feel the need to move on quickly.”
“I don’t think I can stay for too long. I don’t want to get...dependent.”
“Is that really why?”
“That is the only reason we should discuss.”
He nodded slowly. And she could see he was holding back. It was a strange thing to say. Because Boone was strong, and he was fearless. Because she’d watched him ride in the rodeo before, and he wasn’t a man who ever hesitated. But there he was, holding back. And she knew it wasn’t because of him. It was because of her.
Because he cared about how what he might say affected her.
And that touched her deeper than just about anything. Because she’d been married to a man who hadn’t given a second thought to how his actions would affect her.
To what she felt, to what she cared about.
Boone cared.
“There’s not a should anymore,” she said.
Except there were. So many. And they both knew it.
“What’s that code for?”
“Say what you’re thinking.”
“Be very sure,” he said.
“I’m sure.”
“You don’t want to stay because you’re afraid of what will happen between us.”
She felt like a layer of her skin had been peeled away, but she nodded slowly. “Maybe.”
“I don’t think there’s any maybe about it. It’s been two days, Wendy. Two days and I swear to God if I come too close to you...”
“I know.” She was suddenly desperate for him to stop talking. And she realized now why he held back.
“I won’t, though, is the thing. I need you to know that. I recognize that what he did to you is going to have you messed up for a while. I don’t want to be part of that. I don’t want to be part of this... Hurting you. I don’t especially want to have anything to do with him. You understand that?”
“Yes,” she said.
“I would never do anything to take advantage of you right now. Or ever.”
His words were raw. And the most real thing she had heard in so long. After so much bullshit.
“I appreciate that.”
It was such a weak statement. And it didn’t tell the whole truth. Or even part of it. Appreciate wasn’t the right word for him. It never could be. It was much, much too insipid.
She felt torn apart looking at him. And mostly, it was regret. Regret that she couldn’t afford to feel. Because she had the life she had. And the truth was, without Daniel in it, it was so good. She had Sadie, and Mikey, and they were wonderful. She would figure out what to do, and it wouldn’t always be a struggle. She had confidence in herself now, confidence she didn’t have when she’d been younger, and it hadn’t been given to her by Daniel, so it couldn’t be taken away by him.
She couldn’t regret those things. And yet, she looked back on that moment when she had first seen Boone, and she felt...pain. This deep wish that she could go back in time with two doors in front of her. Two men. That she could walk toward one and not the other. If only those moments had joined up. If only they had been side-by-side.
If only Daniel hadn’t been first.
But then she might not have confidence because of him, but she had made the steps she’d made in life in part because of her relationship with him, and she could never take him away and expect that she could have been the same person she was now.
So regret was pointless. But appreciation wasn’t the right word either.
Because Boone made her feel bruised. And swollen with need. All kinds of it. And she felt...tired. And where before that exhaustion had made her want to let Boone carry her bags, carry her burdens, now it made her want to let her guard down. Because it just took so much strength to be near him and not get nearer. She hadn’t realized how much strength it had taken all these years, but they were closer now. Closer than they’d ever allowed themselves to be, and that created a situation, or rather it exposed one she hadn’t fully realized she’d been in.
She went to the fridge, and she got some mayonnaise. Some lunch meat. Then she got bread and tomatoes. And she began the very mundane work of making the man a sandwich. This was on the heels of having done the very mundane work of his laundry. She had none of the excitement with him. None of the electricity. And all of the chores.
And that should demystify him. It should make this feel as bland and dry as appreciation. As thanks for helping her out, and nothing more.
She got a knife out of the drawer and she began to spread mayonnaise on a piece of wheat bread. Truly, what could be more boring?
“I like a little mustard on that.”
“Oh,” she said.
She turned back to the fridge and opened it again, hunting around for the mustard.
“You said you wanted to make me a sandwich.”
“I do.”
“But you don’t want me to tell you how I want a sandwich?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“But you’re annoyed.”
“I’m not annoyed.”
Maybe she was. Maybe she had kind of wanted to intuitively guess exactly what he wanted on his sandwich. She blinked. That was a very odd thing to want. A strange thing to worry about.
“Listen,” he said. “At the end of the day, I would probably like it however you wanted to make it. But if you want a little instruction...”
“Who says that I like to take instruction?”
“I’m sure you don’t.”
And here they were, standing in the man’s kitchen in the middle of the day. The sunlight streaming in through the window. There was no sexy mysterious lighting. A broad shaft of light was going across his face. But it only made him look more handsome. He was the sort of man who could withstand being on a big screen with high-def. She was sure of it.
He didn’t have a flaw in his features. He was perfect in every way.
And so even the broad light of day couldn’t diminish it.
“Tell me, then. Tell me how you like it.”
His smile shifted, turned wicked. And they might not be in a bedroom, but his eyes held the suggestion of it.
She took the mustard out of the fridge.
“Just make sure you’ve got a firm grip,” he said.
“For God’s sake, Boone.”
“What? You wouldn’t want to drop a bottle of mustard.”
“I guess not.”
“Give it a good squeeze.”
“Boone,” she said, not sure whether she wanted to laugh, or get irritated, or... If she was a little bit turned on. That was ridiculous.
“Just trying to help with best kitchen practices. You can lay it on a little thick.”
She rolled her eyes because she decided faux irritation was better than melting into a puddle over this kind of thing.
She turned the bottle over and squeezed a generous helping onto the sandwich.
“Just like that, Wendy.”
His voice was like silk, and the sensation it sent along her nerves was glorious.
“I don’t need encouragement to make the sandwich.”
“All right.”
She got the tomato and sliced it, then laid it on along with some turkey. And then she handed him the sandwich with no ceremony. But when he took it from her, their fingertips brushed, and her breath was sucked straight from her lungs.
He looked at her. And he really looked. Saw her. Looked into her. He took a slow bite of the sandwich, and there was something about the way he did it, purposeful, and intense, that made the space between her thighs throb.
She shook her head and turned away from him.
“It’s a good sandwich,” he said.
“You’re welcome,” she said.
Doing housework for the man felt like sex. And that seemed unfair. Because it should defuse things. Everything. This reminder that he was normal. That he was a human. That he could never live up to whatever fantasy her body was convinced he would give. Because how could he? No man could. No man could live up to the ridiculous thing she had built up in her mind.
Or rather, tried not to build up.
“So you only want to stay here a month,” he said.
“Yes. That was my thought.”
“And what do you want to do after that?”
“I don’t know.”
He set his sandwich down on a paper towel on the counter. And then he grabbed hold of the loaf of bread and took two pieces out. “Do you like mustard, Wendy?”
“No,” she said.
“Mayonnaise?”
“Yes.”
“Okay.”
And then, slowly and methodically, he began to make a sandwich. This one without mustard. And she could only stare at him because she didn’t know why it made her want to cry. Because this was such a small thing. Because she was supposed to be working for him, and he was doing things for her, and she had made him a sandwich, and they could’ve easily made their own, but he was making one for her.
And it just seemed exceptional. Maybe it shouldn’t. Maybe that was the biggest commentary on her marriage to Daniel so far.
That she wanted to weep as she watched strong, scarred masculine hands put turkey between two slices of bread.
He handed it to her, and she did her best to swallow the lump in her throat.
“Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.”
She took a bite of the sandwich. “I don’t know what I’m going to do,” she said finally.
“But not this.”
“No,” she said. “Not this. My mother cleaned houses. It’s a good job. It’s a great job. I don’t look down on anyone for any kind of work that they do.”
“But you’ve been looked down on.”
She nodded slowly. She felt exposed, and he could see that. Quite so easily.
“Yes. I have been. I grew up in a community where being the daughter of a cleaner made me a certain thing to other people. Mostly, the worst part about my mom’s job was that sometimes the people she worked for tried not to pay her. And that would create gaps between paychecks. And she was never quite in a space where she could just walk away from that work, not while they were dangling money owed over her head. There was no protection. No rights. No power. It’s the kind of thing you never forget. And I never wanted to be in that position. I never want my girls to be in that position. And here I am. We don’t have a prenup or anything, and I know he’s going to have to pay child support of some kind, but the truth is I earned so much of his money for him. Right now, I don’t want it. I want to wash my hands of him and walk away. But I know that in the long run that isn’t the best decision. I know it isn’t going to serve me. It isn’t going to serve my daughters, so it isn’t the way I can treat this situation. But I want... I want to find myself. I want to be myself. Whatever that means.”
“I know who you are,” he said. “You’re the woman that showed up with the baseball bat and smashed the hell out of that asshole’s truck. Even though you could’ve gotten in trouble for it. Even though it destroyed a perfectly good vehicle. You’ve got a lot of passion. And you’re right, you have a lot of what you have because of that passion. Because you got him all those deals, because you were so good at building him up. And what did he do with that? Tried to tear you down. If you need anger to motivate you, to kind of guide your way...why not use it?”
“Well, the problem is, I’m not all that angry right now. I’d like to be. But anger just implies a level of passion I’m not sure is there. I felt scorned. I felt tricked. And that made me mad. I felt disrupted. That made me mad. I’m not heartbroken, though.”
Something in his eyes sharpened. “Really?”
“Really.”
This was dangerous. She had tried to steer them back into something mundane. Tried to think about socks and turkey sandwiches, but he had gone and changed everything when he had made the sandwich for her.
Her husband had found it a turnoff for her to talk about her past. And yet here he was, listening to her, and he didn’t seem turned off.
“No. Because I think that I love the life I had as a result of my marriage a lot more than I love my marriage. Or maybe seeing a picture of him quite literally sticking it in another woman did it for me. That could also be it.”
“I’m sorry. It was a terrible thing.”
“It was. But you know the truth... There have been very few moments in my marriage when I haven’t wanted another man. You know that.”
She was being so dangerous right now. So very dangerous. “And I might not have acted on it... But the truth remains... I was with Daniel and the whole time I wanted someone else.”
“Yeah,” he said, his voice suddenly gruff and strangled.
“I was poor,” she said. “And I’ve been shaped by that. The way you saw me react to my divorce, it was all the anger that had built up inside me all those years. All that hunger. Because I know what it’s like to have an empty pantry and I never wanted that for my girls. Because I didn’t have a father growing up and I didn’t want that for them either. So I clung to the shape of my life because it was the shape I wanted, even if the content was never quite what I had fantasized about it being. It didn’t matter. I found a man, and I thought that was going to keep me safe, so I clung to it. And even though I know better, I’ve seen better—in all these years I’ve learned I don’t need him to keep me safe, I don’t need him to make me money—I was afraid that by walking away from the marriage I was walking away from security. And so, when he ripped it out from under me, I was furious. Because I felt like he was taking from me the one thing I cared about the most. My security. That was why I was so angry.”
“As you should be,” he said.
“Does it bother you? To think of me that way.”
“In what way?”
“Does it bother you to know that the woman you met, the woman who was dressed nicely, who looks like she’s never known a struggle, isn’t real?”
“Why the hell would that bother me? You’re strong. And I like that about you. I always have. Did you really think I was responding to a certain brand of cowgirl boots? Did you think I was responding to the rhinestones on your jeans? I don’t give a shit about that. It’s your backbone. There are a lot of beautiful women, Wendy, but I haven’t spent fifteen years fantasizing about what it would be like to get them naked. It isn’t just how pretty your eyes are, or the shape of your mouth, though I think it’s beautiful. It isn’t just the way your tits look in what I assume is a pretty expensive bra. Though I like that too. It’s not your ass. Though again, I like it.”
His words were the single most erotic thing she’d ever heard in her life, and maybe that made her simple, but she didn’t care. She just did not care.
“It was always the spark in your eyes. It was always that little bit of wicked in your smile. The way your ass moves because of the way you walk, which has nothing to do with the shoes or how expensive they are, but with the way you carry yourself. You’re strong. And he never gave you any of that. And he does not have the right to take any of it away. No. Finding out that you were broke when you were young doesn’t turn me off. It just explains what I saw in you already.”
“He didn’t like to hear about it,” she whispered.
“He’s a weak man,” he said, restating it.
“And you’re not.”
“I’m just a man,” he said. “I’m a man who wouldn’t dream of turning away from my responsibilities, not on the level he has. But also, I don’t take on shit I can’t hang on to. I don’t try to carry something I can’t hold.”
That felt like a warning more than a promise. And she should be grateful. Because she knew it was foolish to go straight from a marriage into another relationship. Hell, it was foolish to go straight from a marriage into Boone’s arms, but suddenly it seemed like maybe it was a stupid thing not to do.
“Fifteen years,” she said. “That’s how long it’s been since I walked into that bar and saw you,” she said. “That’s how long it’s been since I...since I looked down at my wedding ring and wanted to take it off. I didn’t want to do that all the time. Not for the whole fifteen years. But pretty much every time I was with you. I wanted to break my vows for the chance to know what it was like to have your hands on my skin, Boone Carson. Do you know what kind of insanity that is?”
He moved closer to her, his blue eyes blazing. And there was no counter between them.
“Yes. Because it’s the same kind of insanity I felt since the moment I saw you. Forget friendship and all of that. Because I just wanted you.”
“I had kids with him,” she said.
“I know,” he growled. “Do you have any idea how much I hated that? Knowing... Knowing just how tied to him you were. Your girls are great, don’t mistake me. And I’m not saying that I should’ve been a husband or father or anything like that. But I am saying... Damn, honey, I wasn’t gonna go here. I wasn’t gonna touch you.”
“You still haven’t.”
“I’m going to, though, you know that.”
“It was inevitable. From the beginning.”
“Maybe I should thank him. For being the one to blow it up. Because we don’t have to.”
She shook her head. “We wouldn’t have.”
“Are you sure? Because I’m not. You’ve been here two days. And here we are. Being just a little too honest.”
“You made me a sandwich.”
“So?”
“Yeah, I asked myself that same question. Why should that matter so much? Why is it so damned impactful that a man is showing me basic concern? Because it’s what I’ve been without. Because I had a marriage, but just the framework of one. We were business partners, and sometimes I think we liked each other. We had sex, and it was fine. I gave myself to him when I was nineteen, and that was just that. I thought I had to stick with it. Because I didn’t want to be pregnant and alone. Because I didn’t want to have the life I grew up with anymore, and I didn’t want that for my kids. I sure as hell wasn’t gonna blow it up just because I wanted to tear some other guy’s clothes off.”
“I want you,” he said. “I want you, and I understand that you don’t want me.”
She was immobilized by that. “What does that mean?”
“You’re attracted to me, but you don’t want it. You don’t want me to take your clothes off. You don’t want me to kiss your lips. You don’t want me to taste every inch of you. And you sure as hell don’t want me inside you.”
She couldn’t breathe. His words were tracing erotic shapes through her mind’s eye, things she was never going to be able to unseat. To un-imagine.
“I don’t understand...”
“Because if you did, you’d be across this room already. Because you know what’s holding me back. It’s you. I cannot be part of hurting you. And I cannot be part of taking advantage of you, and I sure as hell can’t have you thinking you owe me. And it doesn’t matter that I know you’re attracted to me. I know something is stopping that from becoming want, because if it was want , then the want is on both sides. And it would be enough to push us together.”
“I have the girls. And I just think that if...”
And she knew that it was a lie. The moment those words passed her lips. Even thinking about whether or not it was smart and all of that, it was just excuses. She didn’t want to get hurt. She didn’t want to get burned by the intensity of the thing between them. She had discounted common sense once for a man, and ended up married to someone who had never been faithful to her. So this was all about fear. It was one thing to want Boone when she couldn’t have him. It was quite another to have him and contend with what that might mean.
With where he might fit into her life, or with where she would want him to fit into her life even if he didn’t.
But she knew one thing.
That she had fifteen years’ worth of complicated regrets. Like trying to pick broken glass out of a piece of cake. And she just didn’t want any more of that. There had been good things about her marriage. Even though she was hurt by it now. Even though it wasn’t going to last forever. Even though it was over.
She had her girls. She had some work experience. She would find a way to use the things that her marriage had given her. Even as she moved forward without her husband.
But she didn’t want Boone to be a regret. Not anymore. He’d been one, deeply, for fifteen years. And that was what she didn’t want. More than anything. More than she wanted to be protected. More than she wanted Boone to be a safe space. And yes, when she had first shown up at the house, she had maybe wanted safety more than she wanted him. For a minute.
Because it was wonderful to have him remove the burden. Wonderful to have him give her a place to stay. Wonderful to have him carry her bags.
But she would leave. She would leave in four weeks, just like she’d said, and she would start fresh on her own. But she would know. She would know what she’d been missing all this time, and he would be resolved. She deserved that. She needed it.
“I do want you,” she whispered.
She took a step toward him, her heart pounding. Nothing was stopping her. And she was giddy with that. Giddy with a sense of freedom and wildness.
And it was like years had been lifted off her shoulders. Not just the years of marriage, but the years that had come before it. The years of feeling like she had to be good. Better. To avoid ever stepping into the trap of poverty again. To avoid food insecurity and homelessness and all the things she had grown up so terrified of. The things that had shaped her. And yes, they had made her strong, but sometimes she was just so tired of being that kind of strong. She didn’t want to do it anymore. And he made her feel, in that moment, like she could just be. Like there was nothing but now. Because there were three hours until she had to go get the girls from school. Because her wedding rings were gone, and her vows meant nothing. Because he didn’t look at her and see somebody who deserved to be treated like less because she had been through something difficult.
Because he had listened.
And all those things combined to make her feel free.
And she knew what she wanted to do with that freedom.
Nothing was holding her back.
And for the first time, she reached out and she touched Boone Carson.