Show Me You Remember (Oak Point #2)

Chapter 1

TILLY

I’ve always known that I was kind of crazy.

I grew up surrounded by cowboys and a twin brother who treated me the same way he would have if I were a boy.

If I weren’t a little twisted up in the head, I would have spent my entire childhood locked away in my room crying instead of bucking up and making him and his friends follow me instead.

Replacing pain with anger became second nature, and I’ve carried that with me into my thirties.

Moving out here to Mahone Bay, Nova Scotia, came as a shock to everyone in my life. Hell, it surprised me too. The woman I was back home in Oak Point, Alberta, is nothing like the one I became here. I guess I have my husband to thank—blame—for that.

He seems to be behind every negative thing in my current life.

That’s the easiest way to explain why I’m currently slamming my front door shut in the face of the woman who just took a giant metaphorical shit all over me and reaching for the lamp on the console table.

Ethan, said husband, hops out of his hiding spot in the dining room at the sound of the door closing and opens his slimy mouth to speak.

I dig my fingers into the smooth base of the table lamp and lift it so fast the cord rips out of the wall before he can get a word out. With my vision tinted red, I whip the whole goddamn thing at him, watching with bated breath as he rushes backward to try and avoid getting hit.

“You fucking bastard!” I shout, chasing the lamp when it explodes on the floor a few inches shy of his kneecap.

“Tilly—let’s talk about this. She’s lying!”

The shattered pieces of teal porcelain look sharp enough to cause some damage, but do I really want to stab him? Gritting my teeth, I launch my fist at him instead. He trips on his feet, stumbling back against the wall with a terrified curse.

“I knew it, you son of a bitch,” I attack, readying my sore fist to hit him again. “A kid? Really? You couldn’t have even wrapped it up while you had an affair?”

The bar is in Hell.

Ethan winces, hands rising to shield his face as I bare my teeth and lift my knee. It sails up into his groin so hard I wouldn’t be surprised if the baby in the woman’s arms on our porch was the only one he could ever have.

“We don’t know it’s actually mine,” he argues, choking on pained groans.

“Oh, I know it is. I’ve seen more than enough of your ugly baby photos to recognize that kid out there.”

He squeezes his eyes shut, making more of those annoying noises as he clutches his dick. Inhaling deeply, I back away from him and uncurl my fingers. The burning sensation in my palm has me looking at it to find small crescent-shaped indents from my nails.

“You’re my wife,” Ethan says with a wince, as if I need the reminder.

I laugh and shake my head while leaving the room. “Not for much longer.”

There’s a beat of silence before— “What does that mean?”

“It means we’re getting a divorce.”

“You don’t get to decide that on your own, Tilly! Just wait up. Christ, wait a second.”

I speed up, turning down the hall and into our bedroom. His hurried steps are uneven on the hardwood as he follows me. Maybe he’ll trip and send himself face first into the wall on the way. What a treat that would be.

God, I wish I wasn’t upset by this. The ache in my chest is a poison that I can’t afford to feel right now.

Six years of marriage and seven of a real, serious relationship down the drain so quickly.

One minute, I’m brewing his coffee for him with the machine that took me two months to understand, and the next, I’m answering the doorbell to see his old assistant holding a baby in her arms.

A baby that looks just like him. One that I didn’t bring into the world. I didn’t need to hear her tell me that it was his before I already came to that conclusion. All hearing it did was upset me even further.

“Tilly, baby, I haven’t even seen her in months,” he says, desperation making his voice shake.

“Since you fired her? Let me guess, you did that when you realized she was pregnant.”

“No.”

“You’re a terrible liar, Ethan,” I snap.

The giant black suitcase in the closet is the one I grab. I toss it onto the bed I made earlier and unzip it. It’s empty from when I unpacked it after our trip to Florence three months ago. God, do I do everything around here? The realization is swift and cruel.

A hand falls into the left side of the suitcase, and the silver ring on the fourth finger stokes the anger simmering inside of me. Without thinking twice, I lift the other side of the suitcase and bring it down on his wrist.

His loud curse is music to my ears as I turn from the bed and start grabbing clothes out of the closet. The warmth from his body hits my back a beat before he grips my arm tight enough to hurt.

“You’re not seriously going to leave, are you? What happened to for better or worse?”

“I don’t think staying with you after you’ve knocked up your assistant is included anywhere in the fine print.”

Shoving past him, I stare at the open suitcase. I drop my armful of clothes inside of it and stalk into the bathroom. My toiletry bags are under the sink, so I snatch those first and start filling them up.

“Well, it should be. I didn’t do it on purpose. I cut things off with her already, Tilly. I chose you,” he rambles.

“You smell like bullshit, Ethan. Back off, or I’ll teach you what we do with guys like you back home.”

“I’m not afraid of that. Your mother will be devastated if you leave me.”

False. “I’m sorry to tell you, but she’s always hated you. If it were up to my parents, I’d have never made it down the aisle to you.”

“What? Don’t lie to me. We’re above that.”

I have to close my eyes before they pop out of their sockets. “My dad rented me a car in his name on our wedding day so I had the option of running if I wanted to.”

“Is that why they haven’t been up here since then?” he asks, anger spiking in his voice.

“Probably.”

Honestly, it has more to do with the cost of flying all the way across the country than anything else, but I’m not going to tell him that. He’s not entirely wrong, anyway. They’d have hated staying around him for longer than a couple of days.

“So, what, then? You’re going to fly home now? Run back to that place like it wasn’t the other way around when we met?”

“I’m not running anywhere.”

“Why are you packing, then?”

“I’m not running. I’m leaving,” I correct him.

“Where? You can’t just disappear, Tilly. We’re married.”

Closing my bags, I carry them out of the bathroom and to the suitcase. They fall on top of the clothes before I shut the entire thing. My fingers are slick with sweat when I pinch the zipper.

“For now. We’re married for now.”

He reaches for me again, this time grabbing my hand and trying to pry it away from the suitcase. “I didn’t choose her. I chose you.”

“Are you fucking kidding me right now? Are you actually that stupid?” Tugging my hand free, I lean in close to him. Fuck, I want to slap him. “Stop touching me unless you want me to break your dick this time.”

His expression crumples slightly, backing away an inch. “You can’t hurt me just to avoid talking about this.”

“I can, actually. And I will if you don’t back off.”

With a rough exhale, I pull the suitcase onto the ground and drag it behind me out of the room.

I don’t know when I’ll be back for the rest of my things, but right now, that doesn’t matter.

What does is finding a hotel to stay in while looking for the best divorce lawyer in the province.

Then, I can try to get myself back together.

The last thing I need is to lose my head already.

The broken lamp pieces crunch under the suitcase wheels as I roll it over to the front door. My car keys are still in the lemon-shaped bowl on the console table, so I grab them with a slick hand. The glimmer of the diamond on my finger catches in the light from the window.

There’s no hesitation in me when I yank the ring off and let it ping into the bowl.

My slippers are still on my feet when I open the door and carry my suitcase onto the front stoop. The old, worn pair of cowboy boots on the inside mat are dirty from work yesterday, but I take them with me anyway.

The red coupe parked in front of the house has me moving faster, desperate to get away from here before I actually wind up doing something that will have me needing Ethan to bail me out. My suitcase clunks down the wet cement steps as I drag it behind me.

“Don’t do this, Tilly. Not without us having a real adult conversation about what to do next,” Ethan calls, still following.

“You’re not understanding that there’s no conversation to be had here. We’re done. That’s it. I don’t give cheaters second chances. Never have, and never will. It doesn’t matter if we’re married. Actually, yes, it does. It makes what you’ve done that much worse.”

“It was one mistake. Was I not allowed to make any?”

There isn’t an appropriate answer to that. Not that I can think of, at least.

“I’ll have my lawyer reach out to you. I suggest you find one too,” I say, my words clipped and to the point.

I pop open my SUV’s tailgate and haul my suitcase into the back before tossing my boots in beside it. Pulling the door back down, I glance behind me to the ugly-ass car still parked along the curb. The sound of footsteps on the wet snow turns my muscles to lead.

“You could have hit my baby in the head when you shut the door on us!”

I freeze at the driver’s side of my vehicle. Inhale, exhale. I’m not necessarily a violent person despite being slightly aggressive. Not anymore. What happened with Ethan hasn’t happened in a long time. I don’t need to beat this woman’s ass. Nope. Especially not in front of a baby.

I’m not teenage Tilly chasing the high of earning a smile of approval from her brother’s best friend anymore.

Without looking at my husband’s baby mama, I pull open my door and get inside the SUV. Then, I turn it on and crank the heat despite the flames beneath my skin. She’s still standing behind the vehicle, the baby nowhere to be seen when I look into the rearview mirror.

The last thing I see before peeling away from the house is Ethan joining her, keeping the smallest distance between them. As if that would have ever been enough. Just the sight of them together is cruel enough.

Going home to Oak Point isn’t ideal by any means, but anywhere is better than here. Even if that means facing those that I’ve hidden from for the last ten years.