4. Margot
CHAPTER 4
Margot
S tomach churning with nerves, I step into the diner. It’s relatively lean tonight, but I offer a wave at Mrs. McGinley, the town’s librarian, who sits in the corner with a group of her friends. All of the women glance over at me and offer smiles, but I can see the curiosity on their faces, and know it’s because word got out that Chad is in town.
I received more than a few phone calls about the sightings, with people asking me if I was okay or if I needed anything.
Honestly, that’s one of the things that angered me most. I became a victim in the eyes of every single person in this town. I was the poor, unsuspecting wife who waited at home for her cheating husband.
And I hate that they see me that way, even if it is the truth.
My gaze travels around the diner as I look for Chad, but instead, my attention focuses on the handsome, dark-haired man with salt-and-pepper strands at his temples, sitting in a back booth, his nose buried in a book.
Just the mere sight of Jaxson eases some of my nerves, so instead of taking a seat at an empty booth to wait for Chad, I walk over to Jaxson and slide in across from him.
He sets the book down and offers me a smile. “Fancy seeing you here.” His expression turns a bit more serious. “You okay?”
“Yeah, why?” I set my purse down.
“You look upset.”
“Stop reading me, Detective,” I reply with a half smile.
He chuckles. “Can’t turn it off, it’s my superpower.”
“Fair enough. I’m just nervous. Chad is on his way here, and I have a feeling he’s going to try to fight me for custody. I thought I was done with him, but apparently I’m not.” I flash a smile. “And now I’m rambling.”
“I like when you ramble,” he replies, his deep voice making the butterflies in my stomach go feral.
How can one man have that much power with just the mere sound of his voice? “Tell me something good. Anything good that happened today.”
“Mrs. O’Connell, can I get you anything?” Lanetti steps up to the table, her notepad out. I don’t understand why she seems to have taken such a dislike to me recently, especially since she used to babysit Matty whenever Chad and I would go out on date nights. But lately, ever since she started working here, she treats me like a complete stranger .
And no matter how many times I try to correct her, she insists on continuing to refer to me as Mrs. O’Connell.
“Hey, Nettie, no I’m good right now. Just sitting for a minute. Thanks.”
She smiles and turns her full attention to Jaxson. “Hey, Jax, refill on coffee?” Her bright smile answers the question I’d quite literally just asked myself and solves the mystery as to why she doesn’t care for me. I bite back my knowing smile.
She’s jealous. Of me. Which, of course, is absolutely crazy.
“No, thanks. I’m good,” he replies.
“Let me know if you need anything.” She turns and saunters away from the table.
I steal one of Jaxson’s fries from his plate. “Someone has a crush on you.”
“I don’t even know how to stop it,” he replies. The man looks genuinely distressed which, of course, only amuses me further.
“It’ll pass. Just give it time. You’re the cute new guy in town, and she’s a single girl in her mid-twenties who is looking for her white knight.”
“You think I’m cute?” He grins at me, so I roll my eyes.
“Of course that would be what you zero in on.” I steal another fry. “Anyway, good things. Tell them to me.”
“We went out to investigate a missing girl, and I found her passed out in bushes.”
“Drunk? ”
“No. Hypoglycemic. She’d headed out for a run in the morning, then passed out.”
“Oh, man. Is she okay?”
“Going to be just fine.”
“That is good news.” I steal another fry, so Jaxson pushes his plate into the center of the table.
“I thought so. How was your day? Other than Chad showing up.”
“Not too bad. The B&B is booked solid for the next three weeks, so that’s good for business.”
“Maybe you’ll be able to hire some additional help,” he replies. “I know you’re tired.”
“Maybe,” I reply, not mentioning the fact that the money will barely be enough to cover some of the bills piling up.
“That’s great.” He looks genuinely happy for me, and seeing his interest makes my stomach twist into knots. Why couldn’t Chad have been like this? Supportive, interested, faithful. Why did my marriage have to go down in flames and leave me terrified of risking another burn?
“It will be. Thanks again for grabbing that paint, by the way.”
“No problem. I plan to search for the areas you need touched up when I get back. Unless, of course, you marked them for me before you left.”
I eye him with fake annoyance. “You are not doing the labor.”
“I like to paint.”
“No one likes to paint that much. ”
“I do,” he replies. “And this is me asking if you want my help.”
Knowing that I really could use the hand, I take another fry. “Then I guess this is me accepting said help.” I smile at him, and our gazes hold. I’m captivated by his hazel eyes, and my breath catches. Oh, God, why does he have to be so beautiful?
A bell dings in the distance. “Your husband is here,” Lanetti says as she stops by the table.
I blink quickly, trying to clear the desire I feel for the former detective from my system. “Ex-husband,” I correct. “Thanks, Netti.”
“Uh-huh.” She beams at Jaxson again, then walks away.
I glance back at Chad, who has clearly not noticed me as he slides into a booth a few down from ours, his back to us.
“You going to be okay?” Jaxson asks.
“Fine. If I yell strawberry , that’s my ‘I need help’ word. Come rescue me.”
He laughs. “Done. You got this. If you want me to stay until he leaves?—”
“Actually. I do. If you don’t mind. Chad is?—”
“You don’t need to explain,” he interrupts. “I’m here for you.” As he picks his book back up, I swallow hard and stand, then make my way over to the booth where Chad is sitting.
“Hey, sorry, were you sitting somewhere else?” he asks, glancing around the diner .
“Just visiting a friend.” I move into the seat across from him, and fully focus on my ex-husband. “What did you want to talk about?”
“Mr. and Mrs. O’Connell, so good to see you. What can I get you guys?” Lanetti is far more cheerful now that I’m not sitting with Jaxson, and I can’t help but be annoyed.
“It’s Ms. Anderson now,” I finally correct her. It’s one thing to refer to me by that name when I’m alone, but something else entirely when I’m sitting across from Chad. “And I’ll take a burger and fries, please. To go.”
“A grilled chicken salad for me. Watching my weight,” Chad jokes.
Lanetti laughs. “You have nothing to watch, Mr. O’Connell. Still look like you’re in high school.” She winks and leaves the table.
“I always did like her.”
“I’m sure you did.” Once again, the alcohol stench is so pungent it makes my stomach churn. He’s drunk. Again. Of course he is.
He crosses his arms. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
She’s pretty and young. Just your type. “Nothing. Can we just get to what this is about, please? I have people staying at the B&B, and I need to get back.”
Chad rolls his eyes. “You always have to have control, don’t you?”
“Excuse me?”
“I come to you asking if we can talk, and you’re trying to control the way I do it. It’s so typical.”
My throat burns as I try to bite back my embarrassment, noting a few people looking at us. “I’m not trying to control anything. I just don’t like my time wasted.”
“I haven’t even told you what I want to discuss, and you order your food to go, like it’s not going to take any more than a few minutes.”
Truthfully, I’m not even sure why I ordered anything since the last thing I am is hungry. But it seemed like the thing to do. “As I said, I have things to do. Now what do you want to talk about?” I keep my gaze averted to my hands, something I would do whenever we were fighting.
And why am I doing that now? Why give him the satisfaction of knowing he upset me? I force my gaze to meet his and stare him straight in the eyes.
“Our divorce was filed so quickly I don’t feel like I had time to fully process what was happening before it was over.”
“You’re the one who left. How did our divorce take you by surprise?”
He leans in. “You threw me out.”
“Do we really need to discuss why I threw you out? Even before that, you were cheating and coming home so drunk you could barely stand.”
Anger flickers in his gaze. “We’d been together so long, I thought you’d want to at least give us time to come back around.”
I gape at him. I can’t help it. How is he blaming this on me? “You cheated on me.”
“I apologized. You kicked me out.”
“You’d already been on your way out the door when that happened and we both know it,” I snap. The warning is there, the underlying understanding that if he pushes too hard, I have no issue telling everyone what the final straw was that sent him packing.
“Either way. I’ve had time to think about it, and I realized you made out with everything in the divorce and I got nothing.”
“Nothing?” I choke on the word. “You don’t pay child support. You don’t pay alimony. I had to sell our house to afford to keep the B&B open, and I have worked my fingers to the bone to keep it since. But you got nothing? ”
“I had to leave my job for you to start your ridiculous money pit. You kept Matty?—”
“You left us when you followed her out of this town!” I yell, slamming both hands onto the table.
His cheeks turn red as he looks around to see who’s watching. “Keep your voice down, Margot. This is not anyone else’s business.”
I take a deep breath to steady myself, trying to calm the rage burning in my chest. “You cheated on me. You left Matty behind. Do not come in here acting like I threw you out for no reason and slammed the door on you on your way out.”
“You got the B&B. I didn’t take a cut from you even though selling our house is what helped you keep that ridiculous place. And you kept full custody.”
“Because you signed your rights away!”
“I didn’t think I had a choice!”
He’s lying. I know it. He knows it. Everyone in here probably knows it. Signing his parental rights away to avoid child support had been his idea. He’d asked me to keep Matty because his son reminded him too much of me. He’d actually told me that seeing Matty would be a reminder of the jail cell I kept him imprisoned in since the moment he got me pregnant.
“I cannot believe you’re saying this.” I shake my head as tears burn in my eyes.
I will not cry.
Not out of sadness. Or anger. Or frustration.
“I want what is owed to me.”
“And just what do you think that is?” I demand. “What do I have that you want?”
“Partial custody of Matty. And half of the profit of the sale of our house.”
I gape at him. “No. Absolutely not.”
“I thought you would say that.” He reaches onto the seat beside him and hands me a manila folder. “Papers that I’m filing. I’ll see you in court.”
“Here’s your food.” Lanetti sets his plate and my Styrofoam container down, but I barely register it as I stare down at the manila folder.
“You’re taking me to court?”
“Yes. I want what’s mine.”
I don’t even realize I’m standing until I slam both hands down onto the table and lean in, aggression lacing my tone. I could strangle him. Bury him in the backyard or throw him into the ocean, I’m so angry. “What’s yours ? How about what was mine ! How about promises you made to me and Matty? How about that?” I scream at him, my cheeks heating.
“You’re making a scene,” he growls, and his hand tightens into a fist on the table. It’s not meant as a threat, I get that, but I take it as one.
“You will not get custody of Matty. Do you understand me? Not while I’m still breathing, and not even once I’m gone. The only way he will see you is if he chooses to. I swear to you, Chad, you will never get another thing from me.”
“That’s for the court to decide.” His gaze lifts to someone behind me, and I know that Jaxson is there. I can feel the warmth of his body, the steady presence of Jaxson Payne. “This is none of your business, Payne,” Chad snarls.
“No, it’s not. And I’ll walk away if Margot wants me to.”
“No. I don’t.” Straightening, I grab my purse. “I’ll see you in court, Chad.” Mortified that I let my anger get the better of me, I storm out of the diner. I don’t have to look behind me to know that Jaxson followed.
Nor do I need confirmation that he walks quietly behind me all the way across the street and toward the pier overlooking the ocean. I grip the wooden railing and breathe deeply, trying to steady my mood.
How can this be happening?
How did Chad even manage to find a lawyer to take his case?
And then I remember—his mistress was going to law school. Is that what happened? I open the manila folder and glare down at the name of his legal representation.
Chelsea Brogan.
“You have got to be kidding me.” I start to fling the papers into the ocean when a large hand closes over mine. Heat shoots up my arm, attraction eating away at the anger. Our gazes meet for a moment, then Jaxson plucks the papers from my hands, releasing me.
“I’ll hold onto those.” Jaxson slides them back into the folder, then folds it and tucks it into his back pocket.
“He’s using his mistress to sue me. He’s coming after custody of Matty and twenty thousand dollars that I don’t have.” A tear rolls down my cheek. “The hits just keep coming. Why do they keep coming? Why is this so hard?” Jesus, please help me. I can’t do this. I can’t carry this alone.
Jaxson is silent a moment, likely processing everything I said, then he turns toward me. “I’m divorced.”
It’s honestly news to me, since he keeps his personal life under wraps and I never wanted to pry. When Michael told me I could trust him, I did because my brother’s words are solid. “I didn’t know that.”
“Yeah. It was a nasty divorce. She cheated on me—multiple times—and I gave her everything because I kept trying to hang on to what was already gone.”
Cheating never made any sense to me. If you make vows, you should honor them. Still, I managed to find faults in myself that I used to excuse Chad’s behavior. I put on a few extra pounds. I wasn’t available to him as often as he needed me… It was a vicious cycle, and one I still fight wi th. But the mere idea that anyone would cheat on the man beside me is outrageous.
He follows God, is kind. Strong. Loyal. Everything that a man should be.
So what kind of fool would sacrifice that?
“She reached out to me recently and has been trying to get me to meet up so we can talk ever since.”
“So what you’re saying is that there’s something in the water that’s bringing exes out of the woods and back into our lives like the wrecking balls they are.”
He laughs. “Something like that. I just wanted you to know that I get it. I get how it feels to fight for that piece of yourself stolen by their infidelity. How hard it is sometimes just to get out of bed in the morning because you can’t understand what it was about you that drove them away.”
“I came to terms with the fact that I wasn’t enough for him. I just don’t know why he has to come back and torment me all over again. Why can’t he leave us be?”
“Margot.”
I turn to face him, and Jaxson reaches up to brush some of my hair behind my ears. I shiver at the contact. The feel of his fingers gently gliding over my cheek. My gaze locks with his, and I lose the ability to breathe for a moment.
“You are not the one who was lacking,” he says softly. “Any man would be blessed to have you as their wife. Matty as their son. As far as Chad coming back now? He’s bored. Looking for a fight. And probably realizing that he walked out on the two best people in the world when he left you and Matty behind.”
His gaze drops to my mouth, and I get the slightest inclination that he might kiss me. Would I pull away? Turn my head?
No. I know I wouldn’t. Because even as afraid as I am to get burned again, the pull I feel toward Jaxson Payne is far stronger than my desire to avoid more pain.
He clears his throat and looks away. “So, we have some painting to do?”
I smile. “We do.”
He starts to hand me the papers, then hesitates.
I laugh. “I won’t throw them in the ocean, I promise.” I take them from him. “Meet you back at the B&B?”
“Definitely.” Jaxson begins walking, and I fall into step beside him. As I steal a glance his way, I let myself imagine—if only for a moment—how it would feel to be cherished by a man like him.