CHAPTER FORTY
I’m straightening the cushions in my living room when I hear whining outside. It’s ten at night. Frowning, I open my front door to discover Uno standing on my porch, his black body quivering in excitement, tail wagging.
“Hey, boy.”
I absently stroke his head while I glance over at Gideon’s house. My stomach drops when I glimpse his Jeep in the driveway. He’s back. It’s been over two weeks since I last saw him and spoke to him. Since he last held me in his arms. Since I discovered the photo of him with my ex-husband.
Uno whines again, drawing my attention. He’s looking at me with baffled, brown eyes, his head cocked to one side, as though he’s asking a question. I know exactly what his question is.
“Off you go,” I say to him, pointing to the house across the street. “Go back to your owner.”
Your lying, deceitful owner. But I don’t say any of that out loud, because Uno has always been scarily intelligent and I’m not sure how much dogs comprehend.
Uno nudges my leg with his head and continues to stand there, looking up at me reproachfully.
I lower my voice. “It’s not me, okay. It’s your owner. Ask him why I’m not coming around. Why I don’t see you anymore.”
Uno whines again. I think he misses me. Funnily enough, I miss him too.
Fortunately, Lisset is fast asleep. If she saw Uno here, she’d insist on taking him over to Gideon’s place.
“Fine, stay out here,” I say to Uno when he doesn’t budge. “See if I care.”
I close the door on him in frustration. I should head upstairs and get ready for bed, but I don’t move from the entryway. I lean my forehead against the door, picturing Uno on the other side, staring in hurt confusion at the door I shut in his face. Do dogs get confused? In the next instant, I’m picturing Uno running across the street and a car knocking him down.
I sigh and yank open the door. Uno is still standing there, and I swear he gives me a full-on canine grin.
“It’s not your fault your owner is a douchebag.” Which is honestly the kindest label I can think of right now for Gideon.
“Come on.” Lisset is asleep and I won’t be long. I slip on the sneakers I leave outside and Uno trots obediently at my side as I head down my driveway and make my way across the street.
The closer I get to Gideon’s house, though, the harder my heart starts to pound. I feel almost dizzy with nerves and tension and other feelings I won’t admit to.
I knock sharply. Five long seconds later, Gideons opens the door.
He looks terrible. Thinner and paler. Shadows of exhaustion in the lines etched on his face. An emptiness to his eyes that alarms me a little.
I feel a frown forming. He’s not supposed to look like this, but I steel my heart against any sympathy for him. He brought this on himself.
I gesture to Uno, who’s pressing against my leg like he’s a barnacle. “Uno wandered over to my place.”
Gideon frowns, briefly distracted. “He was inside. He couldn’t have gotten out.”
“Well, he did.”
“He’s never done that before.”
“There’s a first time for everything,” I say pointedly.
“Yes, there is,” he says carefully. “Thanks for bringing him back.”
He’s looking at me like he’s translating every gesture, every facial expression, searching for hidden meanings. Studying me as though this is the last time he might see me.
He makes no move to touch me. Which is good. Because I don’t know what I’d do if he tried to touch me. I’m scared even of myself in this moment.
“How’s Lisset?” he asks quietly.
“She’s fine,” I answer, my tone abrupt.
He looks away, but not before I glimpse the pain in his eyes. I relent slightly. “She’s reading really well. And she’s made some new friends.”
He makes an effort to smile. “That’s good to hear.”
My throat tightens as regret washes through me. He used to smile so easily.
“She misses you,” I tell him before I can think better of it.
“I miss her too,” he responds, his voice thick.
And you, his eyes say. I miss you .
In a secret corner of my mind, I remember the way Gideon looked when he told me he loved me. How safe and secure I felt in his arms. The scent of him. The way he sometimes had dinner and a glass of wine waiting for me when I arrived home from work.
I step back from all the memories swirling between us, trying to contain the flow of despair in my chest.
“I can’t do this,” I say, my voice and my heart cracking. “It’s too hard, you living opposite me, seeing you, speaking to you like this.”
His eyes are bleak, so full of sorrow and regret. “I love you,” he says. “I’ve never stopped loving you.”
No, he can’t do this to me. It’s so desperately unfair.
“I want you to leave,” I say, my voice hollow. “I want you to move out of your house.”
And out of my life.
But that’s not going to be enough, I realize. If he stays in Brown Oaks, he’ll still be in my life. I’ll bump into him at the library, in the coffee shops on Main Street, at Lisset’s school.
I can’t, I just can’t.
“I also want you to leave Brown Oaks for good,” I add. “I don’t want you anywhere in this town.”
He stiffens. “Is that what you want?”
“That’s what I want,” I say, even though I don’t really know anymore what I do or don’t want.
He works his jaw. “Kate, will you please give me a chance to explain?”
“When did you move here?” I ask abruptly. “Into your house?”
“February,” he answers reluctantly, as if he knows where I’m leading.
“We’re in October. That’s over eight months, Gideon,” I tell him. “You had eight months to explain and you didn’t.”
He bows his head, not defending himself. Probably because there is no defense. Yes, he tried to talk to me once and I didn’t want to hear what he had to say. But he could have tried again. He didn’t.
I don’t want to attack him anymore. I only want him gone.
“Will you move?” I ask him again. “If you say you love me, will you do that for me?”
He’s silent for a few seconds. Then he says, “I’ll move.”
In that devastating concession, in the raw ache in his voice, I glimpse the naked truth written on his face. He loves me. That was never a lie.
For the first time in two weeks, I feel a twinge of...something.
And I say, “You have ten minutes to explain why you lied to me.”