A Fragile Season (The Wolcotts #1)

Chapter 1

That Romantic Dinner in Winter

Erin

My husband ignored me.

Candlelight flickered in grim shadows, and a wailing cello announced my grand entrance at the restaurant.

The combination created the perfect ambiance to capture the mood of my crumbling marriage as I walked to the table near the back.

Even my dress matched the occasion—funeral black satin.

The split up the thigh added a little more spirit, though.

Just in case.

I stopped beside Jeremy. The pop of my hip was deliberate. I wanted him to notice me, but the wine list had his undivided attention. He didn’t look up.

“You’re late,” he said.

It was just after eight o’clock. Despite his last-minute dinner invitation and a frantic call to the babysitter, I was on time.

But I said, “Sorry,” and bent over to kiss him.

He turned his cheek, and an unwanted red smudge stained his beard until he lifted his napkin to swipe away any sign of my affection.

“They don’t even have a decent Grenache here,” he muttered.

Six years ago, when we’d first met, Jeremy would have leaped to his feet, falling over himself, begging me to join him.

He was older than me, of course. He was handsome, too.

Yet, back then, he wasn’t so self-assured, and the attention of a woman like me was something he had to earn. He had competition. I had options.

Tonight, Jeremy wore a more expensive suit, and if I were lucky, I’d see his heart-stopping smile. But now, I was the wife and about as captivating to him as the chair he didn’t bother to pull out for me.

“Maybe we could try a white wine tonight?” I edged my chair closer to his before sitting down.

Jeremy’s short “Hmm” was more uninterested than thoughtful.

“A Riesling?” I suggested.

He flipped to the next page of the wine list.

I unfolded the napkin and spread it over my lap with trembling hands.

Uneasiness was becoming too familiar. How long had it been since Jeremy stared at me with so much longing that my stomach tumbled?

Was it before Matilda was born? That was almost three years ago.

Our wedding? Four years ago. Before he’d finished his training to specialize as a psychiatrist?

Five years ago. Longer? Would I need to hunt for that giddy feeling all the way back to when we’d first met?

But I wasn’t about to let the rest of the world know how much his indifference hurt me. I did what any self-respecting woman would do—I hid the pain underneath a smile he didn’t see.

“I’m excited you organized a date night for us,” I said.

Jeremy leaned back, and finally, he forgot about the menu, and his dark eyes focused on me. His expression was blank. He said nothing.

“It’s been a long time since we’ve gone out to dinner.” I dialed up my smile now he was paying attention to me. “Just the two of us.”

“I don’t think anyone dining here would appreciate Matilda’s singing, do you?”

Snooty diners who enjoyed cello music while gazing over the river? I grimaced. “They might…”

Jeremy’s eyebrow rose. It wasn’t an unexpected reaction.

He enjoyed telling people he was a father, but he seemed less interested in actually being one.

Tiny handprints on the glass coffee table and squeals that interrupted him watching tennis weren’t appreciated.

He’d never gotten used to having a toddler around the house.

The slump in my voice matched my shoulders. “Her songs about bath time are adorable. Goggles on…” I sighed. “Bottom in…”

This was hopeless.

I twisted the napkin in my lap. How much longer could I pretend everything was fine between us?

Why was I even here? The cocktail dress was too much—even for this place.

I’d wasted half an hour frying my hair from a dull brown board into glamorous waves, and I’d even squished my body into lingerie I hadn’t worn since Matilda was born.

The black lace was snug, and my belly spilled over the waistband of the panties, but the set still fit.

A twist back and forth in the mirror had convinced me I still looked sexy, even if the quick and careless fumbles our sex life had become hadn’t left me feeling very desirable.

I dreaded lifting my eyes to meet the cold stare of a man I used to believe loved me. “Jeremy, why did you ask me to dinner tonight?”

“I wanted to talk to you…”

“About what?”

“Us.”

My smile wavered. “O-oh?”

“Erin, I think we—”

His phone buzzed. It was always face down these days. There was no chance of glimpsing the name on the screen before he grabbed it off the table.

A quick flick of his eyes over his phone ended with a frown. “I need to take this.”

I caught only his rushed “Hey” and the hint of his cologne before he slipped out of his chair to disappear somewhere in the crowded restaurant. He didn’t want an audience for his conversation—just like the hurried, whispered calls he took in our laundry room.

I loosened my death grip on the napkin twisting in my hands and forced in a deep breath.

Think. None of this awkwardness meant Jeremy was having an affair.

Patients called sometimes. Other doctors, too.

People relied on him. They needed him. This was the sacrifice of being a doctor’s wife—or so he’d told me.

I snapped open my clutch. Mindless scrolling on my phone would keep my eyes away from my husband’s hiding spot in the dimly lit corner by the door.

There were no messages from the babysitter. The playgroup teacher had sent a reminder to bring cupcakes to Matilda’s next session, though. And the only response I had for my parents’ latest update, as they “spent my inheritance” on another trip around Europe, was an eye roll.

I paused on the trail of messages and photos between my best friend, Lila, and me. There would never be anything new, but I still checked every day.

“Miss you,” I whispered.

Callan’s name usually hovered somewhere near the top, too.

His contact photo always dragged a smile out of me.

Disheveled layers of burnt copper hair in desperate need of a trim and blue eyes dominated the shot.

Most of the scarring on the left side of his face was hidden behind an apple he was about to bite.

It was a rare candid moment captured on my phone. Callan hated photos.

Callan

RIGRATIE

I bit back a grin. “Cal, you make this way too easy.” My fingers flew over the screen to solve tonight’s round of Unscramble.

Erin

Irrigate. You’ll have to change your theme if you ever want to beat me at this game.

I can’t help being a simple farm boy at heart.

Boy? In your dreams, dude. You’re already on the wrong side of thirty.

So are you, city girl. Come on. Quit stalling. Hit me with tonight’s word.

My gaze drifted across the restaurant. Jeremy still stood huddled in the corner with his phone pressed to his ear.

Miserable, confused, unsteady—I could have sent any of those words to Callan.

But my marriage wasn’t his problem. Years ago, we’d had all the time in the world to talk over the barbed wire fence separating his family’s farm from my parents’ failed dreams of owning a vineyard.

We’d been close once, but life had moved on.

Our nightly game of Unscramble was our way of keeping in touch with an ocean between us.

Erin

YEALTIR

Callan

Bloody hell, Ez. Give me a clue.

I snickered. The word I’d chosen was “reality.” Time for some teasing…

The type of shows you secretly love.

A man watches one episode of Castaway Island, and he never hears the end of it!

Do you perhaps mean one season?

I don’t watch reality TV.

Uh-huh.

You can go back to doing whatever fancy city people do now.

Grinning, I sent him a few emojis—laughing, waving—and tucked my phone in my clutch. I’d memorized the menu and waved away the waiter twice before Jeremy reappeared at the table.

Inching my chair closer when he’d been gone made it easier to touch his thigh. “I hope everything’s okay,” I said.

Distracted, Jeremy mumbled, “Sorry?” before he put his phone on the table—face down.

“With your patient,” I added.

“Oh… Yes. I’m sure she’ll be fine.”

She.

“Did you settle on a wine?” I grabbed the menu. It didn’t matter if I knew every word on it. I needed something to hide behind. My fake smile was no protection. “Any thoughts on what you want to order? I read some reviews in the taxi on the way over—”

“Erin.”

“—and everyone recommends the confit chicken.”

“Who gives a shit about the chicken?”

I shrank in the chair. “They say the beef is good, too.”

Jeremy exhaled a long sigh. “What the hell is this? Are we talking about beef? I can’t—I’m not—” He raked his hand through a tumble of dark hair. He’d taken to styling it messier when too many strands had started thinning on top. “Erin, I need more than this.”

My body was as heavy as stone, but my eyebrow crept up. More? “I love you,” I said. “I do what I can to take the pressure off so you can focus on your practice. I raise our daughter. I cook—”

“Here comes your laundry list of shit you supposedly do.”

“I’m not keeping a scorecard.”

Jeremy grunted a sour laugh. “You keep a scorecard. Up here.” He tapped his temple. “Well, guess what? Me too. I bust my ass putting food on our table—this table”—he knocked his fist on the white tablecloth—“and you’re either flitting around Melbourne socializing or sitting around the house—”

“I don’t just sit around the house.”

“You don’t work anymore.”

“That was a joint decision. We couldn’t balance the hours we were working once Til came along. You never liked me running around solving the problems of a bunch of uptight lawyers anyway.”

“Human resources is hardly a career. It’s a step above herding cats. You should do something more valuable with your time.”

I reached out to take his hand. “I am.” What could be more valuable than caring for our family?

“Such as? You didn’t bother following my lead on a healthy eating plan.”

I loved butter too much to agree to Jeremy’s latest fad diet. Carbs, too. “Well, no…”

“You sure as hell aren’t making time for the gym.”

“No…”

When was I supposed to waste time working out?

Between the endless rounds of picking up toys?

After Matilda’s swimming classes? If Jeremy was suggesting the perfect slot for a workout was skipping the one adult conversation I had each week with the playgroup mums, he was fresh out of luck.

A coffee here and there shouldn’t derail our marriage.

“Jeremy, I don’t understand. What’s not working for you?”

“Everything.”

“You can’t say everything like that’s an answer. You and Til are my whole life. I love taking care of our home—”

“And I need more.”

Again, that word: more.

What more was there to give? What more could he possibly want?

“Did you want me to agree you can buy a boat like that doctor bragging at the party last weekend?” I asked. “How can we afford a boat? Where the hell would you keep it? We live ten minutes out of the city.”

“This isn’t about the boat.”

“What then? Are you still angry with me for not wanting you to go to that tennis tournament? You have a daughter, Jeremy. She only gets to spend time with you one night a week. If we could’ve taken the trip together as a family—”

“Forget the tennis tournament.”

“Why does this have to be a guessing game? Why can’t you just tell me what you want?”

Jeremy’s jaw tensed, and he shifted a sideways glance to the next table before leaning closer. “Because I need…intimacy.”

I scoffed a laugh. Who was he trying to fool?

Was this psychiatrist double-talk? Intimacy was cuddles just because.

It wasn’t ignoring me or turning his cheek when I tried to kiss him hello.

At night, if I wriggled too close on the bed, he shrugged me off, complaining under his breath that my skin was a furnace.

When I tried to look sexy, well… He’d barely looked at me since I’d arrived. Not one compliment.

“Erin, I’ve tried. Honestly, I have.” Finally, he reached for me, his hand covering mine. “But I can only chase you so far when you keep pulling further and further away. You have been since Lila died.”

I squeezed his hand back, but guilt knotted tight in my stomach.

Had I pulled away? Without realizing, without ever meaning to, had I been so stuck in my grief after I lost my best friend that I’d been the reason he’d stopped saying hello when he came home from work?

Was the mess plaguing our marriage my fault?

Jeremy forced his lips to curve up, but his words were nothing to smile about. “I can’t do this anymore.”

“You…want…a…a divorce?”

He shook his head. “That’s not what’s best for Matilda.”

I managed a shaky smile. Finally, we agreed on something. We weren’t a completely lost cause. “What then?”

“I want us to consider opening our marriage.”