CHAPTER 7 Penny Calloway
Happy Meal
I collapse on the couch after I finally get Sammy down.
At seven, he thinks he’s big enough to stay up past nine.
He’s not, for the record, but if I don’t let him just stay up, he comes out of his room no less than three thousand times to ask for something.
Anything. Water. A snack. A story from recess three weeks ago that he forgot to tell me.
Whatever it is pushes him past nine anyway, so it’s easier to just let him stay up.
We’ve taken to watching shows together. He’s really into sharks, and his favorite is Shark Week.
I record every possible show, and we watch them until his eyes get heavy.
But the rest of the year when it’s not Shark Week, he’ll sit with me through pretty much any competition show, and he’s picking up my penchant for anything on the Food Network.
I can totally see him being either a chef or a marine biologist someday.
Or maybe a marine biologist who loves to cook in his spare time.
Though truth be told, I like to watch Food Network. I don’t love to cook.
That’s not true. I do love to cook. I don’t love to do all the dishes afterward, so I tend to keep it simple with sheet pan or crockpot meals.
My kids are picky eaters, anyway, so most of the time I end up microwaving dino nuggets for them, and I eat whatever quick meal I can throw together between when we get home from practice and bath time—if we don’t pick up fast food and a to-go coffee on the way home.
What a day…and I’m not saying that in a good way.
It’s the first chance I’ve had to sit all day.
I ran home this morning, took a thirty-second shower, threw on clean clothes, and raced to the office.
I walked in just as the nine o’clock meeting was coming to a close, so I missed everything.
My boss, Stuart, pulled me aside, and rather than asking me if everything is okay, he reamed me out for missing the meeting.
I spent the rest of the day basically putting out fires.
I’m a project manager at a marketing firm, and that means I’m the middleman between our agency and our clients.
One client hated the campaign pitch and threatened to leave.
Creative is behind on another project, so I needed to reschedule several events there.
Another client was supposed to launch next week, and they’ve decided they want new branding.
And then I picked up the kids from school, and they were a whole lot of extra since I didn’t see them yesterday after school due to my client meeting and my wild night.
They talked over each other, wanting to fill me in on every detail of their day today, plus the Mountain Dew from last night. Then it was soccer, baseball, McDonald’s because I’m mom of the year, reading, homework, bathtime, and finally, finally sweet bedtime.
It was one thing after another today, and I finally get to sit and decompress.
The television is off. My phone is across the room. It’s silent, and I listen to the lovely sound of silence after the chaos of the day.
And the first thought that comes to mind as I put my feet up on the coffee table despite scolding my children when they do it is Liam Bradley.
I let out a sigh as I recall his mouth dragging across my skin. His fingertips dancing along my spine. His cock as he shoved it between my breasts.
God, that was hot. So hot.
It’s been years since I’ve been with anyone other than Brent. Over a decade, now that I think about it. We were married over eight years. We were engaged for one and dated for more than one before that.
So Liam Bradley broke my Brent Calloway streak, and what a way to be reintroduced to a world I’d long forgotten.
Just as I settle back to dream of what a night that was, I hear the door open.
Brent’s home. Late, of course. Right after I got the kids down, like he has cameras set up around here and waits so he doesn’t have to deal with his own kids—or waits until I’m finally alone and decompressing after a long, hard day, the majority of which I’ve had a pounding headache that’s the sum of too much wine and not enough sleep.
I don’t want to deal with him right now. At all.
It’s another reminder that I need to get the hell out of this house.
He walks in front of me and stops. He stares at me, and as I stare back, I tilt my head and try to find the man I married somewhere in there . He’s still packaged up in an attractive shell, but when the inside is as ugly as his is, well, he doesn’t look very good to me anymore.
“What?” I snap impatiently.
“This.” He nods at me. “This right here. In case you were wondering why I stepped outside our marriage, this is why.”
I glance down. I’m wearing my black work pants and my favorite pale pink blouse, and while I’m dying to get out of this outfit and into pajamas, I didn’t have the energy to walk all the way to the guest room I’ve moved into to change.
I can’t imagine exactly what he’s talking about.
“I just assumed you stepped out because you’re a fucking asshole. ”
He rolls his eyes. “No. Because I’d come home from a long, hard day earning money to support this family only to find my wife lying across the couch when there’s still garbage from your fast food dinner on the table.”
Anger leaps through me. First of all, it’s not garbage. It’s toys from their Happy Meals, and Benji threw an absolute tantrum when I tried to throw away the box, so I let him keep it on the table by his place setting.
But this asshole in front of me didn’t bother to take one second to think about that.
God. Why the hell did I ever marry him? Lesson learned. I’m never getting married again. Ever.
“Fuck you, Brent,” I hiss.
“First you abandon our children on a weeknight to your mother’s house and don’t come home all night, and then you feed them trash and leave it all over the house?” He shakes his head like I’m the one who’s unbelievable here.
“I didn’t abandon our children! They had a sleepover at their grandmother’s house! And I don’t need to report back to you, but for your information, I had the best sex of my life last night.”
“While your children were where again?” He shoots me a smirk as he pulls his phone out of his front shirt pocket and presses a button. “Thanks. That’ll do.”
Lovely. The fucking bastard recorded me without my consent. He’ll conveniently delete the part where he baited me, and he’ll use it for whatever advantage he needs in court.
I’m not exactly sure what I did to deserve him, and I mean that in the most disrespectful way possible.
Honestly.
I was a good wife to him. A great one. I was faithful. I took—and still take—care of our two kids. I made sacrifices when he didn’t.
And this is how he treats me. The mother of his children. Does he even like his own children?
I silently berate myself for thinking that. Of course he does.
Except…
He didn’t show up tonight until they were asleep. He didn’t see them last night, either. He never spends time with them, and Sammy told me that when he has them for the weekends and I go to my mom’s house, some woman named Heather takes care of them.
Last year, a video of my husband went viral for all the wrong reasons.
He was in a suite at a basketball game, and when the cameras panned to him, he was making out with some woman who isn’t his wife—and presumably who isn’t Heather, either.
The announcers poked lighthearted fun at them, saying how there was more action in that suite than on the court, but the damage was done.
The announcers didn’t know who he was despite his fame as a bit of a local celebrity.
They didn’t know that he was married, that the woman whose mouth he was shoving his tongue into wasn’t his wife.
He’s a pig. A slimy slimeball. A total jerk. A cheater.
And I’m the woman nobody would leave alone for weeks afterward. I still see the memes people made of them when I’m scrolling the internet. And that’s why you’ll rarely find me scrolling anything at all these days except when I have to for work.
Maybe it’s time for a new line of work.
I hate Brent with every fiber of my being.
I’m long over him. But I don’t know if I’ll ever get over what he did to me, cheating on me in public when he’s a well-known face around town since he has his real estate business plastered on every billboard, bus, and city bench within twenty-five miles of metropolitan Chicagoland.
I storm out of the family room and head to the guest room, and I shut the door quietly so as not to wake the boys even though I want to slam it with every fiber of my being.
Where do I even go?
It’s not like I can just walk out tonight no matter how much I want to. I deserve better. The boys deserve better.
All I know is that I need to get out of here. This situation is way too toxic for the boys to be around—even when they’re asleep. Because tomorrow morning, they’ll be awake again, feeling all the anger and negative vibes this house is filled with now because of their father.
I can’t do that to them.
I leave tomorrow for Vegas, and the boys are already asleep. I sort of have to just deal with it tonight. But I need to come up with a backup plan.
My mom’s place isn’t big enough for both kids and me to move in.
It’s fine for a night or two, but not for a temporary living situation.
At least not comfortably. The guest room only has one twin, so usually the boys sleep in sleeping bags when they visit.
It could work temporarily, but I need to be on my best behavior, and I need to prove to the court that the asshole who baits me and films me doesn’t deserve to spend another second with the kids.
I just want to get the hell out of here, out of this marriage, out of this goddamn prison I’m in.
I’m trapped, and Brent holds the keys. I hate that he has the power here just because he makes more money.
I could be making more if I would’ve had the time to move up in my company.
Instead, I became a mom. I don’t regret that for one hot second.
I love my children. They’re my entire heart and soul, and it’s exactly what I always wanted.
Just…not with Brent.
Liam’s offer comes to mind again.
Liam.
What a heady contrast to the asshole who I married. He’s young, and he’s kind. Sweet, even. He walked me to my car.
And that tongue of his.
I’m getting hot just thinking about it.
He’s green flag after green flag.
And his place is more than big enough.
He didn’t show me the three other bedrooms since we landed in his bedroom and didn’t really leave, but it would be a temporary solution to get me and the kids the hell out of here.
I can’t, though. I can’t just move into a twenty-six-year-old’s bachelor pad.
Especially not when all I want to do is fall back into his bed with him.