15. Jillian
— ? —
Jillian
The dress was a mistake.
I knew it the moment I zipped it up in the hotel bathroom, watching my reflection in the mirror that was probably designed to make guests feel better about themselves but was doing the exact opposite for me right now.
The fabric was a deep cobalt silk that caught the light when I moved, with a neckline that dipped just low enough to be interesting and a back that… well, the back was the problem.
Or rather, the lack of one.
Priya had helped me pick it out a lifetime ago, back when I was still trying to be the kind of wife who made her husband’s jaw drop at weddings. Back when I thought there was still a marriage worth fighting for.
Now I was wearing it to a destination wedding where my almost-ex-husband would be seated next to me for three hours because a close friend had finalized her seating chart before my life imploded, and she’d tearfully refused to redo it.
“It’ll be fine,” she’d promised on the phone last week. “You’re adults. You can handle one dinner.”
Famous last words.
***
The welcome dinner was held in a courtyard strung with fairy lights, the coastal sunset painting everything in shades of gold and rose. I found my table easily enough, Table 7, right in the middle of everything, and I found Trevor already there.
He was talking to Daniel’s cousin, a conversation about the housing market, but his eyes tracked me the second I stepped into the courtyard.
I watched him lose the thread of his sentence completely, watched his gaze travel from my face down to the blue silk and back up again with an expression that made my stomach flip traitorously.
I hated that I still wanted him to look at me like that.
I hated even more that I’d worn this dress hoping he would.
“Jillian.” He stood as I approached, because of course he did. Trevor’s mother had raised him with the kind of manners that were impossible to unlearn, even when the woman approaching was the wife who’d served him with divorce papers. “You look…”
“Don’t.”
“I was going to say nice.”
“No, you weren’t.”
A muscle ticked in his jaw. “No. I wasn’t.”
I sat down in the chair next to his, because the place cards told me to and because making a scene at Priya’s wedding was not an option. The table was round, intimate, designed to force conversation. Our chairs were close enough that his shoulder brushed mine when he sat back down.
The contact sent electricity skittering across my skin.
This was going to be a very long night.
***
Three hours.
Three hours of pretending we were fine, pretending the space between us wasn’t charged with so much tension that I was amazed no one else at the table could feel it.
Three hours of his hand brushing mine when we both reached for the bread basket, of his thigh pressing against mine under the tablecloth because there simply wasn’t room to avoid it, of catching him looking at my back, the bare expanse of it in this devastating dress, every time I leaned forward to talk to someone across the table.
Three hours of remembering exactly why I’d married this man and exactly why I’d left him.
“So how long have you two been together?” asked the woman across from us, Daniel’s aunt or cousin or someone, clearly oblivious to the undercurrents.
Trevor and I exchanged a look.
“Almost four years,” I said.
“Three and a half,” Trevor corrected quietly. “Since the night we met.”
“That’s beautiful.” The woman beamed. “You can always tell the couples who are really in love. There’s just this energy.”
I reached for my wine glass. Trevor reached for his at the same moment. Our fingers tangled, and neither of us pulled away for a beat too long.
“Energy,” I repeated flatly. “Right.”
***
The dinner ended.
The guests filtered toward the bar, toward their rooms, toward the fire pits scattered around the hotel grounds. Trevor and I moved in the same direction by silent, mutual agreement, away from everyone, toward the hotel’s main building and the blessed privacy of separate rooms.
Separate rooms directly across the hall from each other, because of course Priya had booked us a block of rooms months ago.
We walked in silence through the corridors, the click of my heels and his dress shoes echoing off the terracotta tiles. I could feel the weight of everything we weren’t saying pressing against my chest.
The hallway to our rooms was empty. Quiet. Intimate in a way that made my skin prickle with awareness.
We stopped in front of our respective doors, mine on the left, his on the right, and both reached for our key cards at the same moment.
“This is ridiculous,” Trevor said.
“I know.”
“We’re adults.”
“Theoretically.”
“We should be able to…” He stopped, shook his head. “I can’t stop thinking about that dress.”
“It’s just a dress.”
“It’s not just a dress and you know it.” His voice was low, rough. “You wore it on purpose.”
“Maybe I just like blue.”
“You wore it because you knew what it would do to me.”
I finally looked at him, really looked at him, and the naked want on his face made my breath catch. “And what exactly is it doing to you?”
“Driving me out of my mind.” He stepped closer, close enough that I could smell his cologne, the same one he’d been wearing since our third date. “Three hours, Jillian. Three hours of sitting next to you, not touching you, pretending I don’t know exactly what sounds you make when…”
“Don’t.”
“Don’t what? Don’t want you? Too late.” His laugh was bitter. “Way too late.”
My key card was shaking in my hand. I turned to my door, swiped it, heard the click of the lock disengaging.
I should have walked in and closed the door behind me.
I should have said goodnight and ended this before it could become a mistake we’d both regret.
Instead, I pushed the door open and looked back at him over my shoulder, over all that bare skin that his eyes had been devouring all night.
“Are you coming in or not?”
***
He was through the door before I could change my mind, and the moment it clicked shut behind him, the whole mood between us tightened. The polite distance we’d maintained all evening evaporated, replaced by a pull that was electric and dangerous.
“This is a terrible idea,” I said.
“The worst.”
“We’re getting divorced.”
“I’m aware.” He stayed by the door, like he didn’t trust himself to move closer. “You look incredible. I’ve been wanting to tell you that all night.”
“You’re not allowed to say things like that anymore.”
“Why not?”
“Because…” I threw my clutch onto the bed, suddenly furious. “Because you don’t get to look at me like that, Trevor. You don’t get to show up at this wedding and act like nothing’s wrong, like we’re still…”
“Like we’re still what? Married? We are still married.”
“For now.”
“For now.” He nodded slowly. “Right. Because you gave up.”
The words hit like a slap. “I gave up? I gave up?”
“You filed for divorce without even…”
“Without even what?” I was shouting now, all the careful control of the evening shattering. “Without even trying? I tried for so long, Trevor. Months of watching you choose her over me, watching you run to her every time she snapped her fingers…”
“That’s not what happened.”
“Then what did happen? Explain it to me, because I was there, and from where I stood, your ex was more important than your wife.”
He moved then, away from the door, toward me. “You want to know what happened? What happened is that Chloe was spiraling, and I was the only person she’d talk to, and I was trying to help her without…”
“Without telling me. Without including me. Without treating me like your partner instead of some obstacle to manage.”
“Because every time I mentioned her name, you looked at me like I was already cheating!”
“Maybe because you were always with her! Maybe because you had a whole history I wasn’t part of!”
“I married you!” Something in his voice gave way. “I chose you. I have chosen you every single day since the night I met you, and you still don’t… you’ve never believed that I…”
“How was I supposed to believe it?” Tears were burning in my eyes now, tears I’d been holding back for months. “How was I supposed to believe you chose me when you kept choosing her?”
“I wasn’t…”
“You were. Every late night, every secret phone call, every time I asked where you were and you lied…”
“I never lied to you.”
“You omitted. Which is the same thing.”
“It’s not…”
“Tell me one time,” I said, my voice breaking. “Tell me one time you picked me over her. One time when she called and you said no, I’m with my wife, my wife comes first.”
The silence that followed was damning.
“That’s what I thought.”
Trevor’s face crumpled. “Jillian…”
“No.” I turned away from him, pressing my hands to my face, trying to hold myself together. “You don’t get to… I can’t do this. You need to leave.”
“I’m not leaving.”
“Then I’ll…”
“You’ll what? Run away again?” He was behind me now, close enough that I could feel the heat of his body. “That’s your answer to everything, isn’t it? The second things get hard, you run.”
I spun around. “I didn’t run. I tried to protect myself from a husband who made me feel like I wasn’t enough.”
“You have always been enough.” His voice was raw, broken. “You have always been everything. I’m sorry I made you feel otherwise. I’m sorry I was so focused on trying to fix her that I forgot to take care of you. I’m sorry that I failed you. Is that what you need to hear?”
“I don’t know what I need.”
“I do.”
And then his mouth was on mine.
It wasn’t gentle. It wasn’t sweet. It was three years of love and months of resentment and months of missing each other, all of it pouring into one desperate, furious kiss.
His hands were in my hair, on my bare back, pulling me against him like he could erase all the distance between us through sheer force of will.
I kissed him back just as desperately, tears streaming down my face, hating him and wanting him in equal measure. His tongue slid against mine and I gasped into his mouth, and he groaned in response, walking me backward until my shoulders hit the wall.
“I’ve missed you,” he breathed against my lips. “God, Jillian, I’ve missed you so much…”
“Shut up and kiss me.”
He did. He kissed me until I couldn’t think, couldn’t breathe, couldn’t remember why I’d ever wanted to live without this. His hands found the zipper at my hip, and I arched into him, ready to forget everything, ready to burn all of it down…
And then he stopped.
He pulled back, breathing hard, his forehead pressed against mine.
“No,” he said. “Not like this.”
“What?”
“Not like this.” His hands were shaking where they gripped my waist. “Not when you still hate me.”
“I don’t…” My voice broke. “I don’t hate you. That’s the problem.”
He closed his eyes, a look of pain moving across his face. “I know.”
“Then why…”
“Because when we do this again, and we will do this again, it’s going to be because you’ve forgiven me. Not because you’re trying to burn it out.” He pressed a kiss to my forehead, achingly tender. “I love you too much for that.”
“Trevor…”
“I’m going to fix this.” He stepped back, and the loss of his warmth left me shivering. “I’m going to prove to you that you’re the only one. That you’ve always been the only one.”
He left.
I slid down the wall and sat on the floor in my stupid blue dress, shaking and wanting and completely wrecked.
***
The next morning, I was in Priya’s suite with the rest of the bridal party, letting one of the bridesmaids touch up my makeup while trying not to think about the night before.
There was a knock at the door.
“That’s probably the photographer,” Priya called from the bathroom. “Someone get that?”
I was closest. I opened the door.
It wasn’t the photographer.
Blonde hair. Perfect smile. Eyes that looked at me with an expression I couldn’t quite read.
“Sorry I’m late.” Chloe pushed past me into the room. “The bride invited me last minute, didn’t you know?”