Chapter 1
Chapter One
Allegra was beyond exhausted when she walked through the door. It wasn’t just the normal tired that came from a long day of work. It went beyond that. She felt weary to the bone.
It had been like that for a while, and there seemed to be no end in sight. She could have handled it if there was some future point to look forward to, a day on her overloaded calendar where she’d get to sit back and relax, but there wasn’t. It was starting to fray her nerves.
She needed to veg out on the couch, doomscroll, and just not think until she passed out. The last thing she wanted to deal with was a date night with Carter and the moment she walked through the door she realized that’s what she was in for.
Delicious smells were coming from the kitchen, and she could hear the clatter of pans as he whipped up one of his amazing meals.
She was great at homey comfort foods, but her husband was an artist when it came to cooking, and he did most of it since he worked from home.
Her mouth watered and she realized she was starving.
That part wasn’t the problem. The problem was that she could see the dining room table, which they rarely used, was set with the nice plateware.
There were fresh roses in a crystal vase in the center, and taper candles had been lit.
He’d gone to a lot of effort to prepare a romantic dinner, and it made her want to cry, because she had zero energy for any of it.
“Ally,” he called from the kitchen. “That you?”
Long seconds went by while she tried to push her emotions back and control the sudden need to panic. She finally managed, “Yep, it’s me,” in a voice that sounded off even to her own ears.
She couldn’t do this. Couldn’t sit across from him and smile and pretend like everything was okay, because it wasn’t.
And she couldn’t tell him that she wasn’t up for the nice dinner, after all the work he’d done, because it would hurt his feelings.
It seemed like she’d been hurting his feelings a lot lately.
Every time he tried to take her to a movie. Every time he suggested they go away for the weekend. Every time he suggested she come home early so they could have a quiet night together. She didn’t want to say no, but she had no choice.
Carter stepped out of the kitchen and swept her into his arms. “Been missing you, sweetheart.”
She forced herself to relax against him. Made her lips form the smile he expected to see. “You just saw me this morning,” she reminded him. “It’s not like I’ve been away for a year.”
He snorted. “For five minutes as you rushed out the door. It’s not enough. It’s never enough.” He leaned in to kiss her.
For a moment she let herself go, set aside all the stress and worries to just be in the moment with him. There was a tartness on his tongue, citrus and something green from whatever he was cooking.
She’d never even liked deep kissing before him. Never understood the point. Part of her even thought it was gross, but when his tongue pressed against her lips, invaded her mouth, it was different. It was like opening a connection between them and it drew them together.
Her body reacted, as it always did, and she melted into his arms. There was peace there, and safety too, if she allowed herself to accept it. It was perfect… for a moment.
With reluctance she broke the kiss and pulled back, ignoring the look of surprise on his face. “I’m starving and it smells like dinner’s almost done,” she offered as an explanation.
His eyes fixed on hers and held them in silent examination as seconds ticked away and then he nodded slowly and deliberately. He obviously had questions and she was grateful he didn’t ask them. “It’s ready now. I turned down the heat to keep it warm. Do you want to go change before we eat?”
Getting out of her heels and the pantsuit sounded like the best thing in the world and this time the smile he got was real. “I can’t even tell you how much I want to be in something soft and cozy right now. I’ll be right back.”
She kicked off her heels and was already unbuttoning her blouse as she headed to the bedroom.
It didn’t take long to dig out her favorite pajamas and shove her feet into fluffy slippers.
Scrubbing away the make-up took a little longer, and when she looked in the mirror, she was tempted to put the mask right back on.
The woman in the glass looked even more tired than she felt—if that was possible. Her skin was washed out. The dark circles under her eyes had been a near constant companion lately. She hesitated and then dabbed a little concealer over them, so Carter wouldn’t worry.
It wasn’t until after they’d started to eat that she realized it wasn’t a date night. This was her husband’s idea of an intervention.
He’d made one of her favorite dishes, Pasta al Limone.
There was a glass of rosé from the small local vineyard she adored, and a plate full of crispy hot garlic bread.
It smelled heavenly and tasted even better.
Taking small bites took real effort, when what she wanted to do was stuff her face as fast as possible.
God, this is soooo good. Even if it hadn’t been her first meal of the day, she’d have wanted to devour it, but—
“I’d like to talk about some texts I saw on your phone last night.”
She froze with the fork on its way to her mouth. “You checked my messages?”
“No, but I checked on you when I woke up late and realized you’d never come to bed. I found you passed out on the couch. You were so out of it you didn’t even wake up as I got you comfortable.”
It had been a late night thanks to a client dinner after an already long day. She vaguely remembered sitting down when she got home, promising herself it would only be a few minutes, and then she’d go shower and get into bed. None of that had happened, of course.
“You still had your phone in your hand,” he continued. “I noticed it was dead, so I plugged it in for you and a bunch of messages started popping up. They came too quickly for me to read them all, but I got the gist of it. Is this a new thing, or has it been going on for a while?”
She could feel his eyes drilling into her, but she didn’t meet them. Instead, she drew in a deep breath and then calmly let the fork continue its journey to her mouth. Chewing gave her a minute to think about how she wanted to respond.
He had to find out eventually. She’d expected it. Hiding things from Carter never worked for long, he was too attentive. But explaining wasn’t going to go over well. “It doesn’t mean anything. It just sort of happened. I…” She trailed off with a jerk of her head.
“Just sort of happened?” There was a note of incredulity in his voice. “Hiding things from me doesn’t ‘just sort of happen’, Allegra. That was a choice you made.”
“It wasn’t like that. I didn’t plan any of this, Carter.” She took a sip of wine, and then a much longer one that almost finished the glass.
“So, all these long days and late nights… they’ve all been…?” He didn’t even sound angry, but there was a note of disappointment in his tone that was worse.
She closed her eyes and blew out a heavy breath. “Yes.” After a second adding, “I’m sorry. It was supposed to be a one-time thing.”
There was silence across the table, and it drew out for long enough that eventually she needed to look. He was just watching her from his seat. Brow furrowed, expression solemn, just… watching.
“Are you mad?” she asked in a soft whisper.
“How long was this going to go on before you finally told me?”
“I-I don’t know. I guess I was hoping it would get better before I had to.” It was the wrong answer.
He started to say something and then closed his mouth. A muscle jumped in his jaw as he reached for his glass, but instead of drinking the wine, he just pulled the glass over and began tapping the side of it with his fingernail over and over.
Ting. Ting. Ting. Ting.
She cleared her throat. “Carter, I—”
“Eat your dinner, Allegra. I could hear your stomach growling when you came in. I’m guessing you didn’t have time for lunch again today.”
She swallowed and looked down at her plate. Despite being slightly queasy from nerves, she was still ravenous. She picked up her fork and began to eat without answering. He wouldn’t like the answer, and he didn’t need one anyway. Her silence was as good as an admission.
But just because he expected her to eat didn’t mean he was done talking. “I thought you knew better than this. I thought I could trust you, but apparently not.”
One stolen glance at his expression sent her back to her food without a word. He didn’t want her input; that much was obvious. And honestly, there was nothing she could really say at this point that would help matters.
“It stops now. Tonight,” he said with a note of finality that made her cringe.
She didn’t want to know what that meant.
Allegra heard him pick up his fork and start pushing food around his plate, but she didn’t look up to see if he was actually eating. Only when her food was gone did she look up. She reached for her glass, but at some point, she’d emptied it.
“Is there more wine?” she asked. Her voice was soft, hesitant. He considered wine part of the dinner experience, but they rarely had more than one glass with a meal. Tonight though, she had a feeling she was going to need some fortification.
“No. I don’t want you tipsy for this conversation.” He dropped his fork and went to the kitchen. A second later he returned with a glass of ice water and set it in front of her. “You probably haven’t been getting enough water lately anyway.” It wasn’t a question.
“Thank you.” She didn’t correct him, but to her credit, it wasn’t one of the things she’d let slide. Mostly thanks to the fancy water bottle he’d gifted her at Christmas. She’d gotten used to carrying it around with her everywhere, and it tracked her ounces for the day.
Oh well, at least I have that going for me. It felt like she didn’t have many other successes she could have reported.
“Done?”
She nodded, while noticing that his plate had barely been touched.