Chapter 10
Chapter Ten
L orna’s mouth went dry and every muscle in her body tightened. The spaghetti in her stomach churned and roiled and threatened to come back up.
She hadn’t seen him in a year and a half, but she knew that voice—that mocking tone laced with underlying menace.
Her body shrunk into itself—the way it had for the full five years of their marriage—as if only she could make herself smaller, which was laughable for a curvy woman who stood over five feet eight inches tall, then maybe he wouldn’t notice her. Or he might leave her alone.
But it had never worked.
And it was not working now.
She breathed out his name. “Lyle.” Forcing back the wave of panic that threatened to consume her, she flashed a hard stare at Mack then at her son then back to the cowboy. “Stay here,” she commanded, then hurried down the hallway, her primary goal to keep her ex away from the family room and Max.
She tried to keep the fear—the emotion that like a vampire to a drop of blood—he most liked to feed on, tamped down as the man she’d given six years of her life to walked into the kitchen at the same time she did.
He looked a little different—his dark hair was cut into a trendier style, and he may have lost a few pounds. She imagined those were both due to him trying to keep up with a younger girlfriend. Same with his clothes, tan golf shorts and a red polo shirt that was still a little too tight around his bulging middle. Maybe he’d changed, but she’d never known him to play a round of golf. Although, his outfit also made her think of someone who might help her find the laundry detergent at Target.
He was a few years older and had played defensive end for their high school football team. A few inches shy of six feet, he’d once had the body, and the strength of an athlete, but he’d let his workouts go after they’d gotten married and packed on an extra fifty pounds. Which, of course, he’d blamed on her for feeding him too much. And despite losing his athleticism, he still had plenty of strength, as her blackened eyes and split lips had proved.
She swallowed and tried to force some pleasantness into her tone. He’d always hated sarcasm or when she’d questioned some decision he’d made. “Hey Lyle. What are you doing here?”
He cocked an eyebrow and brandished that expression he used to make right before he asked her if she was stupid. “I just told you. I’m home.”
The word sent a chill racing down her spine.
“This is not your home,” she wanted to scream.
But she knew—as sure as she knew how to back slowly away from a rattlesnake coiled in the middle of a hiking path—to do the same with that comment. The wrong word or any sudden movement could cause the snake—and Lyle—to strike.
“Where’s Misty?” she asked, trying to keep her tone light as she peered behind him for the petite younger blond woman he’d left his family for. He was such a cliché, running off with the administrative assistant at the insurance company they’d both worked at.
Wrong question .
His brow furrowed as a dark expression crossed his face. “You don’t need to worry about Misty. She’s taken care of. But something smells real good in here, so maybe you could worry about fixing me up a plate.”
Taken care of?
What the hell did that mean? That she’d already eaten? Or that he had left her, too? Or did taken care of mean his violent temper had finally killed someone?
“Oh, sorry, there’s none left.” She knew that Mack had stuck a container of leftover spaghetti in the refrigerator and that she was taking a risk by not offering Lyle some. It would really piss him off if he checked the fridge and found the container.
But her main objective was just to get him out of the house, so she wasn’t about to offer him a plate of supper if she could help it.
His gaze roamed around the room. She fought another shudder as it felt like he was cataloging and appraising the value of everything she owned.
“Pretty fancy digs. It would have been nice if your mom would’ve offered us this place back when we were barely making rent in that shitty apartment we used to live in.”
Except my mom couldn’t stand you.
“I notice that you failed to mention owning this house in the divorce settlement.” He said the words lightly, but she could hear the sneer and contempt in his tone.
“I don’t own this house. It’s still my mom’s. She’s just letting us live here.”
He paused in his appraisal and cocked his head at her. “Rent free, I suppose.”
Izzy had been holding still in Lorna’s arms as if she could sense the distress of her mother. Her eyes were wide as she watched this strange man posture around their living room then she buried her face in Lorna’s shoulder.
Lyle finally looked at the child in her arms. “I guess it’s about time I met my daughter. She’s pretty cute. Must have got that from my side of the family.” He reached his arms out for the baby. “Come here, Elizabeth. Come to Daddy.”
Lorna gritted her teeth so hard she feared one of her molars might crack. “Her name is Isabel .”
The baby shrank against her—like mother, like daughter—and whimpered as Lyle plucked her from Lorna’s arms.
“That’s what I said. Isabel.” He started to put her on his hip then wrinkled his nose and made a gagging sound as he shoved her back at Lorna. “Good Lord, she reeks. Does she always smell like that?”
She caught herself right before rolling her eyes—she’d learned the hard way how Lyle felt about that action. “No.”
He fanned his hand in front of his face. “Damn, I forgot how bad a shitty diaper smells. Don’t you change her?”
“Of course I do. I was just getting ready to when you let yourself into my house.”
“Don’t you mean our house?”
Bile rose in her throat.
He gestured back toward the living room. “I just need to grab my stuff from the car. I’m good taking the couch tonight though. For now.”
She swallowed hard, trying to think of something, anything , to say that wouldn’t set him off.
But there was no way in hell she was letting him back into her house.
Or her life.
She tried to keep her tone calm. “No. I mean, I don’t think that’s gonna work.”
His eyes narrowed, and his tone hardened as he took a menacing step toward her. “No? What’s the problem?”
“I think the lady said no,” a low voice stated from behind her.
Shit.
She appreciated Mack standing up for her, but she didn’t want to give Lyle a reason to get angry. She just wanted him out of her house. Although it didn’t seem like he was planning on going anywhere.
Lyle’s gaze flashed toward the tall cowboy who came to stand next to her. “Who the hell are you?”
“Mack Lassiter.” He extended his hand. Lorna waited— and wished —for Mack to crush Lyle’s in a hard vise grip.
But her ex just looked at Mack’s offered hand with disdain, as if it were holding out a dog turd in his palm. “And what are you doing in my wife’s house?”
“ Ex -wife,” she and Mack said at the same time.
Mack took Lorna’s hand, squeezing it in silent support, and she held onto him as if he were a life preserver and she’d just been thrown into a shark-infested sea. Except there was only one shark, and she wasn’t sure that even a six-foot something life preserver could save her from it.
“He’s mommy’s friend,” Max said, his small chin raised as he stepped in front of Mack.
Lyle’s gaze turned sharp, glancing from the boy to the man behind him then dropping to their joined hands between them. His lips curled into a sneer. “I didn’t realize Mommy had a friend .”
“I wouldn’t think she’d need to inform you about anything she had,” Mack told him. “The two of you are divorced, so she can have any kind of friend she wants.”
Lyle’s sneer fixed on Lorna. “I think you need to tell your boyfriend to stand down.”
“I don’t need to tell my boyfriend anything,” she said, pushing her shoulders back as she drew strength from the squeeze of Mack’s hand. “He can do what he wants. But he is the reason you can’t stay here.”
Lyle’s gaze went back and forth between them as if assessing the situation, then he held his hands up in surrender. “Hey, no problem. I’ll find someplace else to stay tonight. But we’ve got things we need to talk about, so I’ll be back tomorrow.”
“Make sure you call first,” Mack told him.
She stood still, clinging to Mack’s hand, as Lyle backed out of the room. Then she let out a breath she hadn’t realized she was holding when the sound of the door slamming echoed through the house.
“You guys okay?” Mack asked, reaching for her son’s hand and drawing him closer to them, the concern for all of them etched on his face.
That might have been the moment she fell in love with him.
She nodded, but her voice seemed to have deserted her.
He pulled her in, holding her and Izzy against his shoulder while Max wrapped his arms around their legs, hugging them both at the same time. She let go of Mack’s hand to grip her son’s shoulder.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered into the soft flannel of his shirt.
“What the hell for? You didn’t do anything.”
“For insinuating you were my boyfriend. It just sort of came out.”
He shrugged. “It’s fine. I’ll be whatever you need me to be if it helps get rid of that jerk. Did you know he was in town?”
She shook her head. “I had no idea.”
“The nerve of that guy. Walking in here and acting like he was going to stay.”
She could feel the tautness of Mack’s shoulders, the anger humming through his body. She recognized the emotion—the fury that Lyle incited.
“He didn’t even say hello to Max,” she said softly, choking back a sob. “Or try to hug him. He hasn’t seen his son in a year and a half, and he barely acknowledged his presence.”
Don’t you dare let him make you cry.
She swallowed back the tears, but her body betrayed her as her hands trembled, and she squeezed them into tight fists.
“It’s okay, darlin’. I got you. All three of you. And you don’t have to worry. He’s gone now.”
Yeah, he was gone now , but like a bad penny, she had this terrible imminent feeling he would show up again.