18. Astrid #3
He’s already given away a bunch of money. He’s agreed to play bonkers hockey and sing. He’s already won over the portion of the town that threw an impromptu party on my front lawn this morning.
He’s not what I expected.
He’s more patient than I thought.
And he’s definitely protective of me.
Yeah, this could definitely work—
My phone starts buzzing with a call, and I take a breath and pull it from my purse.
It’s surely Declan. He’s probably wondering what the hell happened and where I am.
I’m not sure what I’m going to say to him, but I owe him some kind of explanation.
But it’s not Declan. It’s Miles.
“Hi,” I answer.
“Where are you right now?” he asks without even a greeting.
“What do you mean?” I don’t want to tell Miles that I’m back in therapy.
The next person I want to talk to about all of this is…my husband.
Amusingly, Miles is Team Declan. He’s been trying to get me to talk to Declan about everything for months.
“Declan just called Iris freaking out, Astrid,” Miles says. “What is going on?”
My heart flips over. “What?”
“Something happened between the two of you, right? He didn’t say what, but he said you ran out of the house and he’s not sure where you are. He’s convinced he did something terribly wrong, and he has no idea what to do about it. Please tell me you’re not hiding from him to torture him. Come on.”
I slide off the table and grab my underwear. I put the phone on speaker so I can talk and get dressed at the same time.
“I’m not hiding from him!” Okay, I was kind of. In the beginning. But then this visit to Thea turned into an important therapy session. I take a deep breath. “We…made out.” I grimace. That’s such a dumb way to describe what we did.
There’s a long pause on Miles’s end of the phone. Clearly that wasn’t what he was expecting to hear. “You did? That’s… great. Isn’t it?”
Miles knows everything. Pretty much everything. He doesn’t know about the specifics of my therapy, but he definitely knows about the pain, the fact that I don’t and can’t have sex, and the fact that I’m very worried about that with my husband.
He also knows that I think I want to have sex with my husband, and that I’m pretty upset about the fact that I might not be able to.
Maybe you will be able to.
I can’t stop the voice in my head from reminding me that things are looking pretty good.
“It was a surprise,” I say. “I panicked. I probably didn’t handle it well.”
“So we’re talking more than the kiss last night?”
“Oh yes,” I say. “Much more.”
Again, Miles pauses, then my best friend exclaims, “Astrid, that’s awesome!”
I feel tears prick my eyes. Thea and Miles are both so happy for me, and it hits me directly in the chest. It sounds funny to have other people excited about my orgasms, but they understand what a big deal this is.
They know what I’ve been through and how hard I’ve been working on this and how worried I’ve been.
And how much I want this.
“Thanks.” I sniff.
“Do you need me to do anything for you right now?” Miles asks.
“I think I’m good. Thea and I talked. And I’ve had some time to process.”
“Okay, good,” he says. Then he takes a breath, and his voice gets firm. “Then you need to get your shit together and go find your husband.”
My brows arch. “What? Why? “
“Declan is tearing the town apart trying to find you.”
“He hasn’t tried to call,” I say, looking at my phone as I say it.
Shit. He feels bad, and I’m just making it worse.
“He said he knew you wouldn’t answer.”
I shake my head, but I have to admit he’s right. I wouldn’t have answered at first. “Crap.”
“Yeah. Listen, I love you, but you need to either tell that man what is going on with you or stop kissing him.”
I don’t want to stop kissing him.
That hits me directly in the gut when Miles says that.
And I guess that makes the decision for me.
“I want to keep kissing him,” I tell Miles.
“Then find your husband and make him feel better about this. He is beating himself up.”
That makes me feel terrible. Declan has been nothing but great since he got to town. Sure, he’s messing with my life. He’s staying in my house uninvited. He’s making friends with all of the people who are supposed to be helping me run him out of town. He’s rolling with every single punch I throw.
And I fucking like him.
That’s the thing. More than being attracted to him and wanting him, I like him.
“Fine, yes, I’m going to find him right now,” I promise Miles, pulling open the therapy room door and stepping out into the hallway that leads down to the main part of the clinic.
“Good. I wish you many more orgasms with your hot, bossy husband,” Miles says. “Finally.”
It’s that last word, the echo of mine, that makes my eyes well up again.
Which is why when I step into the main part of the therapy clinic, the first thing Declan sees is me crying.
He stalks toward me, looking absolutely distraught and borderline furious. But I know he isn’t mad at me.
“You’re in PT? You had to rush out to an appointment here? Why didn’t you just tell me that? What’s going on?”
And all of the emotions of the past hour swirl together and rise up, almost choking me, and I blurt out, “My vagina is broken, Declan.”