17. June
JUNE
The door clicks shut behind us, muffling the winter wind and the snow that’s just started up again. But even with the much-needed and familiar shelter, the warmth of my house doesn’t quite reach my skin.
I don’t bother shrugging out of my coat, hands still tingling from the cold or from the residue buzz from Birdies, I’m not entirely sure. Next to me, Meredith’s silence stretches taut like a wire, as if somehow her steadfastness will counteract Mark’s constant yammering.
“...but Andy’s proposal didn’t even make it to the floor.
The whole idea behind the setup was to incriminate the partner, not the client, so, as you can imagine, the whole thing went down like a lead balloon.
No one wants to work with him anymore, which is why I always say you have to put the client first. Otherwise, they’d badmouth you to everyone else.
Which is fine if you’re like Andy and all your clients end up behind bars, but for me–”
“Don’t make me murder you on Christmas, Mark.”
The lawyer grins as he unwraps his scarf to join me on the couch. “But then who would defend you in court?”
“Me,” Meredith finally breaks her stony silence as she sits down in the armchair. “Not that she’d need it. Between the three of us, your body would be at the bottom of the Atlantic before anyone bothered to come looking for you.”
“Four, if you include Eddie,” I point out just to watch the man squirm.
His scowl deepens further as Meredith hums her agreement.
“You really want to talk about your new beau, Mere? After everything I’ve done for your sister?”
Meredith’s jaw slams shut with a snap. Eyes furious as they glare right back at her ex-husband.
I watch the display with an unsettling amount of dread that does nothing to satisfy the curiosity itching to make itself known. It takes everything within me to stamp down the words threatening to spill into the tension between them.
“If you’re done pretending to blackmail my sister,” I manage to keep the accusation out of my voice. “Shall we get into this? I have plans tomorrow that involve leftovers and reruns, so I’d rather not be up all night.”
The glare-off lasts another few seconds before Mark finally backs down.
With a sigh, he diverts his attention to his bag, pawing through an ungodly amount of paperwork.
I grimace at the sight, thinking how grateful I am that I pursued a creative career instead of following my sister into law.
(It was on the table for the few hours between the first bottle of wine and the second, a few weeks after Meredith first left Nantucket, if only out of spite.)
“Mere?” I say as casually as possible. “Come make some cocoa with me while he gets set up?”
“This will only take a second,” Mark grumbles.
I shoot him a flat look. “Sorry, I’ll be less discreet. Meredith, will you come to the kitchen with me so we can talk in private?”
Mark rolls his eyes but returns to his task as my sister rises with me. The second he’s out of earshot, I turn on Meredith.
“Boston,” I hiss. “Did you really go crawling back to him in Boston?”
Her jaw tenses. “June, not now–”
“No, now,” I search her face more desperately than I thought I’d be. “Because I just watched him throw innuendos like grenades at dinner, and you just stood there taking it. What did you promise him?”
Meredith’s eyes flick toward the living room, toward the faint sound of Mark stacking papers on the coffee table. She steps closer, lowering her voice. “I didn’t crawl. I didn’t offer him anything I wouldn’t have otherwise denied him.”
“That’s such a non-answer.”
“He was the only one who could do anything,” she hisses back. “You need this, June. You deserve answers, this is all I could think of–”
I want to strangle her. “I swear to God, Mere, if you’ve done anything–”
“I haven’t,” she says like an oath. “I’ve got it handled. I need you to trust me to handle this, okay?”
And so much of me wants to deny her, to press.
To insist that she burdens me with this, too, because it can’t be good for her to keep it all bottled up.
I search her face again, desperate for some kind of anchor.
“So what am I supposed to do? Pretend this is normal? Pretend he’s not circling you like a shark every time you’re in the same room? ”
Meredith exhales, looking suddenly older than I’ve ever seen her. “I don’t need you to pretend. I just… I need you to help me keep him in check. Don’t let him push, don’t let him twist things.”
That’s something, at least. Something I can do.
She bites down on her lip. “I’ll explain everything later. I promise. But right now, I need you on my side.”
The desperation in her voice snags something inside me. For three endless, airless months in that Manhattan hotel, she kept me from slipping under. I owe her more than I can untangle by diverting her ex whenever he gets too mouthy.
“Fine,” I mutter, softer than before. “Just… tell me how you want me to play this.”
Meredith’s eyes meet mine. “Don’t give him an inch.”
I nod. “Alright. I can do that.”
We let the silence stretch a beat longer, then we straighten and head toward the living room.
Mark’s sprawled himself across my couch, shoes still on, his phone glowing in one hand.
“Took you long enough,” he says, tone brisk, as if we’ve kept him waiting instead of the other way around. “You could have at least actually made the cocoa.”
I bite back the first dozen responses that spring to mind. Meredith and I sit in the same places as before, only now it seems strategic. Now I’m on the couch, ready to spring myself at Mark if he so much as moves in Meredith’s direction.
“Alright,” I say, my voice clipped. “Let’s hear it.”
Mark sits forward to gesture at the papers spread out before us, lawyer mode switched on like a light. The smugness is gone, and in its place is that brisk, cut-to-the-point cadence I’ve heard over months of isolation and countless phone calls.
“If the no-contact barrier is lifted,” he says, lacing his fingers together like a man about to deliver bad news at a board meeting, “we can formally request a supervised meeting between you and Ashton. Supervised, meaning you’ll have a court-approved observer present, no exceptions, no funny business. The judge won’t go for it otherwise.”
I nod, slow, as if my body already knew this, but my brain needs to drag itself along behind. Like my brain has been forcing me to focus on Mark and Meredith’s drama so it didn’t have to confront… didn’t have to acknowledge…
“Supervised,” I echo, like I get it. Like I understand.
“The court’s adjourned for the holidays, so the earliest I can file the paperwork is the first week of January.
Realistically? Mid-month, maybe later, depending on how quickly the docket moves after the break.
” He flicks his gaze to Meredith. “But that’s the window. Don’t expect anything before that.”
Meredith already has her phone in hand, thumb darting over the screen. “So we’ll need to be in New York by… let’s say January fifth at the latest. I can book us a hotel for two weeks to start–”
“Don’t get too ahead of yourself. The hearing to approve the request comes first. If the judge doesn’t like my motion, we’re back to square one.”
Meredith doesn’t even flinch. “You’ll make the judge like your motion.”
Mark smirks faintly at her confidence, but doesn’t argue.
I sit between them, feeling as though I’ve become a third wheel in my own life. Their volley of logistics hums around me, a back and forth of dates, filings, contingencies. But I’m somewhere else entirely.
The relief of finally, finally, finally, has finally subsided for the weight of my own expectations to settle heavy and hard on my chest.
What would I even say to him? Hi, Ashton, nice of you to ruin my life. Was there any particular motivation for that?
I squeeze my eyes closed. Truth is, now that I’m here, now that things are moving, I don’t know what I want.
Except that’s a lie. I do know what I want.
I want it to be a mistake.
I want him to look me in the eye and say, “June, it wasn’t me. I didn’t set you up. Someone else did this. I’m sorry you were ever dragged into it. I still love you.”
And I want to believe him.
Because I can live with doubting him. I’ve done that already, every sleepless night, every article I’ve scrolled until my vision blurred. I can live with the shame for not trusting the man I married. I can spend the rest of my life trying to make up for that.
But if I sit in front of him and he tells me with his own voice that it was him? That I was just a pawn, a convenient scapegoat? That all along, ever since we first met…
That would destroy me.
“Mark.” Meredith’s voice slices through my fog, sharp as broken glass.
I blink, pulled back into the room.
Meredith’s glare is fixed squarely on Mark, who has leaned back against the couch with that insufferably casual posture of his.
Her tone is all warning bells. “Don’t.”
Mark only arches a brow, lips quirking like he’s about to test just how far he can push her. Whatever they were just talking about had clearly strayed from the topic of not-so-clandestine meetings with potential criminal husbands.
And that’s my cue.
“Okay,” I say loudly, pushing myself upright and breaking their little staring contest. “Enough. It’s Christmas, it’s late, and we’ve done enough.”
Meredith shoots me a grateful look. “I’ll start booking hotels in the morning.”
With a nod, I turn my attention squarely on Mark. “Do you actually have anywhere to stay tonight, or are you planning to swim back to Boston?”
Mark’s grin spreads, slow and wolfish. “Well, I had thought perhaps Meredith might–”
I don’t even let him finish. I smack him, not hard, just a sharp little swat against his shoulder. “Absolutely not. You’re staying in my spare room. Meredith has her own accommodation elsewhere.”
Mark rubs his arm theatrically. “You wound me, June. I was only suggesting–”
“I know exactly what you were suggesting, and you can put it back in your pocket, thank you very much.” I cut him off again, then glance at Meredith. “You should head out. Send my love to everyone still at Birdies, yeah? It was a lovely Christmas, all things considered.”
Mark’s head tilts slightly, sharp eyes flicking between us. He’s too clever not to put two and two together, and I don’t miss the way his jaw ticks.
But Meredith smirks. She knows what I’m doing. She steps close, wraps her arms around me tight, and I hug her back just as fiercely.
“I’ll see you tomorrow,” she murmurs.
I lean back, putting on a wide smile for Mark’s benefit. “Don’t have too much fun.”
Meredith’s eyes glint knowingly, and she lets herself out with a little wave.
The door clicks shut, leaving me alone in the living room with Mark.
He already has his smirk firmly in place. “Spare room, huh? And here I thought you’d make me sleep on the couch just to spite me.”
I drop back onto said couch with little finesse. “Oh, don’t tempt me. I’m so done with you today.”
“Don’t be like that, there’s no audience now. You can admit you’re happy to see me.”
“When I find out what you have on Meredith, I will kill you. I wasn’t joking earlier.”
He presses a hand to his chest, feigning injury. “And here I am, sacrificing all my Christmas plans in Boston to bring you a legal miracle.”
I roll my eyes. “You didn’t sacrifice anything. You just wanted to stir up drama at Birdies. Don’t pretend this has anything to do with me.”
Mark chuckles, low and unrepentant. “Yeah, well. Two birds.”
Silence settles in, but it isn’t uncomfortable. Not like it probably should be. I sink further into the couch, aided by the crash of adrenaline, the weight of the day, and the late hour where Mark’s annoying voice down the phone is practically a Pavlovian trigger for my own yawns.
There’s something bizarrely easy about him. Probably because he’s the only person in my orbit I don’t feel obligated to protect, or reassure, or soften myself for.
It’s a dangerous kind of comfort. Especially knowing that something is going on, that he’s being purposefully antagonistic to the people I love.
It’s enough for me to feel oddly guilty.
“You know…” I start slowly, half asleep, half-lidded, and content with my neck resting on the back of the couch. “Meredith’s never going to take you back.”
Mark looks over at me. For once, he looks equally exhausted.
It shouldn’t be so surprising; he probably looks like this all the time during our late-night calls, but it’s not like we video chat.
But now, there seems to be no clever quip on his tongue, no sharp defense ready to fire.
Just a man with his sharp edges dulled for the first time since I’ve known him.
“Maybe,” he says finally, voice low. “But I’d never forgive myself for not trying.”
It’s so uncharacteristically honest that I feel my chest pull tight. Suddenly more awake than I was a moment earlier.
“Don’t get all noble on me now,” it comes out more as a whisper. Eyes now wide as we stare at each other.
He’s closer than I thought he was, leaning in a near mirror to me with one arm propping up his chin on the back of the couch.
“Have you stopped loving him?”
The question makes me swallow. Caught in an odd moment of honesty that I never knew either of us was capable of.
I shake my head.
Mark nods gently. “So, you understand.”
I should look away, but I don’t. Neither does he.
And then his gaze dips just for a second. His eyes linger on my mouth.
There’s no thought process I can charge through in time. No logic I can grasp hold of.
Lips brush against mine, indulgent and unhurried. Pressing firm and bold and unapologetic. My stomach flips, heat rising up the back of my neck.
No. Absolutely not.
I sit up abruptly, breaking away with the veracity of a snapping rubber band. I welcome the anger creeping along my veins like an old friend.
“Sort yourself out, Mark.”
It’s a hiss, it’s a warning. It’s scathing and patronizing, intent on hurting and wholly rejecting. It’s furious and battered and bruised.
He leans back, a smirk tugging faintly at the corner of his mouth.
And I hate him. I hate him more than anything in the world.
I don’t give him the chance to respond. I push up from the couch and head for the hallway, slamming my bedroom door behind me, angry that I never invested in locks.
Then, with nothing good left to possibly think about, I lean back against it and try not to cry.