Page 107 of Kylie

Moving around the house, I continued tidying up as I did on most afternoons before the kids were due back from school. With Travis and Gage at the resort on the regular, I spent a good portion of my time during the day on my own. Well, when there wasn’t a well-meaning family member stopping by to check on me. Jessie had come by for the first week or so, but her life was hectic, so I understood her need for routine. I saw my dad most because he had taken some time off from work, wanting to be here. He continued to ask me to go to lunch with him, but I had refused him up to this point, not sure I was ready to be in the public eye. The thought of people staring at me like I was a circus act wasn’t something I looked forward to.

But soon enough, everyone would get back to their regularly scheduled lives, and I couldn’t blame them. I was more than ready to resume the life I’d had before.

I hated that word. Before.

Before the world went to shit.

Before Martin Calloway disrupted my life.

Before my family had been ripped away from me.

I was tired of separating my existence. The before and after was making me crazy.

Pausing near the kitchen island, I glanced down at my cell phone on the counter. I remembered how I used to have that thing glued to me. If it wasn’t in my hand, it would be in my pocket. Always close. Always available. Back then, there’d been a constant barrage of ringing or chiming, signaling someone was attempting to get in touch with me.

That wasn’t the case anymore. My cell phone chimed a couple of times a day when Travis or Gage would text me, checking in. It was radio silence from just about everyone else. I had overheard Zoey talking to Kennedy while we were having dinner at Curtis and Lorrie’s, and according to her, they didn’t want to bother me. Perhaps that was true. Or maybe they simply had lives to deal with, and because I’d been gone for so long, it was just easier to keep going as though I wasn’t there.

Taking a deep breath, I picked up my phone and brought the screen to life. Because it was new, I didn’t have a contact list to rely on, so I did a Google search and found Dr. Piper Briggs’s phone number. Without hesitation, I dialed.

An answering service answered. Within minutes, I had an appointment for tomorrow morning.

“This is a good thing,” I said aloud, ignoring the weird churning in my belly. I needed this. I needed someone to talk to about what happened. Someone who didn’t have an emotional connection. I could tell Travis and Gage were curious, but I didn’t want them to know the details. I knew how much it would bother them to know what I had gone through. They loved me. Perhaps they didn’t love me the same now as they had before, but if I told them, it would certainly be the case. They already looked at me as though I was broken, and maybe I was. A little. But not so much that I couldn’t heal. And that was why I wanted to see Dr. Briggs. I was ready to begin the healing process. I was on the mend physically; now it was time for some emotional relief.

As I was setting my phone down, I received an alert letting me know there was motion in the driveway. At first, those alerts had made me hypervigilant, always checking to see what the motion was, who might be lurking. Over time, they started offering a sense of comfort because I was always aware. I wasn’t sure that was necessarily a good thing, but I had gotten used to it.

Making my way to the front door, I plastered a smile on my face. It was time to shut down all the doubts and put my Mom face on.

“Hey,” I greeted cheerfully when Kate came bounding up the front steps, her backpack dangling from her arm. Within seconds, she had her arms around my waist, giving me a bear hug as she did every day. “How was school?”

“Good,” she said, releasing me and heading into the house.

I remained where I was, waiting for Kade and Avery. As had become his preference, Kade gave me a fist bump before heading into the house. Avery offered a hug, but it wasn’t nearly as genuine as Kate’s. But it was something, I reminded myself.

“I wanted to ride the bus,” Avery grumbled as she walked away.

Behind Avery was Gage.

I took a moment to drink him in as I usually did. The man was like fine wine, only getting better with age. He was bigger than I remembered. More muscular. From what I gathered, he’d turned to weights as a way of dealing with his emotional trauma and had continued with it. He looked good. Really good.

“Hey,” he greeted when he was on the step below, the two of us nearly eye to eye.

“Hi.”

As he stood in front of me, there was a moment of awkwardness. It felt like déjà vu, reminding me of back when I first met him all those years ago. A man seeking out someone who could renovate the very house we lived in now. His motives hadn’t been pure back then because he’d learned that Travis was secretly married to me and had been using me to get back at him. But by bringing me back into Travis’s life, Gage had single-handedly set our world to rights. All three of us.

While our initial encounters hadn’t been romantic, I could remember feeling the same as I did now. Hopeful and filled with anticipation.

Unfortunately, Kade chose that moment to holler for his dad.

“Excuse me a minute. Let me get them settled.”

I nodded, ignoring the painful churn in my gut. The one that reminded me that I was little more than a visitor in their house.

I was starting to detest that feeling.

Chapter Forty-Four

Tuesday, October 25, 2022