Page 57 of The Marriage Rebound

“Hey, hey, you know betta than to do all that,” I softly scolded.

After a few more failed attempts, he gave up, hopped down, and curled up on his tiny sofa dog bed. Sasha still said nothing, so it would be on me to either try to get us back on track and be productive in finishing the conversation, or just let it be for the day.

“Where you goin’?” she asked when I stood.

“To clean the kitchen.”

“So, we’re done now?”

I didn’t miss the attitude that laced her words. I silently counted to ten before answering. “There’s no wall,” I said, gesturing to the open space. “If you have something else to say, I can hear you just fine. And for the record, I didn’t say you were being unreasonable. You jumped there while I was listening to what you were saying and trying to take it all in.”

Sasha remained on the couch, surprisingly quiet. For someone who was seemingly worried I was ending the conversation, she wasn’t doing much talking since her outburst. I gathered our dishes from the table, pausing to decide on our wineglasses. I picked up mine, but left hers. As I stood at the sink rinsing our bowls before loading them into the dishwasher, Sasha walked up, wrapped her arms around my waist, and rested her head in the middle of my back.

“Why do you put up with me?” she whispered.

“You’re cute,” I responded without missing a beat.

I felt her body shake as she laughed. “Good to know my looks are my savin’ grace.” She tightened her arms around me. “When you were gone, I told myself I needed to do better. Be better. Not so selfish . . . yet the moment I didn’t hear what I wanted to I slipped right back to being just that.”

Sasha’s statement was probably one of the most self-aware things she’d said in a while. I shut off the water then grabbed the dish towel to dry my hands. She stepped back as I turned to face her.

“This is what I meant about us talking at each other. We are both very passionate people, and we want what we have to say to be heard. But we can’t keep going like this.” I pulled my phone free from my pocket to quickly forward her the email I’d gotten from Doc. “One of the things I thought about was how we rushed into marriage.” I held up my hand to stop whatever she was about to say. “It’s a fact, baby. Things were going good, and we were in the honeymoon phase of dating. Plus, the team had a huge win, and to me, that—I wanted to hold on to all the good that was happening.”

Sasha’s face contorted into a deep scowl. “So, I could have been any-ol’-body that came along at the right time and you woulda married them?”

“What? No! Shit, sorry, that came out all kinds of wrong. I was just tryin’ to explain . . . we were, I was, impulsive. And in that impulsiveness we didn’t learn, truly learn about each other. And with my schedule, even all these years later, we still . . . haven’t. We started based on vibes, and that’s what we’ve been going on ever since.”

I held her chin, making sure she knew I was serious.

“However, I asked you to marry me because I wanted to be with you. And still do.”

A soft smile graced her beautiful face. “I still want to be with you too, baby.”

I matched her smile. “I sure-as-fuck hope so. And I want you to know I hear you, it’s . . . it’s just hard for me to comprehend, I guess.”

She tilted her head. “What?”

“That you want me around. Why you want me around, I should say. Not exactly something I’m used to.”

Sasha frowned for a minute, then her face softened as she stretched up to wrap her arms around my neck. I circled mine around her waist and leaned into her embrace. Into the comfort she offered. Comfort I allowed myself to accept. I nuzzled my face in the crook of her neck, inhaling her soft floral scent. We weren’t perfect by any means, but the feel of her, the smell of her, both managed to bring me a sense of calm.

I cupped her cheeks then kissed her, sweet and gentle. A kiss of remembrance, of promise, and appreciation. She moaned against my lips as she pressed closer, deepening the connection. We were a puzzle with the edges completed, but still needed to figure out the middle.

I broke from the kiss but kept us close. “Are you willing to get to know me?”

Sasha bit the corner of her lip, and a sexy, mischievous glint that I’d missed sparkled in her eyes. “Are you?”

Chapter 21

Sasha

When Courtney asked if I was ready to get to know her, I thought it would be getting reacquainted thing with less clothes and more touching. I didn’t expect her to break out her laptop so we could do some sort of relationship quiz. Vuitton rolled over, stretching, and I stroked his soft belly in response as I tried my best to listen to everything my wife was saying.

“And you got this from Dijah? She just had this layin’ around?”

Courtney shrugged. “Yeah, from when she and Shae were working out their issues. I know it’s a lot, believe me. Doc is type A on steroids,” she said with a small chuckle. “But after reading over some of this stuff—we need to start somewhere, Sash.”

She shot her attention to me when she said the last part. I nodded even though it was still the strangest thing I’d ever heard of. But I’d been so scared she would leave me, so if this was what she’d come up with to stay, I’d go with it. Especially with how I thought I’d fucked up earlier. How quickly I slipped into making everything about me when my wife was trying, truly trying to do what I desperately wanted her to do, which was stay with me.