Page 41 of Playing With Temptation

Boots. Jeans. Light blue henley with two of the three buttons at his neck undone.

When I’d met him, he was a sneakers kind of guy. The first time he’d come home from college he’d switched up to wearing boots. It would seem the boots stuck. But he’d always worn t-shirts or henleys. In the winter he’d throw on a hoody or a jean jacket or occasionally a fleece-lined flannel. In the summer, he’d wear shorts if we were going to the beach. Trunks if we were going to a pool. But mostly even in the height of summer he wore jeans.

I both hated and loved I knew this about him. I both loved and hated in the years we’d been separated he hadn’t changed.

Well, he had changed. My Jase would’ve never lashed out and treated me like shit.

Though, to be fair, his Rainy wouldn’t have a fortified wall around her to keep him out.

However, his Rainy had never been in the throes of emotional devastation.

Okay, so that was a lie.

I had put up a wall to keep him out.

And I’d succeeded in that for sixteen years.

My reason for doing it was embarrassingly stupid. Immature. Lame. Cruel.

“Honey, get out of your head and come back to me.”

Come back to me.

Four words. Twelve letters strung together to make the most beautiful invitation I’d ever heard.

But now was not the time to contemplate why I’d felt those words so thoroughly I wished that invitation was a different kind and Jase wasn’t just calling me back to the present.

“You really should leave.”

“Not until we talk.”

I didn’t get a chance to deny his declaration. I quickly stepped back as Jase pushed his way into my house. Without an invitation to do so, he closed the door and walked farther in. With no other choice, I followed him. Actually, I had a choice—I could’ve thrown a fit and demanded he get out, and he might’ve listened or he might not have, which would’ve necessitated me getting ugly to make him mad and want to leave. And since I was already carrying around guilt, I didn’t want to add to that. So, I had a choice, just not one I was willing to use.

I was suddenly very uncomfortable watching Jase take in my living room, kitchen, and small dining room. Obviously, I’d never seen his house, but the neighborhood he lived in was much nicer than mine, the houses much bigger, and the yards, too. I lived in a crackerbox house in an older neighborhood that was clean, nice, and safe but it was no Griffin Park. The house was also perfect for me and Lucas, not to mention much bigger than the apartment we’d lived in in Florida.

“I always wondered,” he muttered as if he was talking to himself.

Yet I still asked, “Wondered what?”

He didn’t answer right away. Instead he finished his slow perusal of my belongings.

When he was done, his eyes came to me, and he said, “How you’d decorate. What our home would’ve looked like.”

I lost his eyes when they went back to my bookcase, which was a good thing because he missed the blow he’d delivered.

My stomach dropped all the way to hell and my insides started bleeding. No—hemorrhaging.

There were so many times over the years I’d had to physically stop myself from thinking about him. An image of him would pop into my head and I’d have to clean my house to stop the memories from invading. I’d begin to wonder where he was and what he was doing and I’d have to find Lucas to make the pain stop. But there were things I’d never allowed myself to think about and one of those things was the home he’d made for himself. Another was who he’d married or if he had children. Those thoughts would’ve killed.

“Jase,” I whispered. “I don’t think⁠—”

“That’s your problem honey, you’re thinking too much. You’re going back when all I want is to go forward.”

Go forward.

Was there a forward when there was so much between us?

“I don’t think that’s possible.”