Page 3 of Promise

He’ll love me. He’ll never leave me.

Forever.

“Yes,” I whisper.

Shock registers in those amber eyes with rays of gold, and my heart wilts, thinking this might be another one of his jokes. A cruel one.

But suddenly, he’s jostling me, twisting at his hips as he stretches his other arm across his body, seeking the handcuff key just out of his reach.

“Unlock me, Trin,” he strains. “Get me out of this cuff so I can hold you properly.”

Laughing at the sudden movement and urgency in his voice, I slap my hand over the key and insert it in the lock. I continue to jiggle with laughter at how frantic he is to be released.

The second he’s free, he jackknifes upward, wraps an arm around my lower back, and flips our positions.

I laugh even harder, giddy and high, at the suddenness of him wedged between my legs, his arms banded around my back, uncomfortable as I lie on them.

“God, you’re quick.” I’m breathless as I clutch his firm biceps.

“Say it again, Trin.”

“God, you’re quick?” A schoolgirl giggle escapes, like I’m fifteen instead of twenty-five years old.

“The other word.”

“Yes.” The word clogs my throat, rough with emotion. Like more of that summer storm effect, one moving from crackling lightning to a refreshing downpour.

His brows slowly crease, eyes searching mine. Whatever he sees slowly smooths his forehead and deliciously curls his lips. A sunrise after a stormy night.

“Yes, I’ll be Mrs. Dart Rivers,” I repeat to reassure him. The name has a nice ring to it.

“No, baby. You’ll be my forever.”

And when he kisses me, like we have all the time in the world to spend locked together in this fuzzy shift from lust to love, I believe him.

Forever.

1

[Trinity]

Forty-one years old

There is something provocative about Georgia O’Keeffe’s painting Grey Lines with Black, Blue, and Yellow. The obvious slit up the middle of the image. The sliver of a petal pink center. The outward folds of blue and purple, distinct from the contrasting outer rim with a slash of yellow and green before the swollen plume of white and gray.

Dart said the image looked like a giant pussy.

But I no longer care what Dart Rivers thinks about art, especially the framed poster that hangs on my entryway wall.

A dozen years of marriage, swept away like petals falling from a wilted flower, followed by three years since our divorce.

His opinion on anything no longer matters to me. And I remind myself of this as I drop my keys in the glass dish on the slim table below the picture in my front hallway.

In the house I now own alone, without him.

The problem with fighting thoughts of my ex-husband is that looking at this picture reminds me of my own body part, long forgotten by him. A part of me he once loved. Said he couldn’t get enough of. The scent. The taste. The feel of me opening around him.

Ha.