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“Are breakups ever really amicable?”

I shrug, conceding her point, but I’m sure as shit not the expert on the subject.

“Daniel threw himself into his schooling, working hard to earn his degree so he could better our lives.” She gives me the spiel, but I have a feeling those are her husband’s words, not hers.

“I was a stay-at-home mum. Childcare was expensive, and with two children, it just didn’t make sense for me to work a minimum wage job. When they got older and started school, I brought it up again. But Daniel pointed out how hard it would be to find something that would work around the school pick-ups and drop-offs, as well as their clubs, and whatnot. And that was before you factored in all of the time off they get for holidays, teacher training days, and sick days. I love my kids, but god, it was hard, and I was so lonely. Dan got his degree, then a good job, followed by a pay rise. We saw ourselves moving into a nicer place with nicer things, but it was all just surface-level shit, you know? Now I was just crying in fancier clothes.

“The boiling point came when the kids were older. I suspected he was having an affair. He was working later, taking more frequent work trips away, ignoring my calls, that kind of thing. The kids were in uni by this point, and I’d started job hunting to have something to do. I had no qualifications after dropping out of school to have the kids, and no experience. Heck, I had zero work history. There was just nothing out there. I wanted to go back to school, but whenever I brought it up, it dissolved into an argument about me wasting his money for no reason when he paid for everything anyway.”

“The guy sounds like a prick.”

She smiles at me sadly. “He was in the end. I don’t know when he started to change or if it had always been that way, and I didn’t see the signs.” She shakes her head. “I decided to surprise him at work one day.”

“Shit.”

“Yeah. Needless to say, that was my breaking point. Having my suspicions was one thing, watching my husband fuck his eighteen-year-old secretary on his desk, another. I told him I was done, and I wanted a divorce.”

“Good for you. I know that couldn’t have been easy, but so many people chose easy over happy.”

“I know. Truth is that our marriage had been over for a while. I had been trying to breathe life into something that was already dead.”

“How did the kids take it?”

She looks at me sadly. “They aren’t really talking to me right now. They’re angry that I couldn’t find it in me to forgive their father.”

My lips part in surprise. “Seriously? Babe, they’re grown, adults. They’re not little kids in this who don’t understand. Their dad was a dick and hurt you. Don’t matter if you guys were falling out of love—you were still married. They should want better than that for you.”

Her lip wobbles like she’s going to cry, but she straightens her shoulders and nods—Atta girl.

“I know. It’s why I refused to go back, even though it hurts, and I miss them.”

“They have a relationship with their dad?”

“Yeah, they love him. But then, he provides for them both financially. And he’s in a position where he can spoil them rotten and I…well, I can’t.”

“I’ve known guys like him before. It’s always about money. The sad thing is, money doesn’t buy love, no matter what those kids are showing. If the money dries up, what happens then?”

“I don’t know, Lick. I really don’t. But this conversation got a hell of a lot deeper than I planned.”

I grin before standing up and reaching out my hand. “Then let’s go dance our troubles away.”

She looks at it before her eyes move up my body to my face. She swallows hard before reaching out and slipping her hand into mine. “Okay.”

I hold on tightly to her as I lead her downstairs to the dance floor, where some R&B track is playing. I pull her into the middle of the dance floor before I slide my hands to her hips and pull her into me.

She gasps at the contact, her lips parting as I start to move, forcing her to move with me. I take the lead, feeling how unsure she is, and have to fight back the urge to find that prick ex of hers and fuck him up. By the time the song rolls into the next, she’s loosened up. Her arms are around my neck, and her hips sway to the beat as she smiles at me, looking shy but relaxed.

I move my hands around to her back, spreading my hands wide so she can feel my heat seep through the dress to her skin. “You look like a fucking goddess in that dress,” I tell her, my lips to her ear so she can hear me over the music.

“Oh yeah?” She smiles, looking at me like I’m joking, but I’m not. Not at all.

“Yeah, and you deserve to be worshipped as one.”

“Lick,” she whispers, tipping her head back so she can look into my eyes.

I reach up and cup her jaw, skating my thumb along her bottom lip before I lean down and slam my mouth down over hers. She freezes in shock, but I don’t let that stop me. My hands move to her ass, pulling her in, impossibly close, so she can feel how hard she’s making me.

She melts into me, letting me take the lead as I practically devour her on the dance floor, not giving a single fuck about anyone around us. All we’re doing is kissing, but fuck me, I don’t remember ever feeling this turned on in my life.