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It didn’t help her case. Brandon scowled.
“Please take it.” Callie shook her head. “I hate looking at it. It makes me remember …” Her voice trailed off, as she felt overwhelmed by sweet memories of the Christmas day Eduardo had dressed in a Santa suit and given it to her. How happy they’d been … She gave them a tremulous smile. “Sell it. Use the money however you like.”
The young couple looked at the dangling gold-and-diamond keychain.
“We could buy land,” Sami said.
“A farm of our own,” Brandon breathed. He blinked then snatched the keychain from her hand. “Very well. We accept.” He paused, tilting his head with a grin. Then he sobered. “Thanks, Callie. Thanks for being the best friend I’ve ever had.” He turned to Sami. “Till now.”
And then they were gone, racing out of the farmhouse to the car parked near the barn. Their conversation floated back to Callie on the June breeze.
“One ride before we sell it?”
“Let’s go the long way, past the Coffee Stop!” Sami giggled. “I want to see Lorene Doncaster’s face when she sees me in this thing….”
“Your father will forgive us for being out all night. I’ll explain. It was the fault of the stars …”
The fault of the stars. Alone in the kitchen, Callie stood in the warm sunlight of her mother’s cheerful kitchen. She looked back at the divorce papers. She saw the black, angular scrawl of Eduardo’s signature. He’d asked for a divorce. It was the only thing to do.
Wasn’t it?
She picked up the pen in her trembling hand. She looked down at the empty line beneath his black signature.
Was their marriage really nothing more than a nine-month mistake?
She exhaled, closing her eyes.
Then, an hour later, she got a call that changed everything.
“Good progress today. So, same time next week?”
Eduardo nodded, pulling on his jacket. He left the therapist’s office and took a deep breath of the morning air. The June sky was bright blue over Manhattan.
“Sir?” Sanchez stood ready at the curb, waiting beside the black Mercedes sedan.
Eduardo shook his head. “Think I’ll walk.”
“Very well, sir.”
Eduardo walked slowly down the street, feeling the sun on his face, hearing the birds sing overhead. A bunch of laughing schoolkids in identical uniforms ran by him on the sidewalk, reminding Eduardo of the Madeline book he’d read to his two-week-old daughter, to the great amusement of his wife.
He stopped, feeling a sudden pain in his chest.
He would see Marisol soon, he reminded himself. His jet was already gassed up and ready at a private airport outside the city. He glanced at his platinum watch. Mrs. McAuliffe was likely headed for the airport now, if she wasn’t there already, preparing to make the long flight across the country and back. She would collect th
e baby from his soon-to-be ex-wife. From the woman who still haunted his dreams.
Blankly Eduardo stared up at the green trees above the sidewalk. The trees looked exactly like they had in early September, when he’d first shown up in the West Village demanding marriage. On the day when, in the space of a few hours, he’d gained both a wife, and a child.
His stomach clenched. He suddenly couldn’t bear the thought of going back to work. All those hours of work, all those days and years, and for what? He was a billionaire, and yet he envied his chauffeur, who went home every night to a snug little home in Brooklyn with a wife who loved him and their three growing children. Eduardo had a huge penthouse on the Upper West Side filled with art and expensive furniture, but when he was alone, the hallways and rooms echoed with the laughter of his baby. Of his lost wife.
Soon to be ex-wife.
He clenched his hands into fists. Had Callie signed the papers yet? Why hadn’t she signed them?
It had been two weeks since he’d signed the divorce papers, and the waiting was slowly driving him mad. He wanted it done, finished. Every day he was still married to Callie was acid on his heart, making him question if he’d made a mistake, if there was still a chance she might have forgiven him—if he could have earned back her trust.
He clawed his hair back with his hand. No. No way. She was probably engaged to Brandon McLinn by now and planning their wedding. McLinn’s steadfast loyalty had triumphed at last. And unlike Eduardo, McLinn fit into Callie’s world as Eduardo never would. He’d remember to ask her father for permission first. No one could ever deserve Callie, but if anyone had earned her, it was Brandon McLinn.
