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“I haven’t hurt you lately.” He hoped to God that was true. If he had, she hadn’t said so.
“I’m not married to you.”
She would listen to logic. It was one of the things he’d always loved about her. No matter how upset she might be, she listened to logic.
“It’s the only thing that makes sense, Mal. Look at us. Three years divorced and we’re right back where we started. A new building is going up, same plans, same daycare, and—” he stared at her stomach “—you’re having my daughters.”
He sat down on the corner of the couch closest to her. He leaned over and took both of her hands in his. “We can’t get away from each other, Mal.”
“We were no good together.”
“We were at first.”
“Because we didn’t have any real challenges to face. Everything was going our way. It was all fun and games.”
He thought back and had to concede that she was right.
“But,” she said, “when times got tough, when hard stuff happened—”
“—we made mistakes,” he said, cutting her off before she could get into all that. No point in rehashing what they both knew.
She pulled her hands away from his.
“It was more than that, Bray. I realized recently that I never expected our marriage to last forever.”
The words felt like a stab to the gut.
“Not because I didn’t love you, but because I did. Love doesn’t hang around forever in my world. At least I didn’t think it would.”
Adrenaline pumped through him. The salty pub food he’d had for dinner must have replenished his electrolytes.
“So at least I’ve proven that wrong,” he said. “Even a divorce didn’t keep me away.”
Her stare had his heart thumping hard. Was she really going to consider his proposal? Did he want her to?
“I’m sorry that I didn’t share Tucker’s life and my first pregnancy with you more,” she said. It wasn’t quite what he’d been expecting her to say.
“It’s in the past, Mal. Like I said, we both made mistakes.”
“After he died I was so angry and had no one to take it out on. That, I shared all over you,” she said.
Again, he thought he’d heard enough of the past. “It’s okay, Mal. It’s over.” He took her hand again. “It’s time to move on, just like we both said. And it’s clear that we need to do it together.”
She took her hand away. Braden watched her, trying to assess how she felt, trying to get them back to logic.
“It’s not over, Bray.” Her eyes had a suspicious sheen to them. No. No tears. Not when there was nothing to cry about.
“It’s not over at all,” she continued. “This afternoon is a perfect example of it not being over,”
“That’s what I’m talking about,” he said, energized again. “We can’t keep our hands off each other. You know as well as I do that sooner or later it’s going to happen. We’re going to end up in bed together again. We can’t stay away from each other, Mal. It’s time to quit fighting it. We’ve got kids on the way.”
The more he talked, the more she shook her head.
“That’s not what I meant, Bray. I wasn’t talking about the kiss.”
“Then what?”
“Before that, at the restaurant. You wanted to be all in with what was going on until you saw that I was starting to cry. Then you were done.”
