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He began to perspire. “Who says I was done?”
“You asked to order lunch.”
And he had spent the rest of the meal talking business. He got it.
He should have been more...
What?
The words of the counselor who’d done nothing but frustrate him came back to him. He should have “sat with her in her tears.”
Or some such rot.
What did that really mean? Hand her a tissue? Sit and watch her cry for hours? Who did that?
He’d tried to console her during their marriage. Several times. Like that night he’d found her in the nursery, holding Tucker’s penguin, sobbing her heart out. The nursery haunted her. Reminded her every minute of every day what she’d lost. They’d needed to get her out of there. To see that there was still good left in life. That there was more than what she’d lost.
But when he’d said so, she’d raged at him.
Standing, Braden shoved his hands in his pants pockets and strode to the window. He looked at the darkness and felt a storm building within him.
He took a deep breath, and another, waiting for calm to descend once again. He’d learned long ago that giving in to drama only made you do or say things that you’d either have to apologize for or that you’d feel embarrassed about. Like the time his mother had been running her mouth about Mallory, trying to convince him that she’d deliberately belittled her and his sister because his mother was jealous of another woman coming before her and his sister in his life. He’d lost patience with her. He couldn’t remember what he’d said, but he remembered her response. “But, Braden, family always comes first and we’re your family.” What he remembered most of all was his response to that. “Not anymore we aren’t.” He hadn’t meant the words. Not even the second in which he’d uttered them. And the pain they’d caused his mother, the doubt that still lingered from time to time that he’d cut her out of his life if she displeased him...
When he was calm, he turned around.
“We’re having twins, Mal. Two daughters.” He should be there, helping with the responsibility. There’d be so much of it. At first, when she was still recovering from childbirth and both babies needed to be fed and changed and held, there would be two of them and only one of her.
They had to be practical. The rest would work itself out.
“And that’s part of the reason this won’t work.”
When she spoke those words, he moved closer to her. She’d lost him on that one.
“Girls, Bray. Puberty. Drama. Think of your sister, multiply that by two, factor in me, and where would you be?” She was so calm, sounded so logical.
And then it hit him.
“You don’t trust me with your children?”
“Of course I do. I trust you with their lives. I know without a doubt that you’ll always be there for them. Anytime they call, you’ll come running, no matter what.”
Damn straight, he thought.
“But I can’t have you around all the time, Bray. Not if we don’t have to. The drama would make you nuts. And if you were here and then left, think how much more that would hurt them.”
He turned back to the window, breathing deeply.
“Bray?”
He spun around. “What? What do you want from me?” He was yelling. Loud enough to be heard on the next block. Or so it seemed to him.
“I’m sorry,” he said immediately. “That was uncalled for.”
And then he saw the look on her face. Wide-eyed, Mallory stared at him.
“Don’t look at me like that. I wasn’t going to hurt you. I’d never do that.”
“I’m not scared. I’m shocked, Bray. I think that’s the first time I’ve ever heard you raise your voice to me.”
