AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Her laugh is bitter. “I do, though.”
“What do you mean?”
Those awful, desolate eyes stare at me, as if from a vast distance. “My ex-husband is coming to town. I told him I’d be away for Thanksgiving, because I’m the biggest coward that ever existed. So I actually need to go with you, because I can’t afford to book a trip out of town for me and Bailey otherwise.”
Her words send tension stealing through my body. She has so much on her plate. So much that she carries without even showing it. Her snark, her temper—that’s just a defense mechanism. I’ve seen past it, and I want more. I want her to turn to me when she’s worried, when she needs help.
The only place I’ve ever felt like I belong is beside Mia.
Unable to resist, I let my fingers coast along her hairline, tracing the shell over her ear. Whenever my skin is in contact with Mia’s, it’s like some incessant noise ringing in my ears goes quiet.
She shudders when my thumb coasts over her cheek. “I told you I’d do that silly race with you,” she whispers. “So I will. But you have to stop touching me.”
“Why?” I’ve leaned closer without noticing, my face just inches from hers.
“Because it muddles my mind too much,” she whispers. “I can’t think straight when you touch me.”
“Maybe that’s a good thing.”
Her eyes open again, meeting my gaze. ”What about after?”
My movements still. “After?”
“After Thanksgiving. After the race. After we come back. What then? What do we tell your grandparents?”
“Well…” There are rocks in my throat that make it hard to speak. I’ve been careful not to think about after. Mia’s gaze is serious, and I think I know what she wants to hear. She wants assurances that this arrangement will end, that it won’t come back to bite her. She wants to know that she and her daughter will be on solid footing, for once. So even though I don’t want an after with Mia—because “after” sounds a lot like “ending”—I say what I think she wants to hear. “After, I can sell the two condos and find a decent property manager to take over your lease and Georgia’s. My grandparents’ finances will be in good shape. And I’ll—I’ll leave. I can tell them it didn’t work out. Clean break.”
“Clean break,” she repeats. Mia’s lips pinch, the corners turned down. She nods, pulling away from me. She looks at the screen on her phone. “I need to pick up Bailey from basketball.”
“Okay. Can I see you again before we go? Maybe try that dinner again? I can give you a run-down of what to expect with my family. We can get to know each other a bit…”
A deep inhale, and Mia shakes her head. “I don’t think that’s a good idea. I think we should go back to the rules and forget today ever happened. No kissing, no touching, no sex. This is a business arrangement.”
I clear my throat and nod. “That’s probably smart.” Even though I hate it.
She puts her hand on the door latch, then pauses to look at me. “Are you really planning on leaving after you sell their properties?”
Her face is shadowed, her voice low. Every piece of me wants to haul her across the car and pick up right where we left off this afternoon. Make her mine. Make her realize that she doesn’t have to carry the weight of the world on her own.
I tell her a partial truth: “I don’t know. I hadn’t thought that far.”
She nods once. “Let’s forget today ever happened,” she repeats, then slips out of the car and disappears into her home.
19
MIA
I’ve never seenanyone laugh as hard as Simone when I finally tell the girls what’s been going on in my life. Simone actually falls off the sofa where she’d been sitting and continues cackling on the floor. She leans her head against the couch, wheezing, and finally shakes her head. “Amazing.”
I give her a flat look, which nearly sets her off again.
It’s midafternoon on a cool November day, with gray light streaming through the big windows at the front of the library. We’re above Four Cups, in the sanctuary that Wes created for Simone.
“I want to hear the part where you broke the chair and then had to have an emergency masturbation session again,” Simone says, wiping her eyes. “Priceless.”
“We were humping like feral cats. What else is there to say? I wasn’t thinking straight.”
She giggles, glancing at Fiona, who has tears in her eyes.
