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“So, that’s your plan? Avoid me like you’ve avoided Sam for the last twenty years?”
Bile pushes higher in the back of my throat, and I charge down the hall to the front door, hoping I can make it outside. I gulp in fresh air as the front door slams behind me. With my hands on my hips, I exhale and inhale rapidly, letting the warm spring air calm me. Pesky tears overflow, and I blink, fighting them back. My palms wipe my cheeks. The lightheadedness returns, and I sit down on the step, bending over my knees. Once I’ve got things under control, I’ll leave. I can text Mrs. Duke and tell her I’m not feeling well. She’ll understand. After all, the entire town fucking understands.
The front door opens behind me. I don’t need to turn around to know that it’s Ian who stepped through. He takes a seat on the step beside me, leaving a good two feet between us. He rests his forearms on his thighs. I risk a glance his way. He’s staring forward. It’s a brooding, battle-ready stare. His ruffled hair and short beard look good on him. As does his moody persona. Crap. He must hate me.
“I’ve talked to a lawyer. I have rights.”
I close my eyes and wipe the tender skin below my eye, hoping if my mascara’s running, I’ll catch it.
“That isn’t the agreement.” Kara’s words fill my head. But it’s more than words. Her support lends me strength. “We had a verbal agreement.” And he’s a rat bastard to do this. Kara’s words. But I need to understand. That’s what a mature person would seek first. Understanding. “What, exactly, do you want?” A crushing resignation falls over me. Maybe we can get this conversation over before Kate and Oliver arrive. Although I’m not sure I can stand to be around them all this afternoon. “Have you told your parents?”
There’s no way he’ll move back here. I’ve thought about this, but I doubt he has. It’s hard to envision what a shared custody arrangement would look like with us living three hours apart and his work schedule what it is. It’s even crazier to be worried about it when I’m still high risk.
“No, Sandra.” He leans over his knees, gaze fixed on the distance, cheeks muscles flexed. “I haven’t told my parents. I’m an adult in my thirties. They aren’t my first priority. But that’s really all you care about, isn’t it? What everyone thinks about Sunny Sandra Turner.”
The sound of a distant combustion engine and wheels crunching gravel travels from the direction of the trees. Oliver’s red four-wheeler appears. He’s smiling wide, and Kate’s arms are wrapped around his middle.
Ian charges toward his car without saying another word. Which is crazy, because he hasn’t told me anything. I don’t know what he wants. Or why he’s angry. Or why he’s being such a rat bastard.
I jump off the stairs. I will not ruin Oliver and Kate’s big day by breaking down and crying in front of them. Or by vomiting and grossing them out. I express my apologies and reach my car as Ian’s back tires spin gravel.Rat. Bastard.
Tears blur my vision as I slowly make it down the gravel road I know so well. I roll down the windows and let the fresh air circulate. My heart aches, and my brain is awash in confusion. I don’t understand how it all went so wrong.
This was the plan. This was our agreement. And yes, I ended things a little early in Anguilla, but only because I realized how screwed up this situation is. Obviously, I ended things a little too late.
When I turn into my drive, Ian sits on my front stoop. He’s in the exact position he was in back at his parents’ house. He parked to the side, leaving room for me to pull up under the carport.
I stop in my driveway, behind his car, blocking him in, turn off the ignition, get out, and slam the car door shut. My hands are freezing, and I ball them up and tuck them under my arms.
“Probably best we have the conversation here.” He didn’t need to drive away like he did, but I’ll concede this is smarter. “We shouldn’t risk ruining Kate and Oliver’s day.”
He narrows his eyes and interlaces his fingers. “That’s one reason for driving away. We need to have this conversation. I guess you could say this is my version of a life M&M. Do you remember what that stands for?” I stand before him and stupidly nod. Or I try to. He doesn’t seem to register my response. “Morbidity and Mortality. I need to know a few things, so I don’t repeat this mistake. Did we ever stand a chance, or were we DOA?”
“Dead on arrival?”
“Is there anything I could’ve done differently to arrive at a different outcome? Or were you always gonna be hung up on—”
“Don’t you dare say it.” I point an index finger at him as self-righteous anger surges. Thank you, Kara. “You know I’m over Sam. You, of all people, have to know. This is not about that.”
“Really, Sunny? I was there.” He stands now and paces the ground. “I saw how you reacted to him. Don’t lie to me.”
“I. Was. Shocked.” He lifts his gaze, and it’s then that I register the hurt. A little of the surging anger melts. “And the ridiculousness of us being together became clear as day. The truth plastered in front of me. Olivia wasn’t comfortable around me. And what were we doing?” I hold my hands out, pleading. He has to see this.
“Olivia was fine around you. If you saw anything, that was in your head. Your perception.” Frustration seeps from him, which is absolutely ridiculous. Besides, this isn’t about us. It’s about my baby.
“You said you don’t want a wife or a child. That’s what you said, Ian. What is this? Why the about-face?”
His head bows. He clasps his hands, and his thumbs circle each other.
“I want you.” He’s speaking to the ground. I can barely make out his words.
“Ian. We did too much based on what we wanted. We should’ve never risked problems with your family for a secretive arrangement. When I saw Sam, I just saw our arrangement for the mistake it was, and I…” I’m at a loss for words.
“The only reason we were secretive is because that’s what you wanted.” His tone is cold and professional. “So, is that the error? Where I screwed up? If I told you I wanted a chance — dating you for real without an end date — with every single person in the fucking world knowing, would anything have turned out differently?” His head shakes back and forth in short, determined shakes. “’Cause I don’t think it would have. Let’s play this through.”
With a jerk, he stands and paces the ground. It’s easy to imagine him in a white lab coat, standing in the front of an auditorium, discussing the errors that led to mortality.
“Let’s say I told you I wanted to, well, bring you home for Thanksgiving. Tell our family that you and I were dating. I think that would’ve made you panic. And you would’ve ended things then. Probably would’ve gotten the same reaction had I told you at Christmas.” He kicks a piece of gravel and watches it sail into a thicket of grass. “Do you remember how panicked you were at the idea of my parents finding out that I stayed at your house Christmas Eve? You’re forty years old, and my thirty-fifth birthday was last month, but you acted like we were teenagers. No, I don’t think there was a time I could have told you without having the exact reaction we had in Anguilla. Where you shut everything down. Us down.”
