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When he told me he had fallen in love with another woman and wanted a divorce, I nearly died.
Growing up, you have this vision of what your life will look like. Everyone tells you that you can’t control the future, yet no one expects the worst to happen. Death, divorce, and depression were not in the cards. I started this life with a full house. As I played my hand, the cards I had been dealt just got shittier and shittier.
Finally, I met Will. The part of me that had been abandoned was loved again. Long before we became lovers, he started rebuilding me from the inside out by being my friend. He built me up. No longer second-best, I was the upgrade. My entire being felt valued again, and it was liberating. I became myself again. No, I became this amazing newer version of myself, and she was awesome.
I did so at the cost of another woman’s happiness.
The thought tarnishes every good feeling I have.
Mywoe is mesobfest is still going strong as I pull up to my parents’ house an hour later. I need to change and make a few phone calls, yet I’m shook by the sight before me. A Mercedes and a truck, both I know well, are parked in front.
While I want to cry in a corner, I have to pull up my pantyhose and march my ass inside because my ex-husband and boyfriend are alone. This can’t be good.
twenty-six
“WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN?” Tyler is on me as soon as I walk through the front door.
I toss my coat and bag on the table by the front door and look at my ex in utter disbelief. “You should be at work, not in my home.”
Will walks into the foyer from the kitchen. He looks handsome with his hair combed back, like a man who got himself ready for a date. “You didn’t show up for lunch.”
My hand flies to my head, and I close my eyes in mortification. “I forgot. I’m sorry.”
“You forgot?” He’s looking like a puppy, sad he was forgotten yet ferocious he was … forgotten.
Tyler ignores the look of remorse I’m giving Will and intercedes. “We’ve been calling your phone for the last hour. Izzy was at school, sick. They called me after they couldn’t get ahold of you, so I left the office to get her. Come here to find Romeo on the porch, all panicked that you didn’t arrive for your date. Maisie said you were accosted by some woman.” His dark eyes do a once-over of my attire, which is now dry but covered in a brownish-beige stain. I’m pretty sure my makeup is streaked down my face from crying. “You look like shit.”
“Thanks, asshole,” I say to Tyler, then turn to Will. “I ran into Allison. Oh my God, she is so upset. Correction: she is destroyed and has every right to be.”
Will holds his cell phone up and confirms. “She called, and that’s when I started looking for you. Why didn’t you pick up my calls?”
“She threw her coffee on me, and I dropped my phone. It’s broken.” I hold up my own phone to show just how shattered the screen is.
“Why is a woman throwing coffee on you?” Tyler asks with his arms crossed, then turns to Will, who has a furrowed brow as he holds my phone and looks at Tyler. “Were you dating someone when you two got together?”
“I was engaged,” Will states with conviction, and I internally cringe.
Tyler, on the other hand, finds this amusing. “The hero cop who my kids think does no wrong left his fiancée for my ex-wife.” His smug demeanor is even more crude as he looks at us with pure enjoyment. He raises a fist to his mouth to hide his obvious smile. “I knew you were a smug son of a bitch the day I met you. Wait. I remember now. You were there the night Melissa got arrested. You walked her out to me in the lobby. Do you have a habit of picking up women from jail cells often? Easy lay.”
Will takes two quick steps toward Tyler, his fist raised in the air and aimed for Tyler’s face. Will’s face is stern, jaw clenched and face reddening. “Watch your mouth, Landish!”
I thrust my body in front of Will and push him back. The veins of his arms are protruding through the skin.
“Please, Will, stop!” I shout loudly.
Izzy comes rushing from her room and stands at the top of the stairs. I look up at her. She’s already in her pajamas and holding a tissue to her nose. Will doesn’t seem to notice her as his focus zeroes in on Tyler.
“Don’t you dare speak about Melissa that way,” Will states to Tyler, eyes focused and threatening.
“Will! Don’t hurt my dad!” Izzy yelps, and Will throws a cautious eye her way.
His body looks like he’s been punched in the gut with the way she’s looking at him. Not as the hero she saw him as before. Now, he’s the man with his fist up to her father’s cheek.
“You’re gonna pretend to be self-righteous now?” Tyler threatens. “You’re not worthy of being around my children, and you’re certainly not worthy of dating my ex-wife.”
“Mom, you’re dating Will?” Izzy asks from the top of the stairs, and I nod. “I thought you were dating Dad?” Izzy’s question comes out as a cry.
“I am definitely not dating your father. Why would you think that?”
