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All was quiet for a tender moment and then my emotions overwhelmed me. A sob escaped from my throat.
“I’m sorry! I don’t know what’s happening!”
“Shh,” he soothed, running his big hands over my back, “I’ve got you, sweet Willa, I’ll always have you.”
“It’s just, it was a lot, and a lot of feelings, and a lot of, well, everything, and…”
He chuckled beneath me. “It’s okay, angel, you’re okay.”
He continued his gentle ministrations over my back until I relaxed against him completely.
“There you go,” he murmured.
I sighed against his chest before pushing myself up to look at him. He smiled at me with his eyes.
“You look satisfied,” I mused.
He smiled. “I’ve never been more satisfied. I’ve got everything I ever wanted right here in my arms.”
“Lethal,” I murmured, “you are lethal.”
He drew me back down to lie on top of him. “Yours, I am yours.”
Chapter 28
Baggage
Willa
“They got married young, right out of university, and they’ve been divorced for almost eleven years,” Junie explained.
Minty and I pulled our chairs up and we sat around Junie’s desk eating our order from Spuds.
“So, what’s she doing back in town? Does she have a place here?”
Junie shrugged, “She’s taking a break from work, subletting her sister’s place while she’s away for a few months.”
I raised my eyebrows. Something didn’t smell right to me. “And you say they’ve been talking a lot?”
She nodded, swallowed, her eyes cast down for a moment before meeting mine. “Yes. She apparently has a lot of issues, baggage from the past, needs to make plans, doesn’t have a close family, blah, blah, blah. I’m not super comfortable about it but he says I’ve got nothing to worry about. He freely admitted that he loves her, and will always love her, but that he’s not and never has been in love with her. The marriage was a mistake.”
“It’s different,” Minty mused, “that they still have love for one another. Was the divorce a mutual decision?”
“I think so?” Junie answered, forking another spud into her mouth, thinking while she chewed. “He said they’d known each other since they were kids. She didn’t have the best home life. They grew apart in high school, ended up at the same university and got together during their last year. Tied the knot right after graduation and were married for five or six years before calling it quits.”
“He didn’t tell you anything else?” I asked.
Junie shrugged. “He said he wasn’t the husband she deserved. Said he realized almost immediately that it was a mistake, that he felt love for her but never fell in love with her. It still visibly upsets him that he abandoned her the way he did. That’s the word he used, abandoned. He told me as soon as he realized it was a mistake, he became distant and spent more and more time away from her.”
Minty replied, “That’s sad.”
Junie nodded. “It is. I wouldn’t have been so forgiving as she apparently is.”
I blew out a breath. “Me neither.”
Minty smiled her secret smile. “Sometimes you just need to call it quits. Staying causes more hurt. He probably did the right thing in the end.” Minty stood and threw her garbage in the trash. “Saying that, I would watch, see what her intentions are toward him. It’s odd that she’s leaning on him so hard.”
Junie sighed. “Yeah, that’s what I think, too. I was hoping you would have a different opinion because I think there’s potential for him and me to go the distance.”
