The Doctor Who Has No Chance - Victoria Quinn Page 0,28
wasn’t who I hoped.
It was Catherine.
Her pale cheeks had a subtle pinkness from her blush, and she still had the same little freckle under one eye that I used to stare at for hours. She was taller than Sicily, even without the heels, and that had been nice while we were married. I was so tall that it was hard to be with a short woman sometimes, but Sicily made me realize how much I liked it. “Um…what are you doing here?”
Her eyes immediately filled with hurt, as if she’d expected me to respond in a different fashion.
Just this past Christmas, I looked at the floor in front of the Christmas tree and pictured the kid I could have had with her, pictured her sitting on a different couch with a glass of wine, making my mom laugh. I felt so alone, so empty, because I’d lost something that brought me so much happiness. But now, I didn’t feel that way at all.
“Can I talk to you?” she whispered.
“About what? We finished our conversation in the coffee house.”
“Please…”
The part of me that would always love her stepped aside and let her in.
We moved to the couch, and she pulled out a folded piece of paper from her pocket. “I haven’t spent a dime of it.”
“Dime of what?”
She unfolded the paper and revealed a check. It was everything I’d had to give her in the divorce. “My mom found that lawyer, and she instructed him to get every penny from you she could as compensation for my dad. I should have intervened, and I’m sorry that I didn’t. I never felt good about taking the profits of all of your hard work, which is why I never spent it. I want you to have it back.” She held out the check to me.
I looked at the line of zeros in the box, the money I’d earned busting my ass to provide for us, to give her a life that would allow her to work for a nonprofit and essentially make nothing. “Catherine, it hurt when you went after everything I had. But it was never about the money. It was about…the coldness.”
“I know… I’m so sorry.” She continued to hold it out.
But I didn’t take it. “It’s yours.”
“I want you to have it—”
“And I don’t want it. I’m doing just fine now.” I had a place to live, and my practice was making enough to give me a nice profit at the end of every month.
She looked down at the check before she set it on the coffee table.
I waited for her to get up and leave.
But she stayed, wearing a short purple dress with strappy flats, a black cardigan on top, her hair in big curls. And she looked right at me, deep into my eyes, staring endlessly.
It was an out-of-body experience, to have her beside me on the couch, when she’d been a mythical creature for the past year. She lived in my memories, but my heartbreak had driven me to insanity, and I started to question if those memories were ever real. It’d been a really rough year, the worst of my life, and now she was there, staring at me, looking at me the way she used to.
I knew that look.
Remembered that look.
Knew exactly what would happen if I didn’t get up and move.
But I didn’t move.
She leaned in, her hand moving to my thigh to grab on to something, and her soft lips hit my mouth with unbridled desire. There was passion packed in that initial touch, her fingers digging into my thigh through my sweatpants, her body coming closer as she moved to straddle my hips.
It was all organic and natural, like we’d done it a hundred times, because we had. But I also felt numb and empty. It was like watching the Super Bowl on mute. It was like looking at a watercolor painting in black-and-white. It wasn’t what it used to be, that all-consuming passion that drove us both mad until we were done.
My hands grabbed her waist and maneuvered her off me. “Catherine, you should go.” I got to my feet so she wouldn’t have another opportunity to come at me. Just a few weeks ago, that affection would have been irresistible, but now, it just felt…wrong. I felt guilt for a crime I didn’t commit, because I wasn’t with Sicily, and she’d made it clear she wasn’t with me either. I could fuck Catherine and kick her out, but I didn’t