it on the counter. “Have your attorney send something over.”
She shoves through the door and is gone, like an earthquake that lasts less than a minute but leaves a year’s-worth of destruction in its wake.
I slump back against the counter and press the bottoms of my palms to my eyes, trying to quell the headache forming there. How did I ever fall for her act? She wasn’t like this. She was sweet and funny before everything turned. But now I can see through the bullshit, more clearly than before. What she strives for isn’t really important. Life isn’t about being seen in the gossip rags, or reality shows, or followers on social media. Yes, in my business optics are important to an extent, but I want people focusing on the food and not me. I’m not that person anymore. I want to spend time with my family and people I care about. And Scarlett is now a part of that.
A sharp ache twists in my chest.
Hopefully.
By the time I get home to see the girls, it’s their bedtime. We say goodnight to Clara and I ready them for bed. Then I go to the living room and try to breathe through the heaviness in my chest that’s as big as a boulder. I can’t stop seeing Scarlett’s haunted expression before she left. Like her heart was breaking, but it was no more than she expected.
I am not like one of her exes and I don’t want this, whatever it is between us, to be over.
My thumbs hover over the keys to tap out a text.
I’m sorry.
I backspace, deleting the words.
I didn’t mean
I delete those, too. A text will not suffice for this conversation.
Before I can second guess myself, I push the call button and press the phone to my ear.
It rings. Once. Twice. Three times. Fuck. And then—
“Hello?” her voice is low, the word a little fuzzy around the edges.
“Did I wake you?”
She sighs. “No. I was just lying here.”
“I’m sorry. About Marie and everything.”
I count her soft breaths. One. Two. Three.
“I’m not sure if you have anything to apologize for,” she says softly.
“I do. I haven’t even seen Marie in nearly a year, but we are technically still married. She’s been putting off signing the papers because that’s just like her. I think she will, now. It’s only paper at this point. This thing between us, you and me, it happened so quickly…. But still. These are just excuses. I should have told you.”
She’s quiet for a few long seconds and my heart almost stops before she speaks. “Should you have, though? We aren’t in any kind of serious thing.”
Her words are true, I suppose, but it doesn’t stop a lance of panic from shooting straight through my heart. To refer to what’s between us with such indifference…. The sense of wrongness grows, filling my chest and making my head pound.
“Aren’t we?” I ask.
“We haven’t,” the words catch in her throat, “we haven’t really talked about what we are.”
“That’s true. Maybe we should talk about it.” I know she’s attracted to me, but she’s like a spooked horse. And this whole thing with the restaurant and her food truck…. It’s an unresolved issue I’m determined to resolve to both of our benefits. I just don’t know how. And in the meantime, I want her more than I want anything else. I’m half-tempted to give her the parking space, my restaurants, my staff, and my heart. But it’s too soon and too scary to say those words out loud.
“Friends?” she asks.
I grimace. “Maybe something slightly more than that?”
“Friends who have the best sex in the known universe?”
I chuckle and the weight in my chest lightens a notch. “In the known universe, huh? That’s a hefty title to live up to.”
“Something tells me you’re up to the challenge.”
I hesitate. “And friends who only have this amazing sex with each other and no one else?”
She gives a quiet chuckle, and the weight pressing on me is nearly gone. “I think I can handle that.”
“Well, that’s something.”
We sit on the phone in silence for a few long seconds, just listening to each other breathe. I don’t want to sever the connection. I wish she was here. But I also don’t want to push it.
I clear my throat. “I’ll see you tomorrow?”
“Yes.”
We hang up and I’m lighter and heavier at the same time because a realization occurs to me, latching its tentacles around the weird feeling in my chest and sinking into it like