Page 27 of Rekindled Heat

"I think he might have been too harsh with her. I'll talk to her."

When I'm finally decent, we leave the bedroom, and I find that my little house has been invaded by at least ten people. I take a deep breath and steel myself to welcome them to my home.

“Hello, everyone. Thank you so much for this lovely gathering. I have missed you all very much. Please sit down and have some refreshments."

I try to go to the kitchen to help, but both my mom and Erik's mother sit me down on the couch in the middle of the living room.

"Tell us all about your trip, dear." Mrs. Carter says.

"Oh, you know. Miami has really nice weather. I taught some classes, saw the beach for the first time, that kind of thing."

"Ask her what we really want to know, Claire." Says Mrs. Pierce.

"Why are you back so soon? What happened with Erik? We don't see a ring on your finger." Mrs. Carter shoots questions like she is a damn AKA47.

"You don't need to be shy with us. We've known you since you were in diapers." Mrs. Pierce says.

Sam hands me a glass of sangria, and I sip it so that I can use the cup to cover my face.

"Jenny, what do you know?" Mrs. Pierce asks Erik's mother.

"Well, Erik is mad at both of us. He won't take my calls."

That gets my attention.

"I'm so sorry,” I say. “I shouldn't have involved you in any of this."

"You're the woman that's meant for my son, sweetheart. I was always going to meddle."

"Tell us everything that happened, Brandy. We'll figure it out together." Mrs. Carter says.

So I give in and tell them what happened in great detail, except for the hot monkey sex, which I keep to myself, but I'm sure Sam will get it out of me later. When I'm done, the whole room is silent, and everyone looks at me with sympathy and sadness.

"I told you not to go chasing around men—that it was unseemly and not done. But you didn't listen." Mrs. Carter says.

Everyone around me laughs, but I don't. No one likes to be told, 'I told you so.' I ask myself if she's right. Should I have settled for one of the men from this small town instead of going to look for the one man who had my heart since I was fifteen? Or perhaps I should have been completely honest from the beginning and just tried to seduce him openly.

Either way, there's no time machine to go back and change it. All I can hope for is that, eventually, Erik lets go of his anger and realizes that we have something special between us. Two hours later, everyone is gone except for Sam. We sit in side-by-side recliners and put our feet up.

“How much have you had to drink, Brandy?”

“Not enough.”

“Do you regret it?”

“I regret lying, but overall, no, I don’t regret it. I needed to know if we still matched after all these years.”

“And?”

“We do. We match beautifully, like two puzzle pieces that go together without force.”

“Oh, boy. You’re completely gaga over this guy.”

“Sadly, yes.”

“So what’s the new plan?”

“There is no new plan.”

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