Page 45 of Be My Baby

Chapter Fifteen

Max fell intohis bed and groaned. His head hit the pillow and bounced with the force. He scrubbed at his face and sighed.

What a night.

He glanced at his smart clock where his phone docked, charging on his bedside table. It was almost three in the morning.

Sunday nights often hit hard, people staying back wanting to chat or simply hang out, seemingly having nowhere else they wanted to go to. He usually loved it, enjoyed the people and the noise.

But tonight he’d taken one look at Millie sitting there with the rest of the motley lot he called his family, who had decided to invade the Cow after the BBQ, and all he’d wanted to do was be with her, near her, feel her beside him. He’d managed to get away for a few hours after the crowd had thinned, Simon taking over the stragglers for him, and had managed to spend those few hours with Millie. Alone.

He scraped a hand over his face and stared at the flaking paint on the ceiling, making a mental note to have Candy and her father Mario come in and finish painting. They’d done all the other upstairs rooms, barring this one.

“I’m falling for her.”

His words splashed out into the empty room like stones tumbling into a pond. No one was there to hear them, least of all the woman in question, but it didn’t lessen their importance.

Falling for her? Rather, it seemed their unconventional relationship had stirred up the hornet’s nest and revived all the tumultuous emotions he’d so carefully squashed down from so many years ago. Feelings he was starting to hope—no, maybe think—that Millie might one day return.

He’d wanted to stay the night with Millie, at her house, in her bed. And it had looked like she was going to ask him, but then her gaze had caught on his left hand.

On his wedding ring.

She’d covered it well, pretending nothing had happened. Had smiled and kissed him, then asked him to make sure he locked the door. But he’d felt the shift. It had felt like a punch to the solar plexus. Something so small, so innocuous, but so damned important, that was holding them back from whatcouldbe. It wasn’t like he was cheating. Lucy had been gone a long time, but his ring was enough to place a very distinct mental separation between them.

And he didn’t like it. Not one bit.

He rubbed his face again, weariness trying to lay its claws into him. He reached over to turn off the lamp and the light flickered on the ring in question.

He brought his hand closer to his face and stared at the gold band. He hadn’t taken it off since Lucy had placed it there, not for more than a few minutes, anyway. It hadn’t been a particular choice, it was just how it had been. He’d had no real reason to remove it.

Until now.

He twisted the band and slid it down to the tip of his finger, then dropped it onto his palm. He held it up.

It was time. Past time, most likely.

He missed Lucy something shocking. They’d gotten so much closer than he’d thought possible in those months after they’d married. Something that hadn’t been a soul-deep love—at least not at first—had evolved into something so special, so intimate, that remembering her final days still had the power to eviscerate him.

But if he wanted a chance at the future that seemed to be coalescing out of the mist before him, he had to move forward. And he couldn’t do that with this wedding ring on his finger.

He leaned over and placed the ring carefully onto the bedside table near the base of the lamp. He stared at it a moment, his somersaulting stomach proving that this was a bigger moment than he’d initially thought. A final step in accepting that, while not forgetting Lucy, hewasputting that part of his life behind him. Choosing a different future.

ChoosingMillieand what she offered.

He blew out a shaky breath, but a strange acceptance washed through him.

“I’ll always love you, Luce. Will always miss you. But it’s time. What you asked of me wasn’t fair, or realistic. I didn’t know then, and probably won’t ever know why you were so against Millie like that. Were you jealous of her for some reason?” He scrubbed at his face. Surely not? “Did you think we would just forget about you and move on?” His heart ached at that thought and he sighed heavily. “I’m sorry. Whatever your reasoning, I am sorry. But Millie ismychoice.”

He breathed deep and held it, staring at his ceiling, not seeing anything as he mentally poked the parts of him that might hurt with the ring’s removal.

Nothing.

Nothing but a calming sense of rightness. The guilt that had chewed away at him had lessened each day, his father’s support and confidence that he was doing the right thing helping him to sort it out in his own head.

He and Millie got on so well, always had. And sleeping together had only brought them closer. His past attraction to her had only increased, deepening and strengthening.

Things were going great. If they managed to fall pregnant…

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