Page 47 of The Life We Left Behind

No. I knew there was something there.

There had to be.

As the old familiar farmhouse came into view, I slowed the car to a stop. Because there she was. Lifting two grocery bags out of the trunk of the car.

I took in the sight of her. Committing the sight of such an everyday task to memory like it was the most precious thing I’d ever seen. I wanted to remember this moment, and I greedily soaked it in like an addict getting a hit of his favorite drug.

As I watched, a flash of dark hair registered near the doorway as a kid darted down the front porch steps. He sprinted to Delaney, wrapping his arms around her waist, and then took one of the bags from her arms. I watched in shock as she tipped back her head with a laugh that I knew the sound of without even needing to hear it. Then she ducked down, wrapping one arm around the child, and kissed his head before he happily jogged back to the house.

And my heart felt like it came to a screeching halt inside me.

Because this was a glimpse at Delaney’s every day, at the life she’d made with the family she’d built around her.

Of course, she had.

She left for a new life, and she’d found one. That was what she’d told me. I should have listened. But just like always, I was sucked back into her pull, powerless to resist the promise of a dream that would never happen.

This was just like back then.

I wasn’t the one she wanted. I was just a passing phase that she’d used to fill her time until she was ready to reach for something better.

As Delaney followed her son inside, she turned to close the front door, her eyes locking with mine through the windshield as she did. She froze, her hand clasping the door handle as the color leeched from her face.

Was her husband inside, too? There had to be a guy to go with the kid. That was why she’d left me, after all. All this time, I’d been miserable and pining for her, and she’d been building the life she always wanted. The life she left me for. The one she’d made sure to tell me had absolutely no room in it for me. I should have reminded myself of that before I got in this deep. I should have read that letter one more damn time.

It was good that I’d found out now. Better to know the truth before she could pull me in any deeper.

So, I slammed the car into reverse and tore back down the driveway without even a single regret. Well, maybe there was one, but I wasn’t in any frame of mind to think about it right now. That would come later, in the darkest hours of the night, with a whiskey in my hand and every regret I had in this life filtering through my mind.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

DELANEY

Ispent the entire day fussing around the house and yet, not getting anything done. My mind was driving through so many emotions that I couldn’t make sense of anything. Trace had looked so angry when he left.

I was busying myself about the kitchen, pretending to clean the counters even though I’d done it twice now after loading the dishwasher with the dishes from dinner.

Blake had definitely seen the coffee mugs this morning and everything they’d represented. Up until now, I’d managed to avoid her, which she didn’t deserve. She knew something was wrong when we got back from town, and I’d told her everything about meeting Booker. Cade hadn’t spoken to me after we left the bakery, and I asked her to stay with him. At least then, he’d have someone to talk to if he wasn’t ready to talk to me. I knew I was trying to buy myself time. Especially considering that she’d dropped everything to look after Cade for me and then come to Willowbrook. I was being a terrible friend. The only excuse I had was that I was trying to figure it all out myself first.

“So, you going to start decorating, maybe paint the porch, plant a flower garden, whatever else you do on a farm thatdoesn’t have any animals left? Or are you maybe going to grab an enormous glass of wine, sit out on that amazing looking porch swing with me, and tell me all your sordid secrets?”

I turned to find her leaning in the kitchen doorway with a smirk on her face.

“I’m…just about to pour the wine,” I relented.

There was no putting this off, and honestly, I didn’t think I was going to figure it out alone. I didn’t even know why I was trying. If there was anything that would help me sort out the mess in my head right now, it was Blake.

“Red?”

She nodded, then headed to the back door without another word. How did I get so lucky to have someone like her in my life?

As I poured two glasses, my eyes darted back to the doorway and the stairs beyond it. Cade was asleep upstairs. After an awkwardly silent dinner, he went to bed early. Not even a Pokémon marathon could persuade him to stay up with us.

I had an overwhelming urge to check that he was still in his bed. This wasn’t a conversation I wanted him listening in on. Not just because it involved me sleeping with his father again.

He deserved a conversation about what had happened before he was born, who his dad was, and why he wasn’t in his life. I’d put it off for far too long, not wanting to be the one to tell him the ugly truth. His blurted question to Booker was proof that not telling him hadn’t saved Cade from thinking about it, and I needed to make sure he didn’t twist this in his head until he was in some way at fault. I wouldn’t have these people hurting my son all these years later, even if it meant having to take on the whole of the Farrington family. I wouldn’t cower in front of them again.

I made my way out to the porch to find Blake wrapped in a blanket and staring out into the night.

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