Page 146 of Outside The Wire

“Holly Bear, I just fingered you on the couch. This is the time and place.”

“Yes, but?—”

“No buts. And since I’m no longer married, you know what this means.”

She leaned back, trying to get away from me as I moved closer. “You’re going to make a drastic change and cut your hair.”

“Nope.”

“You need to find a different insurance company.”

“Not even close.”

She stood and backed around the couch, but I chased her. There was no way she was making any excuses. “You’ve decided that you need a new vehicle and you’re getting a sports car.”

I chased her down and grabbed her around the waist, pulling her against me. “You have exactly ten seconds to decide if you want to live in this house or buy a new one. Then I’m making the decision for us.”

“But—”

“Ten.”

“Asher, I can’t make this kind of decision in ten seconds.”

“Six.”

“That was not four seconds!”

“Three.”

“This is hardly fair. You’re not even giving me a chance?—”

I kissed her hard, spinning us. We fell over the back of the couch onto the cushions with our lips still fused together. When we finally came up for air, I grinned at her.

“Looks like we’re going house shopping, Holly Bear.”

She nodded breathlessly. “Yeah, alright.”

35

JADE

Not divorced,but not married either.

The news struck me like lightning, making it impossible to breathe. Any chance I thought I had of winning Asher back just flew out the window. I had no claim on him. He was off living his life with the new love of his life and I was…

I was what?

Floating. Drifting.Nonexistent.

I came here to find my husband and instead, I lost him. He’d already moved on with his life. It was too late for me, and I hardly had anyone to blame but myself. His words still rang in my head like a bell.

You’re fucking toxic to me!

I sucked in a ragged breath, rubbing the ache in my chest as I squeezed my eyes closed. It was painful enough to know that he was no longer in love with me, but to hear those words cut me deep. To actually hear a person call me toxic…I didn’t even know how to respond to that. After all the shit I put up with in my life, the last person in the world I expected to say anything like that to me was Asher.

He was the man who held me when things were hard. He kept me together when I thought I would crumble. I stillremembered the way his arms felt wrapped around me, yet somehow, I was responsible for him almost taking his own life.

I swiped the tears from my face as I curled up on the couch and tried to reconcile the man I loved with the man he had become. Life had changed so much in the years since I last saw him. Everything I thought I knew was different. Most of that was good. I wasn’t in the same vile life I was part of before, but the one man I loved more than anything was gone. Was that the price I had to pay for escaping?

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