Page 113 of Zane

As the movie continued, Zane shifted his body so that his legs were stretched out in her direction and sank further back into the couch. Pre-accident, she would have curled up with him, stretching out along his side, with his arms around her.

Though she still had hope, her patience wasn’t as plentiful. She wanted to be further along in this new relationship they were trying to piece together. They might have only been married for six weeks, but it had been enough time for her to get used to loving and being loved by Zane.

She desperately wanted that back. They’d now been apart for the same amount of time that they’d been married, and it really sucked.

It was almost ten when the second movie drew to a close. They cleaned up their food, taking the leftovers upstairs to the kitchen.

As they were transferring the remainder of the Chinese food into containers, Rori and Lee arrived home.

“You had Chinese?” Lee asked. “Any leftovers?”

“You’re hungry?” Rori frowned at her husband. “Didn’t you have dinner with the guys?”

“Sure. We went to the diner before the gym, but then I played a bunch of volleyball and burned it all off. I’m hungry again.”

The lids came back off the containers—they’d really ordered far too much—and soon all of them were seated at the breakfast nook with plates of food.

“How did volleyball go?” Zane asked.

“It was good. Peyton is really excelling at both basketball and volleyball. He held his own against us. The girls decided to stay with the women, so Peyton was the only kid there with us.”

“It was good that Amelia and Layla stayed with us,” Rori said. “They helped take care of the little ones.”

“Did you two enjoy your evening?” Lee asked.

“Yep,” Zane said. “We watched some cheesy disaster movies.”

“That’s not exactly my idea of a good time,” Rori said.

Zane chuckled. “Yeah. I know that it’s not the most popular genre, but I like it, and so does Kelsey.”

“Bonding over disasters,” Lee said.

“That seems appropriate,” Zane replied. “Since we’re trying to make our way out of one.”

They continued to chat until it was almost midnight. Kelsey could hardly contain her yawns, since she’d only had about four hours of sleep coming off her night shift.

When she and Zane reached the landing of the second floor, Zane paused. “Thanks for a great evening. I really enjoyed it.”

“I enjoyed it too. I’m glad we were able to hang out.”

She wished they didn’t have to go their separate ways. But while she missed having him close to her as they slept, he didn’t remember having that closeness with her. Her heart ached a bit as they said goodnight and went to their separate rooms.

As she got ready for bed, however, Kelsey realized that even though she wanted to be physically close with Zane again, she didn’t know if she could embrace that closeness withthisZane. At least not yet.

Each day, she reminded herself that she had to keep moving forward. And moving forward meant accepting that she might never get her version of Zane back again. Somehow, she had to reconcile the two in her mind and allow herself to feel love forthisZane, just like she had the pre-accident Zane.

It was easy to say she loved Zane, but each time she thought about it, those feelings were directed toward her version of Zane. How she was supposed to mesh the two in her mind and heart was something she was still trying to figure out.

She wasn’t ready to give up just yet.

Over the next few days, Kelsey did some last-minute cramming. The date of her exam had arrived quickly, and now she was nervous.

She still hadn’t told anyone she was going to take the exam. Maybe once she’d taken it and passed, she would tell them. If she didn’t pass, she didn’t want anyone to know. And she’d pick herself up and try again as soon as she was allowed to.

The night before her exam, Kelsey had let the others know she would be gone for a good chunk of the next day. She’d have over an hour’s drive to get to Spokane, and they said she should allow five hours to take the exam, including breaks. Then the drive back would be another hour or so.

Her plan was to leave around six-fifteen, so she’d have plenty of time to find where she needed to be and get herself signed in.

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