Page 201 of Ewan

“Anyone wants dessert?” I ask, putting an end to this painful conversation.

“I do,” Ezra says.

“I do, too,” I mutter, pushing to my feet and moving away from the dining table.

“Excuse me,” Ewan’s voice echoes behind me as I pull away from the table.

The door closes behind him when I walk into the kitchen and spin around to him like a piñata.

“A son, Ewan? You couldn’t tell me you had a son? You couldn’t tell me your son was in an accident? And he was Colley’s cousin? Is that why you didn’t want us to have sex in the beginning and then changed your mind and said,‘To hell with it, we’re doing it’?”

“He has nothing to do with us,” he says, moving close to me.

I stop him with a gesture.

“Obviously. It’s not like I want to poke into your family affairs, but you’re related to Colley’s mother.”

“She’s Margot’s sister. Margot was my wife.”

“She was your first love.”

“She was my wife.”

“And first love.”

“What’s your point?”

A frown mars his forehead.

“My point is, I no longer know what this is,” I say, disheartened, feeling things for him I didn’t think I’d feel. “We did all those things…” I say, staring at him and trying to make sense.

I sharpen my focus on him.

“Why is he here? I heard you talking to him and questioning him.”

“He broke up with his girl. She’s not exactly his girl,” he quickly corrects himself. “They got into an argument because he was leading her on.”

“Like father, like son.”

Our eyes collide, a muscle throbbing in his jaw.

“That’s not how I planned for this to come down,” he says. “He almost never comes to this house.”

“That’s not the point. He’s here. It’s his right to be here. He’s your son, Ewan, and needs you more than I do.”

His eyes glint cold, and I regret my words instantaneously, but that’s the truth.

We can’t pretend we’re here to have some fun. Fun, we had in Florida.

And fun we had in the motels and that secret sex room in his brother’s house.

We can't continue to behave like there’s no one else in our lives. And particularly in his.

I’m not accountable to anyone. I have no family left and no children from a previous marriage.

Not even the ghost of my first love is there to haunt me.

There’s no one.

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