Page 42 of Battle of the Exes

I shake my head, trying to clear it. “I don’t remember any of that.”

“Because you left the moment she said she was my wife.”

My mind flashes to that awful day. A dark-haired woman hugging my husband, kissing his cheek, calling herself his wife. I thought it was a joke. Until I saw Beau’s face riddled with shock, then fear.

I asked if it was true. He said yes. I ran.

Beau frowns. “I called. Emailed. You never answered. I was going to reach out to your family. Then you sent me that package.”

I remember it clearly. The day I took off my wedding rings and shipped them with a note:Never contact me or my family again.

A painful hollowness spreads through me. “What happened to her?”

“She was allowed to stay. Got a job. Lives in LA now with her husband and two kids.”

I shake my head. “How’d she marry if you were still wed?”

“After you left, she and I filed properly.”

I don’t know what to say.

“Can you forgive me now, Ivy?”

His eyes are pleading.

Too many years. Too much hurt. Can one night really undo all of that?

Beau must read my hesitation, because suddenly he’s on his feet. His voice is sharp, but his face looks broken.

“You know what? Forget it. Forget that I spent weeks pulling in talent to help savethe Quill.Forget that I dragged the most annoying client of my career here. Clearly, nothing I do will make you see reality.”

He douses the fire. The flames. Mine too. The pit in my stomach aches.

I swallow, frozen. “What reality?”

His chest rises and falls with emotion, jaw clenched, voice hoarse with frustration and longing. “That I never stopped loving you.”

Chapter Forty

Beau

The tornado that is Ivy stops on a dime. Confusion floods her features, and I can’t say I feel any different. I wasn’t expecting those words to come out of my mouth. They’ve been buried inside me for years.

Her expression shifts from wary to something softer, especially around her eyes. Those bewitching, gorgeous eyes.

But all she does is shake her head.

I fold the chairs and douse the last of the embers, suddenly cold to the bone. “I’ll walk you to your car,” I say, defeated. Devastated.

And just like that, Ivy wordlessly climbs into her car and drives away, her taillights fading into the dark night.

Chapter Forty-One

Ivy

SIX WEEKS LATER

Mimi drops the day’s mail on my desk. “You’re going to want to read that one,” she says, pointing.

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