Page 67 of Surrender
I need to recognise that, and spending time with Gareth has helped me find some new perspective. I’m a divorced woman who is co-parenting with her ex. It isn’t a death sentence. It’s actually quite liberating. I get to live a double life, and I get to reclaim the sense of individuality that Callum siphoned from me during our marriage.
Now I find myself in a place with Gareth where I want to be bold. I want to be surprising. Hell, I want to bring a little kink into our lives! Candle wax and all.
I pull into Gareth’s driveway and type in the code to his gate. He’s still at practice, but he said I could come over whenever I needed to today since the turkey will take a few hours to cook.
When I finish hauling the groceries inside, I marvel over how only a year ago I was lusting after this house and imagining what it would be like to live in it. Now I’m cooking a freaking Thanksgiving dinner in the kitchen and I’ve been naked in nearly every room. Life can really be surprising sometimes.
When I step through the front door of my house eager to lay eyes on Sloan, my nose is instantly assaulted with the pungent scent of burnt flesh. I drop my football kit on the floor as a foggy cloud of smoke billows out the door behind me, surprised my smoke alarm isn’t going off yet. Waving my hand in front of my face, I quickly make my way to the kitchen where the source of the smoke seems to be coming from.
My eyes instantly land on Sloan’s backside. She’s hunched over the kitchen island wearing nothing but a tiny string bikini. I have to fight the urge to ogle her body because, from the looks of her, she’s not in a good state. Her head is bowed, hands covering her face, shoulders shaking. I look to the left and see a charred turkey in a large roasting pan sitting on the counter. It’s black. Really black. The legs have fallen off the sides and the heat wafting from it looks practically toxic.
“Hiya?” I state like a question because I’m terrified of the emotional scene I’ve just walked in to.
Sloan’s head snaps up. She sniffs in a deep breath and wipes away tears as she turns to face me. “Oh my God, you’re home already?” she groans and awkwardly crosses her arms over her stomach.
“Yes…Sorry,” I reply slowly, then tilt my head. “Are you crying?”
“No!” she bellows defensively. “Yes!”
“Tre,” I coo and move straight to her, my arms reaching out and pulling her against my body. “What’s the matter?”
“Are you joking?” she mumbles with a garbled hiccup as she hides her face in my chest. She pulls back and gestures to the turkey. “I freaking ruined it.”
I pull my lips into my mouth to conceal my smile. “What happened?”
She looks up at me with wide, watery eyes. “I thought I could go for a swim while the turkey cooked because the package said it would take two hours. But I must have screwed up the temperature on the oven because as soon as I finished my swim and stepped out of the pool room, I could smell something burning.”
“Bugger,” I murmur and hold her head against my chest. “It sucks, but it’s not a big deal.”
“It is too!” she snaps, pulling out of my arms and swiping at her cheeks. “I had plans, Gareth! I worked so hard on a fancy herb rub I found on Pinterest. It took me an hour to dress that damn bird. Now the one thing I was most excited about for today is ruined.”
“So we’ll go out to eat,” I reply, shrugging my shoulders.
She blinks a few times, her pouty lip so damn sexy, I’m finding it really hard to be sympathetic. “But…I mean, is that okay? We don’t do dinner dates. And, I mean, can you just go out in public like that? Aren’t you famous or something?”
I brush the comment off. “There’s a pub that does a great fish and chips, and it’s local so no one ever bothers me.”
She nods and swallows. “I suppose that works. God, I’m such an idiot.”
“No you’re not.” I reach out and grab her hand. “Now, command me to take these tears away.” The playful waggle of my brows brings a small smile to her face.
She looks through the doorway and replies, “Come swim with me. It’s the only room in the house that doesn’t stink.”
The corners of my mouth pull back into a smile. “With pleasure, Treacle.”
Sloan leads me into the pool room and tells me to strip down to nothing for our swim. Watching her loosen the strings of her bikini and drop the tiny slips of fabric on the concrete flooring enables me to finally learn how to enjoy my pool.
It has been mesmerising to watch Sloan embrace this control the past couple of weeks. She’s not the most composed, but there’s always a moment when that spark ignites in her eyes. The one when I know she’s finally letting go of all the baggage and stress in her life and living in the present with me. It’s fucking captivating because I feel the same. When she tells me to shag her from behind on the pool steps and begs me to pull her hair, it’s like I’m finally fucking free. She frees me of my complicated, stressful thoughts and gives me a sense of lightness I’ve never experienced in my life.
It’s dark out by the time we hop in my car and Gareth directs me to the Horseshoe Inn in the nearby village of Congleton. We’re both ravenous and grateful to get away from the stench of burnt turkey still wafting through the house.
When we pull up to an extremely old looking pub nestled in the English countryside, I can’t hide the smile on my face. “This place is so British, I could die.”
It’s an adorable white, stucco building that looks more like a house than a restaurant. It has a welcoming red front door and hanging baskets and window boxes overflowing with fall flowers. It’s exactly what any English country pub should be.
Gareth smiles back at me and hops out of the car, quickly jogging over to my door and opening it for me. “I’ve known the owners, Charles and Mary, for years. They were some of the first friends I made when I moved out here.”
He ushers me into the dimly lit pub, and an elderly hostess doesn’t even smile at us when we come in. She grabs a couple of menus and walks us over to a dark corner booth near an open log fire. The place is mostly empty, and no one gives us a second look as we take our seats.
