Page 116 of Divorced from Number Thirty-Eight
“Maybe.” But her tone tells a different story.
She doesn’t believe me.
“Want to take a lap?” I ask into the silence that falls.
She frowns as she looks up at me in question.
“Around the house,” I explain.
Her frown deepens. “He said it wasn’t safe to go in.”
“We won’t go in,” I tell her, taking her hand and drawing her against me. “We’ll just…look.”
And hope to fuck I can find something that’s not cinder and ash.
Something that reminds her she hasn’t lost everything.
“All right.”
As we walk, picking our way carefully through the broken glass, the shards of wood, I search for a way to relieve the tension creeping into her frame. “I was thinking about the game tonight…”
Her tension ratcheting up even further.
Dammit.
“Gray,” she begins, shaking her head.
I touch her cheek. “No, Red. I just…I’ve been thinking about what you said, what you’ve helped me see. Courtney and I…” I shake my head. “My feelings aren’t totally sorted on my part of what made us go so wrong, but I also know that I don’t want to—no, I know that I can’t keep living my life worried about what she’s going to do.”
She turns toward me, stepping into my arms, squeezing me tightly for a long moment.
“She’s going to post on social media if she wants to, the stories are going to get picked up by the media if they get picked up. She might show at the house, might make a public scene, and…” I shake my head. “I can’t do a damned thing about it.”
Her arms spasm around me. “Oh, honey.”
“I’ve spent a decade trying to prevent that from happening and it hasn’t made a fucking bit of difference?—”
“I didn’t mean to make it seem…”
I cup her cheek. “You didn’t do anything except make me realize I can’t keep doing this.” I sigh. “But the truth is, it’s been easier to pretend I’m trying to protect you from her, to protect the team from the crap she brings. Because I’m scared, Red. What I feel for you…Courtney never had even a modicum of it.”
Her eyes glimmer with tears.
I catch one as it slips from her bottom lashes.
“I don’t want to keep hiding and avoiding and living my life to not trigger her. I just…I just want to be us, wherever that takes us.”
Another tear falls before she buries her face against my chest.
“Gray,” she whispers.
I hold her there, stroking my hand up and down her back, feeling her tears soak into my shirt, feeling my own throat grow tight.
But eventually, we pull ourselves together.
“So, about the game…” I begin.
“Yes.”
