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Chapter Six
After an idyllic weekend with my girl, we collected Billie’s car from her work on Sunday afternoon, and Colby was dropped off at the house at 5:15 p.m. Oddly, Logan didn’t say much when he arrived, but since Billie had decided to keep her ring on, she asked me to keep their son busy while she went outside to tell him our news.
Taking Colby upstairs, I set up his gaming machine with the new game we had bought him as a distraction and realized this was how Billie had managed the arguments with Logan in the past. With Colby all set, he sat with a smile on his face, but within two minutes I could have danced naked in the room and I swear the kid would never have noticed me in there with him.
Slanting the plantation shutter in his room, I saw Billie place her hand on Logan’s car door, over the open window when she spoke. Grandma’s ring glinted in the late afternoon sun, and he immediately placed his hand over it on top of hers.
Seeing him touch her in such a tender way tightened my gut. Billie looked up at the window, I knew she couldn’t see me, but her eyes were blurry with tears and she wiped a stray one away. Jealousy tore at my chest as I stood rooted to the spot, willing myself not to react, and for the first time I saw the intimate side that had once been between my girl and her ex-husband.
There were several more minutes of intensive discussion between them, while I watched and waited for them to finish, and the longer it went on the more my anxiety tightened my chest. My insecurities from what happened with James and Charlotte unexpectedly gnawed at me again, and I empathized with the hurt Billie must have felt in her heart at being in love with one man and bound to another.
The rational side of my brain told me, It’s fine. Billie loves you, she won’t let you down, and my irrational side argued how could I hope to be enough against the man who had given her a child.
A heavy sigh of relief escaped my lungs when I saw him reverse out the drive, but this was quickly followed by another bout of anxiety when Billie had been back in the house for some time, and she hadn’t come upstairs to see us. Leaving Colby playing his game, I headed downstairs to find out what had happened.
The moment I saw her I knew she was feeling emotional about what she had done and rushed to comfort her. Turning, she bawled into my chest, and for the first time I considered the courage it must have taken to tell the man she had married she was marrying someone else.
“It’s okay, darlin’, I got you,” I told her, smoothing down her hair and kissing the top of her head. I cradled her tightly in my arms. “Did he get mad at you?” I asked, knowing from what I’d seen, it hadn’t appeared that way.
“No,” she sobbed, her breath hitching a couple of times as she tried to compose herself enough to tell me. “I think that was the most tender response I’ve ever had from him,” she blurted and hiccupped, before bursting into tears again. I continued to hold her securely, allowing her all the time she needed to feel ready to talk. When she pushed her head back and looked up at me, the haunted look in her eyes crushed me.
When I saw how hurt she looked, it tortured me to think I played a small part in that with her moving on, and I wished I could have felt it for her. Telling Logan she was marrying another man was another hurtful memory she would carry for the rest of her life.
“He said he hoped you’d treat me better than he did. Wished us all the best for the future, and said he was devastated with how he’d behaved toward me. I’ve never seen him accept responsibility for what happened and mean it, until today.” It was and it wasn’t what I’d wanted to hear. On the one hand, he was giving her permission to move on, and on the other, he was chaining himself to her with a heartfelt apology.
“I’m glad he wasn’t a dick,” I said, kissing her head and cradling it to my chest again. I knew my words sounded cold and flat, but in that moment, I didn’t trust myself to say anything else, and I couldn’t bear to see how his apology had affected her. My girl had been getting stronger by the day, but I knew her emotions were fragile and immediately felt guilty for pressing her for a date for the wedding.
“Listen. About the weekend, I was wrong to press you for a date. I guess I’m far more selfish than I realized. I’m not going to push you, Billie, I want you to tell me yourself when you think you are ready.”
Fresh tears immediately followed the sob that caught in her throat, and I held her again with a heavy heart and another new knot in my stomach. A thought came to mind about the mantra I chanted to stop me loving anyone like this again after Charlotte and James betrayed me.
Love hurts, no one loves without it leaving a scar, when you open your heart you invite pain. When I felt Billie’s small body in my arms, her head close to my chest, nothing I’d been through could have prevented my raw feelings of love, lust, and my need to protect; which had driven my compulsion to make Billie mine.
After some time, Billie pushed me away, went over to the fridge, and pulled out a bottle of wine. “Colby playing his new game?” she asked, her eyes flicking over toward the stairs.
“He is, I had him put his headphones on, he didn’t hear a thing … me neither.”
“I know. I feel guilty for thinking the worst of Logan. I had expected him to get mad, shout, and scream, belittle me or for there to be a threat of some kind, but he didn’t do any of that.”
“Good, after how he behaved at Christmas, you were right to be on your guard. I was concerned he’d blow up as well. I watched how he was with you out of Colby’s bedroom window.”
“I wondered if you would, I looked up, but I didn’t see you there.”
“Oh, I was there, Billie,” I answered, my determined tone leaving her certain I was. “Do you think I wouldn’t want to protect what was mine?” My reply drew a small smile from the otherwise destroyed look on her face and my eyes softened. “I meant what I said about the date. I see how difficult this is for you, and I’m not going to push anymore. When we do this, it has to be on your terms.”
“No, we’re a partnership, Sawyer. You’ve stated quite clearly how you feel. I’ve wanted to give in to you because you make me feel everything, I now know I should have the first time I married. Maybe I had to be with Logan to realize real love when I met it, and despite all my fears about the future, I know I’d rather have one year with you than not know how it feels to love you.”
“Meaning?”
“I said, May 3rd. It’s a date … unless it’s you that’s gotten cold feet.”
Stepping around the counter, I moved behind her and encircled her body in my arms. Dipping my head, I pressed my lips to her neck and felt her shiver. Smiling against it, I stole another small kiss at her nape and moved my mouth to her ear. “So, responsive, I’d be a fool to back out now,” I whispered, and felt her sigh as she sagged against me.
“Can we get takeout pizza?” Colby asked, standing at the foot of the stairs by the edge of the kitchen. I loved the way he ignored me holding his mom.
“No, you’re going to turn into a pizza, baby,” Billie replied, stiffening and straightening up in my arms. Stepping away, I watched her move toward the drawer where she kept the takeout menus then focused on Colby.
“How did your weekend go?” I asked innocently, wandering around and sitting on the counter stool beside him.
