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He hummed, tucking a hand into the side pocket of his gym bag. “It’s a special one. You can only use it one place.”
Mira started tugging on his arm. “Where is it?”
With a soft chuckle, he pulled his hand from the bag. Mira’s eyes widened, and I couldn’t help my smile.
It was a rubber duck painted with the British flag.
I vacillated wildly between wanting to hug him, wanting to kiss him, and wanting to tear his clothes off. Maybe all three in rapid succession.
Mira’s eyes sparkled. “It’s blue,” she whispered. “It’s so pretty.”
“You know what ducks do when it’s really bloody hot out?”
“What?”
Liam leaned in. “They go swimming. That’s your pool duck, and if you want to play with it, you gotta get in. Go put your suit on.”
He blew a raspberry on her neck, eliciting giggles as he set her down.
“Zoe swimmin’ too?” she asked.
Liam glanced over at me.
“I have to go next door. I’ll be back soon.”
She zoomed off to her room to change, and I exhaled a wondering laugh. “A pool duck,” I said quietly. “Genius.”
He grunted. “Should’ve thought of it sooner.” His eyes met mine. “Don’t you have to go?”
Slowly, I nodded.
Liam didn’t say anything else as I left. Neither did I.
The cord of tension between us had steadily grown and grown, thickened dramatically by the kiss and jerked tight after this morning in Carol’s office. It felt impossible that this cord had enough slack for me to go next door and do whatever it was he was encouraging me to do.
I didn’t walk through the back of the house, deciding instead to cross the front yard.
Tyler was sitting on the step, his smile friendly as I approached. “Good to see you,” he said.
“You too.” I studied him as he straightened. He was so nice. Always had been. His blue eyes were friendly, his manner polite and sweet.
“You staying there?” he asked, tilting his head toward the house next door.
I nodded. “I have been for a while. Mira is more comfortable there,” I said. “And it’s easier with both of us under one roof.”
“Makes sense.” He blew out a slow breath, studying the navy-blue sweatshirt in his hand before carefully handing it back.
The letters on the back of the sweatshirt were the only visible part, and my heart wrenched with a painful thump when I brushed my thumb over them.
A lot of things made sense now, had been made clearer by the passage of time. Circumstances that I had no control over. And some that I did. Changes that had happened so slowly I’d hardly noticed them.
Thoughts tumbled around in my head. But this wasn’t the person I wanted to talk through them with.
That person was next door, in the pool with a plastic duck that he’d bought to make it easier for our little girl to learn how to swim.
“Thank you, Tyler,” I said quietly. I smiled up into his face. “You have no idea how much I needed this.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
