Page 34 of Chasing the Other Woman

“You look terrible,” she says as I lean against the bar, slapping down the spiral-bound notebook I commandeered for note-taking. I glance at the page and see where I’ve jotted that Mrs. Baker, our fifth-grade English teacher, made contact with her daughter and is alive and well, if not a little annoyed her power is out.

“You always did know how to make a girl feel pretty.”

“Bet you smell like a dirty diaper, too.”

“Why don’t you come take a whiff?”

For a second, we’re two kids watching Twister in her Mama’s basement. I’d told her I was going to marry Bill Paxton. Later, I told her I came close enough when I met Brooks. He looked nothing like Bill, but he was a storm cowboy, and that’s exactly what I’d wanted.

Even back then, we’d had no idea that Storm Posse would lead to the money, the employees, and the sponsors that it had eventually attracted. Sometimes I wondered if that wasn’t where it all went wrong.

“You’re good at this,” she says, pulling me back to present day.

She’s right. My whole body hurts. I want to go to sleep. I want to curl up in a corner and watch stupid TV and have someone tell me that, eventually, everything’s going to be okay.

And yet, at the same time, I feel entirely in my element.

I look up at the plate-glass windows, the ones that somehow survived the storm, when I see him walking toward the bar.

Everything inside me shifts. I don’t even realize that I’m reaching for the bar top and gripping it like that funnel cloud just might circle back and rip me right out of this place.

Because there he is.

Brooks Carlisle. My husband. Heading straight for the bar.

From beside me, I hear Petra say, “Shit.” I ignore her as the door swings open and he steps inside.

For a second, the whole room feels dead silent. My first thought is simple: he’s beautiful. And just like that, I’m twenty-two again, about to fall for a cowboy who lassoes tornadoes. He’s filled out since then, more man than the boy I met. He’s favoring his left arm, his jaw shadowed with more stubble than usual. And the second he steps through the door, his eyes lock straight onto mine.

There’s no hallelujah chorus, or at least I don’t think so, but every part of me goes on alert. I nearly run to him and fling myself into his arms like some stupid girl who’s just realized she’s in love.

Instead, I don’t move.

He doesn’t move his eyes away from me. Not even when Hershel steps in behind him and says something, too low for me to register. Not even when someone barks that they need to close the door behind them. He just watches me.

And he doesn’t look at me like I’m fragile or I’m a problem to solve.

He looks at me like I’m the best damn thing he’s laid eyes on in years.

It’s a look I remember from before. Before everything went sour. Before he replaced me. Before I’d finally had enough and left him to it.

There’s a split second where I’m afraid he might turn around and walk out. Maybe he just needed proof of life before heading straight back to the chase.

Back to Luci.

Instead, he walks toward me, never once taking his eyes off me.

“Sam.”

His voice is rough, rougher than I’ve ever heard it. When he’s this close, I can see the circles beneath his eyes. He’s paler than he usually is. I nearly ask him if he’s sleeping when I remember that I don’t need to care.

Even though I do.

I cross my arms tightly over my chest so I don’t do something stupid, like reach for him. “What are you doing here?”

He ventures a step closer, so close that I can feel the heat of him. All he would have to do is reach out...

“I heard Muncie got hit.”