Page 43 of Marcus

“When is that?”

“I don’t think it’s supposed to be something you just know, baby. At least, not for everyone. We’re all different people. Maybe it’s something you just do. It is about him, isn’t it? Marcus?”

Cella held tighter to her purse, hoping it hid the trembling in her hands. “I don’t know if it is that, or if that’s what I want it to be. But he’s made me think about these things, or at least consider them, when I haven’t done that before. He’s there … no one’s ever been there for me in that way since William died, and I don’t know how to move forward.”

“But you want to.”

It wasn’t even a question.

Her mother didn’t need to ask it.

Cella didn’t need to have an answer.

It felt like, in a way, that the answer was already there staring her in the face. She just chose to ignore that nothing was ever going to be black or white for her here because her situation was not the norm. No young woman should be forced to bury her husband before it was his time with a baby on her hip.

“I don’t want to feel guilty for being happy,” Cella muttered.

Jordyn’s bright smile widened. “The only person you need to worry about making you feel guilty for that is yourself. The rest of us? We only want what you want. And William? He wouldn’t want you to pine the rest of your life away—he’d never ask you for that, Cella. The only thing he ever tried to do for you was to make you happy. So be happy.”

It was such an easy answer.

A complication simplified like nothing at all.

Well, to someone else looking in.

But to Cella?

Not so simple.

Marcus Guzzi was anything but simple, and the way he just swept into her life when she was least expecting it was the perfect example of why.

He was the kind of man who wore three-piece suits with diamond studs in his cufflinks, who opened doors or pulled out chairs for her, and exuded control and charm with every conversation. Always the gentleman. Forever the most enigmatic man in the room. Respected and revered. He was also the kind of man who could make her forget her own name, strip her of shame with a heated word, and could make her beg with nothing more than his stare.

In another life, a man like Marcus would have been everything perfect for Cella.

In her life, though?

A man like him was terrifying.

“Would you watch Tiffany for me? Her booster seat is in the back of my car—just switch it over and take her to dinner. I’ll meet up with you after.”

She watched the windows again.

In her mind, she saw that graveyard.

“You don’t even have to ask,” her mother assured. “And say hello to William for me, okay?”

Her gaze darted back to her mother.

Jordyn only shrugged, though.

She just knew …

“It’s strange, you know?”

“What is?”

“To miss two different men for reasons that have nothing to do with each other.”