Page 23 of One Vow

“You know what I really like?” She asked me, and I waited for an answer because when I pulled up to the stoplight, she kissed me hard and deep, passionate and wanton. Hotter than…anything I’d ever lived through. “I liked watching the video of us together.”

Oh. Well, there was a surprise. “Really?”

“Oh yeah.” She worked the button, then the zipper on my pants, and made contact just as I pulled the car into the driveway of the furnished house we’d rented that morning. “I’m ready for the reenactment.”

It was a cute cottage we’d contracted to rent and buy. It had two bedrooms, a kitchen, a dining room, and a living room. And if I had my way, we’d be reenacting that video in every room in the house.

Unfortunately, fate and her father had other ideas.

8

Felicity

At some point in my life, there would come a time when I made a conscious decision to stop humiliating myself for Finn Makenzie. But ten minutes ago when I probably would’ve gone down on him in the middle of the sidewalk in the business district, and he rejected me, I knew today wasn’t that day. And if he stayed in town, tomorrow wasn’t looking so good either.

And since there was no way to move past it without falling into a hole until I could figure out what to do about it, I pretended I hadn’t just made a pass at him.

“You want some coffee or tea…maybe some…” Oh yeah. “Hot chocolate.”

Back in the day, Finn’s passion for all things chocolate and doused in whipped cream was almost as intense as his passion on the gridiron, in the classroom, and in the bedroom. Although, I had a feeling his addiction to hot chocolate with whipped cream, sprinkles, marshmallows, and even cinnamon might have outweighed the rest. And nobody made a glass of piping hot chocolate as well as I did. I’d spent all of high school perfecting the art at Milburn’s coffee shop in York. And that I’d spent eleven of the best days of my college career learning all the best things to do with the aerosol can of Redi-Whip didn’t mean I had to put any of those things into practice now. Unless…he wanted to. Not that I would bring it up…on purpose.

He nodded and followed me into the kitchen. While I whipped up a batch of chocolate sweetened by the finest syrup Hershey, Pennsylvania had to offer, Finn stood close enough that I could feel the heat from his body, and I could smell his cologne, which should’ve been named after him since I could never smell anyone wearing it and not think of him. He was close enough to intoxicate me. And maybe that was why…

“What if throwing our divorce papers into the fire wasn’t an accident?” I shot him a sidelong glance as he leaned a hip against the counter and cocked an eyebrow. And even I didn’t know where I was going with this, I’d considered it more than once today. “I mean…it was an accident in that I didn’t consciously mean to burn them. I don’t think…but what if…”

I stirred the chocolate in the pan. “What if my subconscious knew you’d want to get married someday and this was my…subconscious,” one-handed double pump air quote, “way of making sure I got to see you again?”

I wanted a specific answer despite the fact he’d left me without a word, without any explanation whatsoever. But I wanted the explanation, too. I just didn’t want to ask for it, so I came up with the ridiculous subconscious theory. Mostly ridiculous.

“What if it was your subconscious?” He moved to stand behind me now. All I had to do was lean back and we would be touching.

Fucking hell. This was wrong. He had a fiancée. A woman waiting for him to resolve this divorce thing and I was…not a good person.

I twisted the knob on the stove and the flame died. Along with my hope for anything to develop between me and Finn. I looked down into the pot. The milk swirled and bubbled. Truth and insight weren’t going to come from middle of the night warm milk. I could boil dairy products until dawn, and it wasn’t going to make me see what I already knew in my heart.

“Then we would have to ignore it.” And I hated those words more than anything in my world.

Hated more that he moved to the other side of the kitchen island. Because no matter what my words said, I wanted Finn. I wanted what we had. And I knew it was unrealistic to think all those old feelings would have survived a decade and that we were the same people so being in love would make sense. I knew those things were unlikely. Unreasonable. But this was my life, my future. And I didn’t want to spend it living with less than I had with him. Didn’t we owe it to ourselves to try? To at least see if there was anything left? To find out if we could make it work? To at least know if we were still compatible. Jobwise. Life wise. Love wise.

I finished his cup of hot chocolate and set it in front of him. And before I could speak, his phone rang in his pocket and he pulled it out to check the screen. His eyes closed. “I have to take this.”

That was okay. I needed time to figure out what to do. I needed a plan.

And I needed not to eavesdrop on his conversation. But…

“No, we couldn’t do it today.” He paused, and I would’ve bet money on him running his hand through his hair. “It’s not her fault. We have an appointment for tomorrow.”

He didn’t sound like a man who was happy to talk to his fiancée, and it was wrong for me to be happy about that. Not that I could control how his surly voice made my heart lighter, but in my defense, I did realize it was wrong. “I know, okay, Beth. I know the wedding is in four days and I know you spent 30,000 dollars on your dress, and I know half the free world is coming to your wedding, and all I have to do is stand there and say I do. I know, okay?”

And now he sounded downright hostile. I hoped those weren’t his wedding vows. “No. I haven’t slept with her.”

The better question, the one I wanted answered right now anyway, was did he want to sleep with me? And what would I do with that information if he did? “Yeah. I know what you said. I’m not going to sleep with her.”

He didn’t have the soft voice of a man consoling an insecure bride. He was more in the throes of homicidal rage or at least pre-wedding panic.

And it was wrong for me to be happy about it. So, I stopped. Stopped listening. Stopped grinning. Stopped trying to plot my way back into his life. I wasn’t being fair and that was all there was to it. It was probably hard for her to know he was in Maine with his ex-wife when she was wherever hoping I would cooperate, and she’d get to wear her 30,000-dollar dress to marry the man of her dreams. And it wasn’t her fault he was mine first. It was time to let go.

But I didn’t want to.