Married To Her Ex

by Cantrell, Kat

  “I thought you were in Boston.” She refused to look at him. It was too soon after the trampling of last night, and her tummy wouldn’t stop dancing around.

  “I’m not going.” He crossed his arms. “You’re welcome.”

  “Oh, thank you, Your Majesty, for opting to stay here instead of jetting off to Boston.” Honestly, she wished he’d gone. Then she could have left without ever seeing him again. Why did love have to hurt so much?

  “Yeah. You sound really appreciative.”

  “The agreement is over. You can keep the patent.” She infused as much boredom into her voice as possible so he couldn’t guess how painful it was to say the actual words out loud.

  He sank onto the couch, his Guns N’ Roses T-shirt and greasy jeans a telling contrast to the plush, suede metro design.

  It was obvious now he hadn’t picked out a blessed item in this house with his taste in mind, which made leaving even more painful. He had been trying, in his own twisted way, with the house and the dates. It just wasn’t enough. Too much unresolved hurt hung between them with too little apology.

  “What’s this about?” he asked, a touch more calmly. “Is the thought of us being together really so repulsive you have to leave?”

  One leg bounced, almost imperceptibly, but the rest of him was rigid steel.

  Was he nervous?

  “Jesse, the thought of us being together strikes me about the same as us being apart. Impossible, either way. Being apart wins because I don’t care about the patent and therefore have no reason to endure this agony any longer. I’d rather be miserable on my own, making my own way.”

  Where I can figure out how to stop loving you, once and for all.

  The leg bounced a little faster. “Is it because of last night? I won’t make another move on you, I swear.” He held up his hand in the Scout salute, a useless gesture since he kept his word regardless of swearing on it or not.

  “Like that matters.” She rolled her eyes. “You ooze sex appeal the way normal people sweat in the middle of August. I don’t know why you ever shut it off, being a guy and all.”

  One side of his mouth lifted. “I wasn’t aware I had anything to turn on or off.”

  “Please.” She glanced outside. What was taking her sister so long? No doubt Jesse had driven well above the speed limit to beat Shannon to the house, but she should have been here by now.

  “Shannon’s not coming. I called her,” he advised. “So you can stop craning your neck.”

  She balled both fists up in her lap. Calling Shannon was despicable. A new low for Jesse-the-control-freak. “Fine, give me the keys to the Vette, hotshot. You think you’re so smart. Always one step ahead, right?”

  His smile was cool and smug. “Yep. And no keys. Because you’re not going anywhere.”

  “So I’m a prisoner now?”

  “Nope. You’re free to leave anytime, but you’re not going to.” Lazily, he crossed his arms, incredibly full of himself for someone who was about to lose.

  “I am, too. Right now.”

  She stood, grabbed her bags with one hand and Reggie’s bowl with the other, and then marched outside. He trailed her to the half-circle driveway.

  Ominous clouds billowed in the sky to the west. They were in for a doozy of a thunderstorm. Perfect. With her luck, she wouldn’t be able to get the top up on the Vette, and it would be a swimming pool before she hit the expressway. Of course that would only matter if she could figure out how to drive it in four seconds.

  The wind picked up as she faced down the only obstacle between her and the keys. “Give them to me. I’m not joking.”

  “If I handed over the keys, which I’m not going to do, but if I was, how would you get the car started?” His grin slipped. “Come on, Alf. Tell me what this is all about. Something had to prompt this exodus. What was it? You’re not leaving because of Moki, are you? He can be a little—”

  “It’s not Moki.” The storm blew closer and whipped hair into her face. Exasperated, she combed it out of her eyelashes. “Are you really that dense? It’s you. All you. You’re the reason I’m leaving.”

  A slow freeze took over his expression. “Is this because of last night? We talked. You said you wanted the patent. Is there more you’d like to say? Maybe a critique of my performance on the couch? You didn’t seem too unhappy with it at the time.”

  Carefully, she set Reggie down in case she lost her temper. “Exactly the point. I changed my mind. I don’t want the patent under these circumstances, trading it for something so dirty.”

  He went still. So still, she fumbled. “I didn’t mean it like that.”

  Sunlight filtered through the storm clouds, casting his face in a weird light, and she caught a glimpse of the unexpected.

  She’d hurt him.

  “Didn’t mean it like what?” he said, softly. “I’m not the one who altered the deal. I believe your exact words were, ‘If you’re home, I’m naked.’ If you didn’t mean to insinuate you’re buying the patent with sex, what did you mean then?”

  Stunned, she stared up into his steel blue eyes. “I don’t know.”

  And she didn’t, all at once. Everything had been so clear in her mind, but the points she’d so carefully considered were confused and upside down. Suddenly, she knew with crystal clarity—this deal wasn’t solely a way to manipulate and control her. He had some sort of emotional stake in it. But what?

  The realization resulted in an odd compulsion to tell Jesse the truth. “I’m broke, okay. So the patent’s useless because I can’t finance the start-up. You can keep it. And your Machiavellian deal.”

  “Ah.” He nodded. “This is all about money. Now we’re talking. How much? I’ll tack it onto the deal. You stay the rest of the contract term, and I’ll fund you.”

  “No,” she countered, furiously. Of course he went there. “I’m not taking your money. I wanted to do this myself, without any help, and the stars just aren’t aligned. It’s over, and I’m accepting it.”

  Hopefully, he would take it at face value and move on, but the odds were slim. Jesse didn’t know how to spell “defeat.”

  “Well, then,” he said.

  “If you won’t give me the keys to the Vette, I’ll take the truck.” She spun to reenter the house, when he blocked the path, arms crossed. The taste of ozone seeped into her mouth as the storm drew closer and the air darkened.

  “We’re good together, Alexia.” He stared her down, his smooth voice settling inside her where she couldn’t pluck him out. “You have real talent, and the Thigh Thing needs you. Think of this arrangement as more of a partnership if you like.”

  More business. Everything was business with him. She was sick and tired of deals and agreements and terms. “You’re not listening. I’m done. The patent is yours. Anyway, neither of us needs to be in business together right now. We’d kill each other inside a day.”

  “No. Partnership is precisely what we need.” His fingers curled into fists and clenched so tight, white leached into the nail beds. “I need you. No one knows me like you do. We balance each other.”

  Clouds roiled overhead, and a jagged line of lightning forked through the sky.

  “You mean I balance the bottom line. Layla will do fine. You’ll see.”

  “I’m not worried about the profit margin or who’s the best person to approve an ad campaign. Stay.” His voice dropped a notch, his eyes clearing until she could see the truth of what he was telling her. “I want you. Not Layla. Tell me there’s no chance. Say you never want to see me again. If you say it, I’ll believe it.”

  The challenge hung in the air, mixing with the wind until she couldn’t tell where one began and the other ended.

  “There’s no chance. I never want to see you again.” She stared him right between the eyes and lied. “I don’t love you anymore, and the agreement is over.”

  “That does make it more difficult then,” he said, his voice cracking. Wow, he was more upset about losing than she’d expected. />
  “Difficult? I’m leaving, Jesse. Please don’t stand in my way.” She clamped her lips around the scream bursting to get out. The clock ticked faster the longer she stayed, and desperation set in. “You were wrong. You do swallow me up. I can’t think when I’m around you.”

  He gripped her forearms in his strong hands. “Don’t lie just to prove a point. We’re meant to be together, and my life is empty without you.”

  It didn’t escape her notice that he was finally telling her what she’d longed to hear for so long. But it was too late.

  “Your life is empty without Outlaw. I’m an afterthought.” She laughed bitterly and twisted from his grasp. A gale moaned through the bougainvillea like an angry spirit seeking an elusive resting place.

  “That’s not true. I poured myself into my company for you, to provide a future for us. Yes, I left. I made a mistake, and all I’m asking for is a real chance to fix it. You haven’t given me one.”

  She rolled her eyes. What a convenient excuse—he worked until all hours of the night for her. A surge of hot anger spurted and spread through her breastbone. “What have I been doing here except giving you a real chance? You had it, and it didn’t work. Give up.”

  “Those words are not in my vocabulary.” Suddenly, he grinned as if just catching sight of a small, delicious creature poking a nose outside its burrow. “I want my chance. You owe it to me, and you have to stay to give it to me. I’ll take a week’s vacation and we’ll go somewhere. Bermuda, Bora Bora, I don’t care. You and me, with the understanding it’s the last time. If I can’t win you over, then I’ll think about giving up.”

  “Vacation? Who are you and what have you done with Jesse?” The threat of losing had blinded him, turned him into a raving lunatic. Maybe that was what she’d seen earlier—a really emotional desire to win.

  “No, I mean it. I’ll leave my cell phone here.”

  Now he was gunning for a straitjacket. “You want to win that badly?”

  “Yes. No.” One finger came up to trace her cheekbone. “I want us both to win. If it was really over, you’d have filed for the divorce. Alexia, stay.”

  Her name sighed across his lips in a plea. Or a prayer.

  “I’m all out of Outlaw repellant.” She sighed. He was right, dang it. She knew exactly why she hadn’t filed the divorce papers yet. And so did he. “Why should I trust you? What’s going to be different?”

  “No bargains. No deals. Just you, me, and most important of all, no fighting.”

  Now he was turning her into a raving lunatic, because the thought of a whole week with nothing between them but skin planted itself inside and spread.

  A whole week together. Just the two of them. Cell phone and Outlaw a thousand or more miles away. A chance to see if they could be with each other without a shred of leverage. Like their honeymoon, but better, because it would be longer.

  The tug of his plea held her captive. The beach and sun and a mostly naked man offering to make it all about her. The men in white coats with the rubber room were on their way to pick her up for sure. Because she was considering it.

  He was right. She hadn’t given it a fair shot, not that she would admit it. From the beginning, this arrangement was destined to be antagonistic, mostly because she and Jesse were more alike than she cared to acknowledge. They jockeyed for control because she didn’t like to lose any more than he did. What would happen if she shrugged off a little stubborn and tried for real?

  A small and fragile spurt of hope bloomed and she wavered.

  “One week? Then, if it’s still not working, you’ll let me leave?” she asked cautiously. With the promise of an out, she’d consider it a little more. This might very well be the same song and dance, and she wasn’t naïve enough to ignore her reservations. There was no way she’d come home from this proposed trip with her heart intact.

  The real question lay in whether she could actually make herself walk out the door afterward.

  “Promise.”

  Fat rain drops fell in a rush and chased each other down his forehead and nose, but he didn’t shift his eyes away. She searched his expression for some missing but vital clue to his real agenda. Jesse always had a hidden motive.

  There was nothing there but raw honesty. It shifted something inside, rearranging everything until she hardly recognized a blessed piece of herself.

  Really, she couldn’t blame last night on him. It had been her idea. He was trying so hard, much harder this time around, with the gifts and the house and coming home early. She wasn’t the type to find a man making a fool out of himself over her attractive. But it wasn’t any man, it was Jesse. Who’d said his life was empty without her and complimented her marketing skills. Almost poetry, or as close as he got.

  He needed her. The walls of her heart caved in.

  “One week. It better be spectacular,” she warned, almost losing her composure as Jesse’s face split in a relieved smile.

  The heavens opened and dumped sheets of water to the earth as he picked her up and spun around in a totally un-Jesse-like move. It was too happy. He released her gradually, and she slid inch by inch down his taut, drenched body.

  Before she could blink, his lips claimed hers, and the taste of him blended with the harsh raindrops to turn into an earthy heat. She would do it this way, with no agenda. It might be wonderful.

  And with no agenda, no interruptions, and the ticking clock of this one last chance, it was the perfect opportunity to tell him that she’d changed her mind about having a baby.

  Surely, a real second chance meant she could be honest about wanting to be a mom. If he was serious about reconciling and getting their marriage back to the way it was, he could prove it by accepting the idea.

  She picked Nassau. There was something second-honeymoonish about it that appealed to her.

  But agreeing to go on a vacation meant Alexia needed to go shopping. Apparently. Which she found out about when Shannon’s Lexus pulled into the drive. Jesse handed Alexia his credit card and shooed her out the door, threatening to punish her if she came back without at least five bags.

  Perversely, she wondered what that punishment might be. But the secret thrill of shopping with her husband’s money overruled the need to find out. Normally, she’d never take a red cent from him, but this trip was his idea and she did need a new swimsuit if nothing else.

  “How did you get roped into this again?” Alexia asked her sister as she sank into the leather passenger seat. The buttery texture swallowed her in luxury. Geez, what did you put on leather to make it feel like that?

  Meticulous to the core, Shannon checked the rearview mirror and carefully slid the gear shift into drive. “You have a persuasive husband.”

  Yeah, not a news flash. “I’m still a little mad at you for not coming to get me yesterday.”

  “I would have come. But I thought it was important to give Jesse a chance to talk you out of leaving. Like he asked me to.” She shrugged but didn’t take her eyes off the road. “Obviously he was successful.”

  That was the Shannon she knew and loved. Most of the time. Big sister knew best, and therefore, she’d agree with whatever Jesse cooked up because she thought Alexia should be bowing and scraping to the master.

  “He made it sound too good to pass up,” she mumbled, not willing to give up any more information in case Jesse had instructed her sister to repeat everything Alexia said. She wouldn’t put it past him.

  “The trip or him?” Shannon asked with raised eyebrows.

  “Both. Can we not talk about Jesse, please?”

  The real question was clear. Was she pinning her hopes on a great vacation to fix all their problems? Or was she open to the possibility of accepting Jesse, flaws and all, once they got back?

  That remained to be seen. They hadn’t even left yet and already she was obsessing over it. Unnecessarily. No agenda. The mantra for the trip applied to her just as much as Jesse and she hoped they could both stick to it.

  Shannon was the
last person she wanted to discuss that with. She’d no doubt be on Jesse’s side, regardless, and Alexia didn’t want to dwell on the negatives when there was a whole day of shopping in her future.

  The Galleria with its four stories of shops and department stores welcomed her with dozens upon dozens of beautiful dresses and shoes on display behind glass. Alexia nearly swooned at the thought of the no-limit credit card in her purse.

  Jesse had insisted she could buy whatever she wanted and had even texted her during the long drive down the Tollway to say so again. She weakened as she caught sight of a gorgeous off-the-shoulder geometric print dress in the Betsey Johnson window. So maybe she’d buy an outfit to wear to dinner one night on the trip as well as a swimsuit. But then Shannon steered her toward a high-end lingerie shop so expensive that Alexia couldn’t even afford to touch the door handle.

  “I can’t go in there,” she hissed. “The panties alone are like a hundred dollars.”

  “Which is exactly why we are going in,” her sister countered mildly. “I was given explicit instructions about what to buy too. If you don’t pick out some things, I will.”

  Heat flushed Alexia’s cheeks. That was exactly like Jesse to control even a shopping trip. He wanted his wife decked out in what he considered “appropriate” lingerie for their trip and somehow had conned Shannon into it as well. “What did he have to do to get you to go along with this ridiculous idea?”

  “All he had to do was tell me to make sure you enjoyed shopping for sexy lingerie to wear for your husband.” She waggled her brows. “And that in return, you’d definitely enjoy his thank you. You seem to think he’s got some nefarious motive, but honey, that’s just not true. He wants you to have some fun shopping, that’s all.”

  Of course it would look that way to her. She didn’t have to live with Jesse’s high-handedness.

  “He does, does he?” She firmed her mouth. Surely it wasn’t that simple, but she yanked on the door handle anyway. It didn’t burn off her fingers, so that must be a sign.