by Leigh, T. K.
“I wish I knew.”
“I guess that’s why I still struggle with what Carla did…what my own mother did. I’ll never let anything come between me and those two girls. I’d rather die.”
I reach for his hand, grasping it in mine. I’m sending mixed signals, but something about this moment, about being here with Drew and the girls, makes this feel right.
“And that’s only one story. I have thousands more exactly like that one…or worse. So please, Drew, don’t ever feel the need to apologize for anything your girls say.” My face brightens as we turn the corner, our fingers entwined, heading down the row of flowers Alyssa and Charlotte are now exploring. “Nothing should discourage them from saying whatever pops into their mind. And, if I’m being honest…” I tilt my head, meeting his dark eyes. “I think it’s sweet they want me to go to Disney World with you.”
He licks his lips, a yearning in his gaze. “And, if I’m being honest, I’d want you to come with us, too.”
We stop walking and I face him, smiling a wide smile. I don’t want to put too much hope into his words. I’ve made that mistake before. But right now, a part of me wants to believe they have meaning. “Me, too, Drew.”
We spend the next twenty minutes following Alyssa and Charlotte through the butterfly exhibit. When they seem to have had enough, we make our way toward the exit, my hand still enclosed in Drew’s. Everything is perfect as I look between him and the girls, who walk ahead of us, a map of the museum stretched out in front of them, arguing over where to go next.
As Alyssa points to the space exhibit, they nearly ram into a woman. Drew and I are so lost in our own conversation, he almost doesn’t realize it himself, pulling them back just in the nick of time.
“Lyss, Char, watch where you’re going.” He scolds them mildly. “You need to be mindful of other people when we’re in public.”
I turn my eyes toward the woman at the same time Drew does. In an instant, every muscle in his body becomes rigid. It feels like all the oxygen has been sucked from the area, my own heart squeezing, a pain in my throat. As I look to Drew, I know my pain is no match for the agony covering him as he’s forced to face the one woman who broke him, who ruined him, who destroyed him. And in doing so, she destroyed me, too.
Chapter 19
Drew
Everything around me seems to fade as I stare into a pair of brown eyes I thought I’d never see again, that I hoped I’d never see again. Six years of wondering, of questioning, of agonizing, and not a single word from this woman who was supposed to love me in sickness and health, in good times and bad.
In retrospect, the odds were stacked against us. I just didn’t want to believe it at the time. I was young, going through life with blinders on. Having just signed a ridiculously large contract for the hockey year, I was on top of the world. I was hockey’s “it” boy. Sponsors were knocking down my agent’s door. My face was plastered on magazines, billboards, t-shirts. So when a petite brunette sauntered up to me as I had a post-game drink at a New York hotel bar, her eyes trained on me and me alone, and asked if she could come back to my room, I was only too happy to oblige.
But I’m not the type of person who can just hook up with someone with no emotional attachment, at least I didn’t use to be. My mother’s sudden disappearance from our lives all those years ago affected Molly and me differently. Molly went through her adult life shunning all forms of committed relationships, thinking real love wasn’t real life, whereas I coped another way. While Molly ran from love, I ran toward it, clung to it, hungered for it. That’s why having to stay away from Brooklyn destroyed me. When Carla entered my life, I was convinced she was precisely what I needed to forget, to finally move on. But it wasn’t enough. No matter what I gave her — the house of her dreams, a car that turned heads whenever she drove down the street, jewelry — it didn’t make her happy. I didn’t make her happy.
We didn’t make her happy.
It took me months to get over the anger she caused when I learned she’d been cheating on me with one of my teammates, then left with no remorse for her actions. I’d just lost the one thing I was good at, being forced into retirement from one too many injuries. Losing her almost killed me. It wasn’t her lack of love that affected me. It was the idea that I’d never feel love again. All it took was one look at my girls to make me realize I would. They were all I needed back then. And they still are today.
“Carla,” I breathe, forcing her to tear her attention away from my daughters, my arms protectively in front of them, shielding them from her…her lack of empathy, her lack of compassion, her lack of love.
Overwhelmed with animosity, I don’t even notice the little boy clutching her hand or the man at her side until he speaks. “Come on, bubba. Mama will be along.” He nods at me, almost offering a silent apology. He must know who I am, why the tension in this small space is as thick as lava. Then Carla lets go of the little boy’s hand, tousling his hair as he walks away with the man. Is she planning on abandoning them, too? Will she wake up one morning miserable with her life and decide to start over, leaving a tornado in her wake?
When she lifts her gaze to mine, tears are visible in the corners of her eyes. Her lips part, but no words come. I should walk away, but I’m glued to this spot. It’s vindictive, but I want her to see how perfect the girls she tossed aside are. Want her to regret what she did to them, to me, to us. Want to take the knife she stabbed into our hearts and return the favor tenfold.
“Daddy?” Charlotte says, and we all snap our eyes to her. “Are we in trouble?”
Carla’s lower lip quivers, having difficulty containing her emotions at the sound of Charlotte’s angelic voice. She doesn’t deserve to hear it, to be near her, to even see her.
Seemingly able to read my thoughts, Brooklyn steps forward, pulling Charlotte and Alyssa close to her. “Of course not. Why don’t you two come with your auntie Brook and we’ll go see the prisms, okay?” She steers them away from me, then glances over her shoulder. “Daddy will meet up with us in a minute.”
Nodding, I offer her a smile, watching as three of the most important women in my life head away from the one woman I’d hoped to never see again.
“I can’t…” There’s a tremble in Carla’s tone. I whip my fiery eyes back to her. She always was a good actress. She made me think she loved those girls when she never did. “They’re so beautiful, Andrew.”
All the anger I’ve suppressed the past six years bubbles to the surface in the blink of an eye. I can get over the fact that she didn’t love me, and I have. But I can never forgive her for what she did to those girls.
“Don’t,” I bark, my voice louder than I want, but I can’t control it, not when it comes to protecting my girls from this woman. My jaw tightens, my fists clenching and unclenching as I struggle to work through the feelings rushing forward. “You don’t get to say that about them. You lost that right years ago.”
“I understand how you must feel,” she responds softly. Her tone is a stark contrast to the woman I remember her to be.
When we first met, she carried herself in a way that made everyone notice her. She craved the attention, didn’t care what she had to do to garner that attention. Now, she seems like a different person — reserved, aloof, withdrawn. While she once wore the tightest pair of pants and shirts that showed off her tiny stomach, she now dresses in more conservative attire — a sweater and jeans that don’t look like they were painted on her skin. Her hair, no longer streaked with blonde highlights, is a deep chestnut. Her face isn’t hidden behind layers of makeup. Gone is the dark eye shadowing and bright lips. In its place is just a subtle bit of color to bring out her eyes, cheekbones, and mouth. If I didn’t say good night to two little girls who bear a striking resemblance to her every night for the past six years, I probably wouldn’t have even recognized her.
“I don’t think you do!” A heat fills me, my heart pounding in my chest, a vein twitching in my neck.
“I made some
horrible mistakes when I was young.” Her expression remains calm, unlike the Carla I married who would argue over the littlest things. She got upset easily, but that was one of the things I was drawn to…her passion. The sex when she was angry was incredible. But a relationship isn’t sustainable on skin clawing and hair pulling. We’re proof of that. “My biggest regret is…” She trails off, her lower lip quivering.
The old Carla never cried. She didn’t get sad. She got angry. Closing her eyes, she draws in a deep breath to compose herself. When she opens them, there’s a glint within, moisture pooling in the corners.
“My biggest regret is abandoning you and those girls. We weren’t right for each other. We both knew that. At the time, all I cared about was myself. The only reason I even liked being pregnant was the attention I got at games because I was carrying Andrew Brinks’ baby. In my mind, it made not being able to drink worth it. Nothing I say can ever make up for what I did.”
“Six…years,” I interrupt, an ache in my throat, in my chest, in my heart. “Six fucking years, Carla, without a single word. Six birthdays. Six Christmases. Six Easters. Nothing. Not even a goddamn card.” My nostrils flare as I breathe in and out through my nose. Tears form in my eyes. Not at what I’ve had to endure because of her selfishness, but at what my girls did, although they don’t know it. I’ve made sure of that. “At least they were both too young to remember you. At first, Alyssa would say ‘Mama’ every time I walked into her room to get her up from her crib. Thankfully, after a while, she stopped.”
“I’ve wanted to reach out the past few years…once I got my life together. My sponsor at AA suggested I do that, but I didn’t know how, had no idea what to say. When I became a mother again, the guilt grew even more. I can’t tell you how many times I took the train into the city and made my way to your father’s café—”
“My café,” I interrupt.
“Yes. Your café,” she corrects. “But I could never work up the courage to go through those doors. I’d see you in there, and you looked happy. I didn’t want to ruin that.” She pauses, tilting her head as she surveys me. “And you look happy now, too.”
“I am. Because of those two little girls you decided were forgettable. They’re not. They’re my world. I won’t let you hurt them.” Acid burning my stomach the longer I stay in this woman’s presence, I push past her. When I sense her watching me, I pause, glancing over my shoulder. “So don’t get any ideas that you can be a part of their lives now, even if you’ve finally realized leaving was a mistake. Those girls haven’t needed you for the past six years. And they don’t need you now.”
I storm off, drawing in deep breath after deep breath to compose myself. The last thing I want is my girls to see me so worked up, wondering who that woman is and why she upset me.
As I approach the exhibit where Alyssa and Charlotte are oohing and ahhing over all the colors reflected on the wall and floors by the prisms, Brooklyn senses my presence and snaps her attention away from them. Dropping their hands, she walks toward me, her analytical eyes seeming to assess every inch of me.
Without saying a word, she wraps her arms around my waist, squeezing me tightly. I momentarily still, then pull her closer, sighing. I need this. The feeling of her warm, lithe body against me calms the fire raging within. It always has. Whenever I felt like my world was falling apart around me, she was the person I always went to. Right now, she’s exactly what I need.
“Oh, Drew,” she breathes. “I am so sorry.” She pulls back, cupping my cheeks in her hands. “I can’t even imagine what you’re feeling right now.”
I look deep into her eyes. “It’s okay.” While seeing Carla was the last thing I ever wanted, I refuse to let her get to me. I refuse to let the memories bring up everything I thought I finally buried. “Those girls are better off without her. They don’t need her. They’ve had a better upbringing than she ever could have given them, thanks to Aunt Gigi, Molly…and you.”
She brings herself onto her toes and places a tender kiss on my cheek. “Thank you.” It’s a simple gesture, but the feel of her soft, pink lips on my skin forces a tingle to run down my spine, easing my worry.
“Daddy?” Alyssa approaches, and Brooklyn steps away. “Are you okay?”
“Of course I am.”
“But that woman…,” she begins, always the observant one.
“She’s no one, sweetie.” When I grab her hand, she doesn’t protest. “She’s absolutely no one.”
Chapter 20
Brooklyn
By the time I pull up in front of my townhouse, the sun has long since disappeared beyond the horizon. I spent more time with Drew than I planned, but I didn’t want to leave him. After his run-in with Carla, I could tell he was shaken up, regardless of his assurances that he was okay, that she didn’t matter, but it wasn’t true.
When she vanished from his life without a single word, other than divorce papers requesting no financial support, he never got any closure. To anyone else in a loveless marriage, as theirs had become, it would have been a proverbial “get out of jail free” card. But to Drew, it was another thing he lost. As much as he wanted to pretend he was all right, that the pain of what Carla did was nothing but a distant memory, it was obvious by his morose attitude the rest of the day that wasn’t the case.
As I head up the walkway toward my front door, my own steps sluggish from the mere thought of how much Drew’s hurting right now, I come to an abrupt stop when I see Wes sitting on the top step, leaning back against the newel post. I consider leaving, maybe driving back to Drew’s to keep him company. A part of me worries he’ll have Molly or Gigi come watch the girls so he can go see the woman he’s been sleeping with. It’s a physical relationship with no commitment, but I still hate the idea of them together, of her touching him, kissing him, screwing him. I’ve never been jealous of her before, but now, it irks me, even though I’m in a relationship myself…at least I’m supposed to be. I’m not sure anymore.
“Where were you today?” Wes asks in a low voice when I remain frozen.
I hesitate before answering, then blow out a breath, heading toward him. I could lie, but I won’t do that to him, even if he deserves it. “At the science museum.”
“With him?” He lifts his eyes to mine and my heart falls at the pain I see. His voice is tearful, his expression slack.
“Who?”
“You know who.” He raises himself to his feet. “Were you with Drew?” There’s a subtle tremble in his chin as he pulls his lips between his teeth, his entire body seeming to tighten.
I hate that he’s hurting, but he brought this on himself. Even if he’s not cheating on me with whomever I heard on the other end of the phone, he still lied. I can put up with a lot, and I have, but I refuse to be lied to, to be made a fool of. I’ve already hit my lifetime quota of that.
“Not that it’s any of your business, but yes.” I hold my chin high. “I went with him and his girls.”
His shoulders deflate as he absorbs my response. “Why?”
“It sucks, doesn’t it? Expecting someone to be somewhere and finding out they’re not,” I bite back.
His spine straightens as he furrows his brow. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Don’t play dumb.” I slip past him, heading toward the front door.
“Play dumb?” He follows close on my heels. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, Brooklyn. Do you have any idea how worried I’ve been? I tried calling. Repeatedly. We all did.” He grips my arm, forcing me to face him. I gasp, about to berate him for touching me when he continues. “When I couldn’t get a hold of you, I ended up calling every hospital in the greater Boston area.”
“You did?” I swallow hard.
“Christ. Of course I did!” He releases his grip on me and paces my tiny porch, tugging on his hair. I study him, noticing how disheveled and weary he appears, a stark contrast to the put-together man I thought him to be. His tie is loose, his crisp white shirt untucked from a pair o
f wrinkled suit pants. “You weren’t answering your phone. You weren’t here. I kept thinking that something happened to you, and I had no way of knowing, of getting to you.”
I peer into his pale blue eyes, his concern clear. But is it real? Or has it all been an act? Reminded why I chose this course of action, I shake off the regret at the idea of being the cause for his worry, firming my resolve. “Why? Guilty conscience?”
“About what?”
I cross my arms in front of my chest. “About where you were last night when you blew me off for dinner…a dinner I was looking forward to, considering how little time we seem to spend with each other these days.”
He blinks, averting his eyes. “I told you. I had to work late.”
“That is what you said.” I lean into him, my proximity forcing his eyes back to mine. “After you canceled on me… I don’t know.” I throw up my hands in frustration. “I got this crazy notion in my head to surprise you at work. If you couldn’t go out, I figured I could at least bring food to you. So imagine my surprise when I learned you hadn’t been in the office since lunch.” I press my lips into a tight line, my heart shrinking in my chest. “Care to tell me the name of whatever bimbo I heard in the background when you called?” I barely manage to choke out.
He keeps staring at me, a deer in the headlights, his mouth agape. I can sense the wheels turning, as if he’s wracking his brain to come up with some excuse. But now that I’ve caught him in his lie, nothing can excuse his behavior. I should be grateful I learned the truth before giving my life to someone who would lie to me so recklessly, so carelessly. But I’m not. His lie makes me feel like a failure, like I’m not worth the truth. Like every other man has made me feel.