Unspoken

by Kelly Rimmer

Marcus raises his eyebrows at her, and when she remains stubbornly seated, he pushes her office chair out the door. She squeals in protest, and Isabel laughs freely. I think that might just be the most beautiful sound I’ve ever heard.

  “How do we stop this stupid pattern we keep getting stuck in?” Isabel asks me, as I wrap my arms around her.

  “I think we take it slow. We heal. We fight and we make up. And we talk. A lot.”

  “Maybe we need ground rules again, like we decided on Saturday night. There’s nothing we won’t talk about, we tell one another the truth and the whole truth, and there’s nothing off-limits between us.”

  “I love that idea. And then...when you’re ready?”

  Her gaze softens on mine. “Then I’ll come home,” she whispers, and I grin.

  “Then you’ll come home.”

  EPILOGUE

  Three months later

  Paul

  “PAUL, WAKE UP.”

  It’s very early Friday morning, and I am deeply asleep until my lovely ex-wife violently shakes me awake.

  “What’s wrong?” I ask, sitting bolt upright as adrenaline floods my body.

  Isabel is dressed for her early morning barre class, and she’s sitting on the edge of her bed. Her bed, because we stayed at her shoebox apartment at SoHo last night, and sitting because she has to sit on the bed to talk to me—there’s not enough room between the bed and the wall for her to stand.

  “I need to tell you something,” she says, and then she draws a sharp breath. “I want to come home. I’m ready to move back home. I mean, we’re spending every night together anyway and it’s silly for us to keep two places—” She breaks off, then draws in another breath. “But the main reason I want to come home is that I love you, I miss living with you, and I’m ready to come home. That’s it.”

  I blink at her. Then I rub the sleep from my eyes and study her—I see the anxiety in her expression as she waits for my reaction and the determination in her gaze, as if I’m going to try to convince her that’s a bad idea.

  Clearly, she’s forgotten I’m a genius. I know an excellent idea when I hear one. I grin and then pull her down onto my chest for a kiss.

  “Yes.” Kiss. “Please, Bel.” More kisses. “Come home.” Many more kisses. “I’m so proud of you.”

  “I’m so proud of us,” Isabel says, relief brightening her gaze. “These last few months have been amazing, Paul. Honestly, I couldn’t be happier.”

  We’ll see about that. I just smile and nuzzle her nose with mine. “Me, too, Isabel. God, me, too.”

  It hasn’t all been smooth sailing since Bel and I got back together. It’s taken real work to rebuild our relationship in a way that will last, including hours of therapy with Alison that’s been frustrating and difficult for both of us at times.

  But Isabel is worth it. And we are worth it. Sometimes our progress has felt glacially slow, but I realized just how far we’ve come last week when Alison pointed out that we’d had three sessions with her where she’d barely said a word. That was the day Isabel and I decided it was time for us to step back from couples therapy and to trust in the strength of our relationship again.

  That’s when I started planning for Isabel to move back into my life permanently. We’re divorced now, but still madly in love, and that means I get to propose again—something I’m well and truly ready to do.

  But I’m not upset that she’s suggested we move in together now. It just shows that I don’t need to wonder if we’re on the same page these days, because she actually tells me when something is on her mind.

  “I really have to get going.” She reluctantly sits up, pulling away from my embrace.

  “I might see you later,” I say tenderly. She brushes her lips against mine.

  “Tonight?”

  “Sure,” I say noncommittally, because I have a feeling it will be a little sooner than that.

  Isabel

  JESS WANTS TO go shopping for baby clothes to surprise Abby and Marcus. This makes little to no sense, as Abby is with us, and is neither in the mood for shopping nor walking through this busy mall Jess wanted to visit. And as for me, I’m still floating along on cloud nine after the discussion I had with Paul before work this morning. Truthfully, I’d much rather be home packing, but Jess was adamant, and an adamant Jess is a very difficult person to refuse. Even for Abby, who’s been holed up in her apartment complaining about the heat for the last few weeks.

  “But why today?” Abby asks, or rather moans as she waddles along between Jess and me. She’s now twenty-seven weeks pregnant with twins and, although radiant, starting to feel the strain on her body. “I just don’t understand why it has to be this afternoon. Can’t we just go get ice-cream sundaes and shop online while we eat them?”

  “That’s not a bad idea,” Jess says thoughtfully as she scans the busy mall around us. She seems to find what she’s looking for, because she suddenly changes direction. “Okay, I think there’s an ice-cream store down this way—”

  “Wait,” I interrupt her. “You dragged us both out on this crazy hot afternoon because you had to go shopping, and before we even visit a single store, you decide you can do it online after all?”

  “What can I say?” Jess shrugs, looping arms through mine and Abby’s and pulling us gently forward. “I’m a fickle, fickle woman.”

  Music starts playing from somewhere to our left, and although I ignore it at first, Jess stops walking, and our elbows are linked, so I don’t have much choice but to stop, too. We turn toward the sound, and I see a lone woman dancing in the crowd. A few bars later, a second woman joins her, and then two men begin to perform the careful choreography, too.

  “Oh my God, you guys! It’s a flash mob!” Abby exclaims.

  The group is facing away from us at first, but as it swells in size and the song winds on, it slowly shifts until the troupe of dancers is performing like they are on a stage, and Abby, Jess and I are right in the front row of the audience. I’m completely taken by the performance. It’s clearly a professional troupe, because each and every dancer moves with the kind of grace and fluidity that only comes from years of disciplined study. I only wish my Thursday afternoon octogenarian ballet dancers were here to see this, because it really is a sight to behold.

  “I always wanted to see a flash mob,” I murmur absentmindedly to Abby.

  She grins at me as she nods. “This is amazing. It looks like they’re performing for us. We’re in exactly the right spot for the best view!”

  “Yeah,” I agree, but that gives me pause. “We really are...” I glance at Jess. “Did you know this was happening?”

  Jess gives me a very convincing what are you on about? look, so I relax and go back to enjoying the performance. The song reaches a crescendo, and the dancers part to make way for...

  Paul.

  My ex-husband-now-boyfriend is not exactly a natural dancer, but he is an exceptionally disciplined man. I know immediately that a lot of work has gone into learning this routine, because while he’s not quite keeping up with the rest of the mob, he is dancing as if he’s been doing it for years.

  “How did he find time for this?” I ask Jess, without breaking my gaze away from Paul. He’s only a part of the flash mob for the last segment of the song, but he lands every step in perfect time, a model of intense focus and concentration.

  Jess wraps her arm around my waist and rests her head on my shoulder. “You know how he’s going to take on that strategy role, so he could cut back his schedule?”

  “Yes?”

  “He promoted Audrey to development manager and cut back his working week as soon as you guys got back together. He’s been preparing for this ever since.”

  My throat feels tight. To think that once upon a time, I doubted that I was a priority in this man’s life. To think that not so long ago, he struggled to express how import
ant I was to him. And now here he is, working for months in secrecy to surprise me...wearing his heart on his sleeve in public like this...

  I’d like to say I can’t believe how lucky I am—but luck doesn’t get you where Paul and I are now. No, we’ve built a solid foundation together over the last few months through consistent effort and sometimes, plain old hard work. Paul has more than proven that our relationship is his highest priority since we came back from that long weekend at Greenport, and that was even before he joined a flash mob just to surprise me.

  Now, I scan the crowd, and discover that my octogenarians are on the other side, along with my under-nineties basketball team, pretty much everyone from Martin’s building, and Nick, and not far from him, even Emma and Noah are watching with blinding grins on their faces. As for Martin, he’s standing next to Elspeth, holding up an iPad. I don’t think he realizes there are two cameras, because he’s holding the tablet with the screen facing away from him. That means I can see that he’s FaceTimed Paul’s brother Jake in, and it also means that Martin can’t see that Jake is rubbing his forehead wearily—because Martin has his finger over the lens. It appears that Martin, much like his son, is only a genius when it comes to a very specific set of tasks.

  I burst out laughing, just as I hear Abby gasp, “Did you know this was happening, Marcus?”

  “Yep,” Marcus laughs from behind us.

  “How could you keep this a secret from me!” Abby exclaims.

  “Well, Abs, Paul wanted to keep it a surprise for Izzy, so we all agreed it was best to let Jess handle the subterfuge,” Marcus laughs again.

  “I can’t believe he did this for me,” I whisper.

  “You know how much I hate true love and all of that shit,” Jess says softly.

  “So you say.” Abby snorts. “You seem to go to a lot of trouble to foster it.”

  “I’m a fourth-generation meddler, Abby. It’s what I do.” Jess shrugs, but then she hugs me again. “I’m not really sure there’s anything Paul wouldn’t do for you, Isabel. It’s enough to warm the cockles of my ice-cold heart.”

  As the final bars of the song play, the dance troupe fades back into the crowd, until Paul is the only person in the space they’ve left behind. As the song finishes and when silence falls at last, Paul simply walks up to me and places a single kiss on my cheek.

  “I love you,” he says softly.

  “Marry me,” I blurt.

  Beside me, Abby squeals with joy and Jess bursts out laughing. I glance at Jess, then back to Paul, suddenly flustered in case I’ve stolen his thunder. “Sorry. Shit. Wait. Were you about to—”

  “No,” he laughs, “I actually wasn’t.”

  “Oh.”

  “Don’t get me wrong.” He takes me into his arms. “I’m totally up for marrying you again. I was going to ask you later tonight when we were alone, so we could talk it through and be sure it’s what we both want. There really was no hidden agenda for this flash mob thing.” He shrugs as if it was nothing. “I just wanted to be a part of making one of your dreams come true.”

  A somewhat undignified sob bursts from my throat, and I throw my arms around his neck and kiss him. There’s a relieved cheer from the crowd around us, who seemed a bit confused by the anticlimactic ending.

  Beside us, Abby is now in floods of tears. Martin and Elspeth have joined us, and I’m vaguely aware that Jess is trying to convince them she’s not crying. Apparently, she’s just got some dust in her eye “from this filthy mall.” But that’s all vague noise around us, and I only have eyes for Paul.

  “So, I get to marry you again?” he asks me, linking his arms around my waist.

  “This will be the last time, so we better do it right.”

  “Our anniversary is next month. Maybe we should get married on the same day so I don’t forget the date.”

  “As if that would ever happen,” I laugh gently, then I kiss him again because I can’t seem to stop.

  “I can’t wait to spend the rest of my life with you, Isabel,” Paul says, suddenly sobering.

  “I feel exactly the same way.”

  Two people come together when they fall in love—they try to smash together different histories and personalities and experiences to create one shared life. If I’ve learned anything in the last few years, it’s that falling in love can be easy, but staying in love takes work. It’s hard and it’s messy sometimes; there are no shortcuts in building a life together.

  Lucky for me, I have the perfect partner in this project we call life. He’s great at math, getting better all the time at communicating, and 100 percent mine.

  * * *

  If you fell hard for Isabel & Paul, turn the page for a preview of Jessica & Jake’s story,

  Undone,

  another in Kelly Rimmer’s bestselling Start Up in the City series from HQN Books.

  Undone

  by Kelly Rimmer

  CHAPTER ONE

  Jessica

  MY FRIEND ISABEL has big blue eyes and natural curls in a startling shade of ash blond. She’s recently turned thirty-five, but she looks much younger even on rare occasions like this one, when she’s wearing a full face of makeup. I think her antiaging secret is her wholesome lifestyle, which is obviously an extreme measure and not one I’d ever be willing to try myself. I’m thirty-five too, but when I’m not wearing makeup, I look like an aged, freckled version of Pippi Longstocking, if Pippi partied way too much in her twenties.

  It’s fair to say that Isabel and I are the unlikeliest of friends. She’s sweet, I’m sharp. She’s kind and gentle and softhearted, I’m...well, I’m just not. We’ve had a lot of great times together, but we also have very different approaches to life, and every now and again I wonder why she puts up with me at all. What I don’t wonder about is why I’ve kept her around. Izzy is the lite version of humanity—all of the goodness, few calories. She is easy to love and, for the most part, quite uncomplicated when it comes to her friends—a rare trait, and one I value highly.

  I’d be lost without her. Completely, hopelessly lost.

  Right now, maybe for the first time ever, I wish that Isabel wasn’t an exceptional human being. In fact, I’m wishing that last year when she abruptly decided to divorce my business partner Paul, I’d have done what I usually do when people around me do something stupid—and told her exactly what I was thinking. If I’d been harsh enough, she’d probably have cut me out of her life. Yes, I’d have been lost and miserable and sad and I’d have missed her forever, but then again, even feeling miserable and lost and sad would have been preferable to what I’m feeling right now.

  Izzy and Paul sorted their shit out—only, this happened just a little too late to stop the divorce, and now they want to get remarried. So here we all are, at their brownstone in Chelsea for the rehearsal dinner before their second wedding takes place tomorrow. There are fairy lights and candles and big vases of fragrant white roses on the long table that centers their dining room. There’s soft orchestral music playing on the speakers. Isabel and Paul are both radiant. It’s all so joyous and romantic that it makes me a little ill.

  Don’t get me wrong: I’m utterly delighted that they sorted their shit out and they’re both happy again. It’s just that all of this haste and love and joy and renewal means that instead of ordering my first wine for the night in a bar somewhere and scanning the room for a companion, I’m sitting here swilling champagne like it’s water and watching the door as if it’s about to burst open to reveal some kind of Jess-Cohen-kryptonite.

  Which it kind of is.

  Because Paul’s brother Jake is due to arrive any second now, fresh off a flight from the West Coast, where he now lives.

  “What’s up with you?” The voice belongs to Marcus, my other business partner, who’s sitting to my right. He speaks quietly—keeping his voice low, no doubt so as not to upset the other members of the w
edding party. Paul and Isabel are opposite me, and Abby, Marcus’s fiancée, is in the restroom. She’s very pregnant with twins. As far as I can tell, being very pregnant with twins means you spend half your time looking exhausted and terrified, and the other half peeing.

  “What’s up with you?” I snap at him unthinkingly, and he slowly raises an eyebrow.

  “Ho-ly shit,” he whistles.

  “What?”

  “Jessica Cohen—are you upset about something?” The incredulity in his tone suggests that the very idea of this is impossible. I’m kind of pleased that I’ve managed to fool him into thinking I really am some kind of superwoman, and also immediately depressed that one of my best friends has no idea I have any emotional depth at all.

  “Mind your own damn business, Marcus.”

  His expression grows serious, and he leans even closer to whisper, “Is everything okay?”

  “Everything’s fine.”

  “Things are clearly not fine,” Marcus says, frowning. He glances down at my hands, and I realize I’m tapping the table. I stop, but as soon as I do, my knee starts to bounce.

  “Seriously, Marcus, leave it,” I whisper it back to him, but the words come out as a half growl, half hiss, and he winces.

  “Okay, okay,” he says, raising his hands in surrender. Just then, the doorbell rings and my heart is suddenly beating so hard and so fast I feel a little faint. I have butterflies in my tummy, and in my back. That’s not normal. Maybe I need medical attention.

  Isabel squeals and stands.

  “That’ll be Jake!”

  And off she goes to answer the door, while I try to figure out just how upset Isabel and Paul would be if I tell them I can’t stay for their rehearsal dinner. But what would be a big enough excuse to justify such a dick move? I can’t say it’s a date, that would make me a bitch. What else is there? Why didn’t I come up with an excuse earlier?

  Aaaand...now it’s too late.