by Flynn, Avery
He doesn’t interrupt me once, but as I wind down, he leans forward and places his large, warm hand over mine on the table. “I’m sorry.”
My eyebrows shoot up. “Why are you apologizing? I was the one who neglected my aunt.”
He leans back again, and his gaze softens. “Because I shouldn’t have rushed to judgment. Because Maggie had an excellent sense of people, and she adored you. And worse, because I took her to several Hoarders Anonymous meetings, and the one thing everyone mentioned was the secrecy surrounding their compulsions. Of course you didn’t know. Because Maggie didn’t want you to, Mallory. And I should’ve realized that.”
The wind rustles through the large elm tree above us as we sip our wine in silence, his words settling in my chest. I vow to spend some time tomorrow researching hoarding disorders. Just to feel closer to Aunt Maggie. She obviously felt she needed to keep a big part of her life hidden from me, and even though it’s a little late, I want to show her memory that it’s nothing to be ashamed of. That I would have understood.
“This is a huge undertaking,” Nick says at last. “You shouldn’t have to do it alone. I could come over and help a bit, if you want.”
I shake my head. “I appreciate the offer, but I can do it on my own.”
“She meant something to me, too, Mallory. It wouldn’t be an imposition to help.”
I shake my head again, my throat too tight to say more. But he seems to get it. I can’t ask for help and now, with my history, I have trouble accepting it as well.
I glance at Nick under my lashes and can’t help wondering if things had been different, if I had visited, if I had left Karl sooner, would we have become friends? Would we have taken Aunt Maggie to those meetings together? Would the three of us have shared a bottle of wine and laughed into the evening over a slice of lemon cake?
“Thank you,” I say softly, reaching for a piece of cheese and nibbling on it.
“For what?” he asks, sounding genuinely surprised.
“For taking care of Aunt Maggie when I wasn’t here.”
Nick just shakes his head, though, and there is a genuine gentleness in his eyes. “It was no hardship and nothing to thank me for. Maggie took care of me at least as much as I took care of her.”
I start to ask him what he means by that when my phone lights up with a text message from Karl—who, apparently, is pulling into my driveway right now.
Chapter Twenty
I can feel all the blood drain from my face even as my heart goes wild.
“What’s wrong?” Nick asks, sounding alarmed as he leans over, as if to catch me if I suddenly faint.
“I’m fine.” Okay, that’s a lie, but I need it to be true.
I don’t want to see Karl right now, don’t want to have this argument with him before I even get the chance to hire a divorce attorney.
“You don’t look fine.” Nick reaches out and squeezes my hand.
“Yeah, well, what else is new?” Part of me just wants to ignore Karl—he came all this way without so much as texting me to see if I would be home, so why shouldn’t I just hide back here and pretend that I’m out?
It’s a good plan, except the last thing I need is for Karl—a very litigious attorney—to get hurt on my front porch. I’m barely keeping my head above water right now as it is. I can only imagine what it would be like trying to do that and fight off a lawsuit from my obnoxious almost-ex.
Mikey was right—I need to put some beware/hazard signs up on the porch first thing tomorrow. Apparently, not actually expecting company isn’t a good enough excuse anymore.
“Mallory,” Nick says, his voice tight with concern. “What is it?”
“My ex is here,” I say, partly to Nick and partly to myself so it can sink in and I can get control of my suddenly rampaging emotions.
“Here?” Nick’s eyes narrow dangerously.
He looks annoyed—really annoyed—and I can’t imagine why. I’ve never told him anything about Karl at all. Apparently, that doesn’t stop him from being pissed off, which makes me wonder exactly what Aunt Maggie told him about my ex. God knows, she never liked Karl.
“Did he tell you he was coming?” Nick asks, already starting to get up from the table.
“No.” Why start with not being a self-absorbed asshole now? “Then again, it might have just been a sudden impulse. Karl’s never been very good at thinking about anything other than what he wants and when he wants it.”
I take a deep breath and blow it out slowly as I text my almost-ex back that I’ll be out in a minute—and not to walk on the damaged porch under any circumstances.
Karl’s only response is to tell me to hurry up. God, how could I have ever been in love with that asshole? And how the hell could I have ever put up with his shit?
Anger replaces my nerves, and this time when I take a deep breath, it’s not to center myself—it’s to cool myself down.
“Do you want me to go?” Nick asks, looking like he is mentally already halfway around the house.
It’s sweet in an I-don’t-know-how-to-process-this way, but I don’t want Nick to go. I don’t want to give Karl any more control over my life—and how I spend an evening—than he already has. “No, of course not. I have a full bribing plan I need to get through.” I force myself to smile, even though I’m afraid it turns out more like a grimace. “This shouldn’t take long. He’s just dropping off the divorce papers.”
More like planning on browbeating me into signing them, but I’m not about to let that happen. I caved to that man entirely too many times during our married life. I don’t have to do it anymore.
“In person?” Nick takes a step toward the yard and the paved walk that would take him to the front of the house, and I realize again that he is an attorney—of course he knows how unusual this is.
“It’s fine.” We both know it’s anything but. I gesture toward the family room just inside the patio door. “Feel free to look through Aunt Maggie’s vinyl and find some music to listen to while I’m gone. I’ll be right back.”
Nick doesn’t look happy, but he doesn’t contradict me. Instead, he sits back down and pours himself some more wine.
I can’t help feeling grateful. No one else needs to see the mess that is the end of my marriage, especially not my totally hot, totally together neighbor who befriends old ladies and eats lemon cake for breakfast.
I hurry around to the side gate, as anxious as Karl to get this over with, though for very different reasons. He’s standing in front of the garage, one of his ubiquitous folders in one hand and a pen in the other.
Because of course he is. The jerk really thinks he’s going to force me to sign those papers tonight.
Then again, why wouldn’t he? I gave him every single thing he ever asked for during our marriage. At first, I fought him over things I didn’t want to do, but he’d argue so much that eventually I gave in. Every. Single. Time.
Then one day it wasn’t even worth it to argue anymore. I just gave in without a fight, and I forgot what it was to expect—or even want—something for myself.
All that has changed now. Because I want this house, and I want this new life I’m starting to make. More, I deserve this new life—just like I deserve half of our marital assets. New York isn’t a fifty-fifty-split state, but the law does say the assets must be split fairly between the two parties. Him getting everything and me getting nothing is definitely not fair.
I just need to remember that when Karl starts twisting things around to best serve himself.
“What are you doing here, Karl?” I demand as I walk up to him.
“Well, hello to you, too, Mallory. Charming as always.” He looks me over, his expression disapproving.
That only makes me more annoyed. I am well aware that I’m not looking my best right now, but I was in the middle of cleaning out the house and hauling trash. Nobody d
resses in designer clothes to do that. Nobody but Karl, anyway. Then again, he has never hauled a bag of trash in his life.
“I don’t have to be charming to you,” I shoot back. “We’re getting a divorce.”
“Yes, well, you never were that charming to begin with, were you?”
I grind my teeth together and remind myself that the courts will not look kindly on my petition for half the marital assets if I scratch his eyes out or knee him in the nuts as he so richly deserves.
“If you came all this way to make nasty comments to me, then you’ve wasted a trip.” I turn to go. “I have a lot better things to do than listen to this.”
“Wait!” he barks at me.
Even though a part of me has been conditioned to do exactly what he tells me to do, there is a bigger part that is entirely too pissed off to even consider it. So instead of waiting, I walk faster.
Karl hurries along behind me—something that I know really pisses him off. Well, too fucking bad, asshole.
Then he grabs my wrist and yanks me around to face him. “I told you to wait, Mallory.” He launches each word at me like a slap. “I have something I want to discuss with you.”
“Get your hands off me,” I snarl. “Or I’m going to call the police and have you arrested for trespassing and assault.”
His eyes widen like I surprised him—and maybe I did. God knows, the Mallory he used to know would never talk to him like that.
“Fine.” He makes a little snort of disgust as he drops my wrist. “Just sign the divorce papers and I’ll get out of here.”
“I already told you I’m not going to do that.”
“You don’t have a choice,” he growls, and suddenly his body language is a lot more threatening.
The thing is, I’m not about to let him threaten me. He’s done enough of that to last a lifetime, and I’ll scream the whole block down if he so much as touches me again.
“You can say that all you want,” I reply, my voice low and quiet even as adrenaline slams through me. “That doesn’t make it true.”
I take a deep breath and straighten my shoulders, refusing to be cowed by the growing anger on his face. Fear and fury and a decade of repressing every emotion that could even maybe make someone feel uncomfortable builds like a tidal wave inside me.
“I dropped out of law school at your suggestion to help cover our bills and your tuition. Then I worked right alongside you to build our law practice. From the very beginning, I scrimped and saved and shopped all the auctions to find decent furniture for the firm on a shoestring budget. I spent the first couple of years cleaning the offices—on top of being office manager for a pittance—because you said we couldn’t afford to have a janitor come in and clean for us.”
“You think because you cleaned a toilet or two, you should be entitled to half of what I built?” He sneers.
“What we built.”
Karl smooths his palm over his tie and shoots me a patronizing look. “Well, I’m sure that makes sense in your little fantasy world, but you’re wrong on so many fronts. Just to take one example, the condo.”
“Our home.” The one I found, the one I cleaned, the one I made livable.
He shakes his head and speaks in a kind of overly polite and completely insincere tone as he looks around at Aunt Maggie’s house, no doubt noting every crack in the sidewalk, chip in the paint, and barely-hanging-on roof shingle. “It’s owned by the law firm and isn’t a marital asset. The firm, as you’ll recall, is mine. My name’s on the door, not yours. You didn’t even finish law school. The office manager doesn’t get half. Maybe you should have finished getting your law degree.”
The gaslighting bastard! “Someone had to pay our bills.”
His lips curl upward in a know-it-all smirk. “So you admit you freely made your choice.”
I’m still reeling from the callous narcissism of his response when I hear the door slam on Karl’s beloved Aston Martin.
It’s nearly dark, but he parked right beneath the streetlamp, so I can see Sasha perfectly as she gets out of the car. It’s just un-freaking-believable. I can’t believe his audacity in bringing his mistress here when he’s trying to talk me into signing the divorce papers.
It’s like waving a red flag in front of a bull, because every time I see her, all I can think about is the way our eyes met in his office that day. The triumphant look on her face as she put her hand on Karl’s head and told him how to please her while she looked straight into my eyes. The bitch.
“Get out of here,” I snarl at my ex, fed up with him and this entire conversation—not to mention the whole situation. “You can throw the biggest hissy fit in the world, and it won’t matter. I’m not going to sign those papers until I hire an attorney and I get a fair settlement. I’m not walking away from the longest decade of my life with nothing to show for it. In fact—”
I break off on a gasp as Sasha turns to the side…her hand cupping her slightly rounded belly. She is directly under the streetlight, and its glow makes her obviously pregnant silhouette impossible to miss.
Chapter Twenty-One
Oh my God.
Oh. My. God.
I’ve never been hit by a bus, but I imagine it would hurt less. Every part of me is in pain. My bones ache. My head pounds. My heart, oh my God, my chest feels like it’s being crushed.
I blink a few times, praying that I’m seeing things, but when I glance back over at Sasha, she looks exactly the same. Breezy sundress, long blond hair, hand pressed against her round stomach.
“She’s pregnant,” I whisper before I can stop myself.
Pregnant.
Pregnant.
Pregnant.
The word reverberates in my head over and over and over again. Karl’s mistress is pregnant. At least five months, by the look of her, too.
“I don’t understand,” I murmur. And I don’t. At all.
I all but begged Karl for a baby for the last half of our marriage. He never wanted one, despite what he told me when we got married: that we just needed to wait.
One more year to get the practice off the ground, Mallory. We can’t afford day care yet.
I’m so busy right now and so are you. We should build up the practice a little more first.
I don’t have time to talk about this today. I’ve got to get to court.
There’s plenty of time to have a baby. We can talk about it next year, when we have more time.
Next year.
Next year.
Next year.
He put me off dozens of times until I finally stopped asking. And now, we’ve been separated less than three months, and Sasha is pregnant?
Very, very pregnant from the look of her, actually, but I don’t have the energy to consider what that means yet.
I knew he was low, knew he was narcissistic, thought there was nothing he could do to shock me. But apparently, I was naive, because right now, I am shaken to my very core.
The bastard. The unbelievable bastard.
My stomach churns, and suddenly I’m terrified that I’m going to throw up.
“What’s there to understand?” Karl growls. “I love Sasha and she loves me. We’re having a baby together, and both of us would really like for that baby to be born inside of wedlock. So if you could get over your little fit of hysteria and sign these papers, we can all just move on with our lives.”
Once again, he shoves the folder with the divorce papers at me. I am so shaken that this time, I don’t even think to refuse. I just take the folder and stare down at it blankly.
Karl sighs, like he’s the one who is put upon in this situation, like my shock and heartsickness are major inconveniences for him. Then he clicks the pen open and holds it out to me. “Just sign the papers, Mallory, and we’ll get out of your hair.”
“Mallory’s not signing anything withou
t her attorney present.” Nick’s voice rings out loud and clear through the quiet night, and suddenly he’s right next to me, trying to ease Karl’s loathsome folder from my death grip. He turns to me and says more gently, “Hey, baby, give me this, okay?”
I know I should say something. I even want to say something—the last thing I want is to look pathetic in front of Nick. Or Karl. But as I glance back and forth between them, my brain is still reeling from shock and no words will form—at least no words that I’d want to say in front of Nick.
He must have gotten that, because suddenly his arm is around my shoulders, and he’s pulling me into him, sheltering me against the solid, muscular strength of his body.
“Who are you?” Karl demands.
Nick raises an imperious brow at him, and it looks nothing like when he raises a brow at me. With me, it’s amused if sometimes annoyed, but with Karl? With Karl, it looks an awful lot like a threat. Even more so when Nick squares his shoulders and pulls up to his full height—an impressive five inches taller than Karl.
“I’m pretty sure I should be asking you that question,” Nick shoots back. “Since you are the one standing here, threatening my girlfriend, on her property. Which you should probably stop doing. Now.”
“Your girlfriend?” Karl sounds as astonished as I feel.
He looks back and forth between the two of us while I all but melt with relief. I’ve looked pathetic entirely too many times in front of Karl and Sasha over the last few months, and I will be forever grateful to Nick for saving me from further humiliation right now, while my head is still spinning and my heart is still breaking.
Not over Karl, of course, but over the baby I wanted so badly and for so long.
“I’ll have you know,” Karl says, trying to stand taller than Nick but falling woefully short, “Mallory is my wife. I have every right to be here.”
“No, you don’t,” Nick says. “Not after she’s asked you to leave.”
“Do you really want to get into a debate over the law with me?” Karl’s eyes narrow. “I’m an attorney, and I assure you this is perfectly legal.”
