CHAPTER 1
“You’ve changed.”
Maeve hoped so. The last few years had taken a toll on her, both emotionally and physically, and change was welcome. She wondered if it was for the better.
She lay on her back, one leg thrown out from under the down comforter on her bed, and considered the observation as well as her feet, sorely in need of a pedicure, not that she had ever had or desired one. If she was getting back into the game, so to speak, it might be worth the effort. The time. The money. The last two she had little of, and that presented a problem. “You think so?”
“I think so,” he said, rolling on top of her and smoothing her hair off her forehead, their faces nearly touching.
“How so?” she asked, knowing that this was a bad idea, going down this road, both the one that had their limbs entwined and the other about how she was different now. This time.
“Do you really want to know?”
Game playing. Her least favorite relationship tool. But she played along. “Yes. I’d really like to know.”
He thought for a moment, kissing her while he did, stalling. “You’re calmer. More confident. You know what you want now.”
“You could say that about any woman past the age of forty. Forty-five maybe. We all fall into those categories.” She thought about herself at younger ages. Scared as a child. Terrified as a young teen. Tentative as a young adult, finding her way after the abuse. Exhausted from the beginning of motherhood until about five years ago when the girls had gotten old enough to fend for themselves, for the most part. Then, enraged. It came out of nowhere and held her in a viselike grip, a hand around her throat until she did something to release the tension.
After that, she was free.
She was ready for him to leave, the point proven. She could still have him, still make him happy. He had other ideas, though, their bodies becoming tangled once again, the down comforter flying off the bed at one point, a feather coming free and landing on her sweaty skin.
“I love you,” he whispered in the middle, just like he always did, taking the fun out of it for her, ruining her moment. She couldn’t say it back; she wouldn’t. That would take things to a new level, make the whole relationship more complicated than it needed to be. She didn’t think “you’re lucky I still like you” was an appropriate response, so she stayed silent, or as silent as she could, given what was happening in her bed.
It was twenty minutes before she could convince him to leave. She ushered him out of the room and down the stairs, telling him at the top, “This can’t happen again.”
He smiled just like he had that first time, repeating what he had said then. “But it will.” When he got to the bottom of the stairs, he turned back. “I sent Rebecca a check for her textbooks, so she’s covered. Don’t worry about that.”
“Thanks, Cal.” She watched him leave, thinking about how strange it was to have an affair with the husband of another woman, particularly someone who had once been her husband. She was cheating on the man she loved with the man she once loved and would never love again, even if she missed him, if only a little bit.
Copyright © 2016 by Maggie Barbieri
