I leaned forward to rest my forehead against her shoulder. “Oh,” I said softly, not knowing what else to say.
“I know. I’m stupid.”
“You’re not stupid.”
“Okay, fine. I’mdelusional,” she said, sniffling loudly. “Why the hell did I spend years thinking you had spent all that time completely celibate? Like, what kind of moron am I?”
I didn’t mean to laugh, but I couldn’t stop the gentle chuckle that rumbled against her back. “Babe, you’re not a moron.”
“Don’t be nice to me,” she scolded before sobbing again. “You were probably screwing women while you were away, then coming back just to screw me, and—"
“No,” I said quickly, lifting up on my elbow to look down at her. “No, that’s notat allhow it was.”
She turned to look up at me, a bit hesitant at first, but … there she was. Tear-filled eyes met mine as she said, “No?”
I shook my head. “I hadn’t eventhoughtto look at another woman until you told me you were with someone else. From high school until that phone call, you were the only one.”
Her eyes searched mine for the truth, her lips parted when she must’ve found it, and she said, “You're serious?”
“Very.”
She reluctantly smiled. “Wow. You really did love me.”
“So much, babe.Sofucking much.”
She nodded and scooted backward to press herself to my chest. She grabbed my hand from her shoulder to press her lips to my knuckles.
And then she asked, “So, who was the first one you looked at?”
I barked with a laugh. “Oh, Jesus Christ … it’s like you want to hate me right now.”
“No, I don’t! Seriously! You said you hadn’t thought about looking at another woman until we were over, so … what was her name? Do you remember?”
She was teasing me now, laughing and wiggling her ass against my rapidly responding dick, but I didn’t want to answer. I didn’t want to think abouther. That enigmatic woman from the past. I didn’t want to think about anyone else right now but mywife.
But the truth, the pathetic and sad truth, was that I had never forgotten about Melanie or the strange, otherworldly connection I’d felt with her. It had been unlike anything I’d experienced with anyone else. And maybe it made me an asshole to keep that from Laura, but it didn’t matter, did it? It never really did, and it mattered less now. But … still …
It felt sacred somehow. A few nice, inconsequential hours spent with the only other woman I’d ever felt anything for. And I was all of a sudden scared that my wife—my very pregnant wife—might sense that long-ago crush in my voice and get upset all over again. She might see the memory of Melanie as a threat, even if she wasn’t one, and I didn’t want her to believe something that wasn’t true.
Or maybe it wasn’t that at all.
Maybe I just wanted that one secret—much like the secrets I never wanted to know about her time with her ex-husband—and I saw nothing wrong with that.
So, I smiled against her shoulder and shook my head.
“It was so long ago,” I said. “And it doesn’t matter now.”
CHAPTER TWENTY
Laura hated sunrises, but I loved them now that we lived closer to work.
Every day, I’d drive home and pray I made it in time to sit outside on the deck and watch the sun rise over the water. Laura would groan and complain, claiming she’d rather be in bed than drinking coffee on the deck, but she never missed a morning, no matter how tired she was.
And I would look over at her scowling face as she wrapped a blanket around her growing belly and think,This is what love is.
Life as I knew it was everything I could have hoped for. It was everything I had ever wanted and everything I’d never known I wanted and all the wonderful things in between.
One cold morning, Laura noticed me smiling at her instead of watching the sun rise over the water’s frozen surface. She hunkered deeper into her robe and blanket and lifted her coffee cup to her mouth.
