“That was mean,” I panted. He was still driving me crazy, but now his touch had turned sensual and my breathing panted for a different reason.
“Mmm,” he murmured as he nipped at my bottom lip. “But so worth it.” His thigh slipped between my legs, parting them until he could slide between them.
This time, I did not puke. This time, when it was over, he pulled me into the curve of his body again and we fell asleep, tangled in each other.
And when I woke, I knew that I was with Ben and not Grady.
I had been afraid that I would forget, that my memories would collide with my reality and I would truly wound Ben by not remembering that I was in his bed.
But I came awake with Ben’s familiar scent filling my nostrils, not Grady’s. And it was Ben’s leaner, longer legs that overlapped with mine, not Grady’s.
I woke with a clear sense of who I was with and what we had done.
And I was okay.
Mostly.
Ben made us a big breakfast of eggs and hash browns over toast. It turned out Pop-Tarts weren’t the only thing he knew how to make. We laughed and talked over a shared pot of coffee and deliciously tingling feelings from what had transpired last night.
When he walked me to my door, he kissed me with the knowledge of a man that knew my body intimately.
“I’ll stop by later,” he said.
“Okay. For dinner?”
“Yeah.”
With one hand on the door handle, I turned back to him and blinked in the light of day. I didn’t have the courage this morning. I couldn’t say the words again. They churned in my stomach, filling my chest with acid.
I wanted to say them. I wanted to believe that they were true… But I couldn’t. The day was too bright, the morning too raw.
“I-I-I’ll see you later,” I told him instead.
“Okay, Liz.”
I escaped to my house and shut the door behind me, locking out Ben and the feelings and sensations he brought with him.
My children attacked me with cries of “Mommy!” I brought them all into a hug and held them tightly to me.
Emma stood over us with a hopeful expression on her face, “How did it go?”
I looked up at her and blinked away tears that I refused to cry. “Good,” I admitted. “Really, really good.” She grinned, blinding me with her brilliance. “And bad,” I continued to confess. “Really, really bad.”
Her eyebrows drew down in confusion. “What happened?”
“He, uh, he told me he loved me.” I mouthed the last part to her so the kids didn’t hear. Her eyes grew huge and her mouth dropped open. “And I… um, told him the same thing.”
If possible Emma’s expression grew even more surprised. “Oh, Lizzy,” she whispered. She stepped close to me and wrapped me in a tight hug.
I didn’t cry this time. I wouldn’t let myself have an emotional release. I deserved this pain. I deserved this heartache.
Unlike Grady’s sickness and death, I had done this to myself.
My heart felt ripped in two. One part would forever stay with Grady, loyal to my first love and my husband. The other part ran to Ben, to this new love.
Emma asked me if I was okay probably forty times before she left me for the day. I told her each time that I would be. I didn’t believe my lie and I knew she didn’t either.
By the time Ben came over for dinner that night, I was wound tight.
He walked in the house without knocking. He had been doing this for a while, but this time it caused my anxiety to spike. The front door happened to be open this time, but if it hadn’t been, he had a key. He had access to my house, my family and now my heart. And I’d just given it to him.
I’d given it all to him.
So now how did I get it back?
“Ben, when are you going to move in with us?” Abby asked over tacos.
I dropped my fork. “What?”
“I asked Ben when he was going to move in with us,” she repeated, as if it wasn’t the most absurd question in the entire world.
Ben chuckled, clearly more level-headed than me, “Why do you ask that, Abs?”
Blake kicked her from under the table. “That’s such a stupid question. Why would he move in with us? He has his own house. And it has a pool.”
Abby’s expression flashed with fury, my little hot head that couldn’t keep her temper under control. “It’s not a stupid question!” she shouted at her brother. “Ben loves mom! I heard her tell Aunt Emma. He loves her! So why wouldn’t he move in with us? People that love each other are supposed to live together!”
“It’s different!” I rushed to tell her. “Some people that love each other live together, but other times they just live… next door.” I wanted to face plant into my refried beans.
“Why?” Abby asked innocently.
“Well,” I cleared my throat and struggled to regain some of my composure. “Sometimes people that love each other live together. Like us. I love you so much that I don’t ever want you to move out. You can live here forever and ever and ever.” She giggled at me and Blake groaned. The two littles cheered for that idea. “But sometimes,” I went on, “people that love each other have to live apart. Like your Nana. You love Nana Katherine, don’t you?” The four of them nodded enthusiastically. “But she lives in her house and we live in ours. It doesn’t mean we love her less, it just means we live in different places.”
“But when you loved daddy, he lived with us,” Abby put in oh, so helpfully.
My heart plummeted into my stomach, “I still love daddy. I still love him very much, Abby.”
Her nose wrinkled with confusion. “I thought you loved Ben.”
I made a frustrated sound that rattled my chest. “Abby, you were not supposed to hear that. You can’t just-”
“Liz,” Ben interrupted with his deep, rolling voice. He gave me a pleading look to let him try this. I slammed back in my seat and raised my eyebrows at him. I blamed him for this. This was his fault. “Abby, do you love your mom?”
“Yes,” she answered simply.
“And do you love your dad? Even though he isn’t here anymore?”
“Yes,” she whispered.
“Don’t you think you’ll always love your dad?”