“He’s my husband.”
“He’s not your husband, Hope. He’s my man. I’m angry you forced this situation but I honestly don’t intend to hurt you when I say that’s where this is at. This is real. It’s serious. It’s going places. And you have to focus on yourself and your life and your children and not on the man who is no longer yours not because he’s mine, which he is, but because he . . . is . . . no longer yours.”
Her expression turned catty. “We’ll see.”
“No, we won’t. I know how it is. You’ll see. And Hope, honest to God, you need to prepare because what you’ll see is not what you’re thinking, and as much as you’re obviously hurting now and trying to find ways to make it stop, if you don’t prepare, it’s only going to get worse.”
“You think it’s about the ring. He thinks it’s about the ring.” She leaned toward me. “But it’s not about the ring.” She leaned back. “And when he knows what it was about, he’ll come back.”
I stared at her and I thought about headboard sex.
I thought about the words to “At Last.”
I thought about the way Hix stroked the insides of my fingers in that sweet way and didn’t even know he was doing it.
I thought about Junk Sundays and having a broken nose and not being allowed to lift anything and slipping on a set of stairs and watching Hix leap down them to get to me.
I thought about the fact Hix had had a variety of opportunities to walk away from me and he didn’t. Even when I tried to close that door, he put his boot in it, keeping it open.
I thought about the man I knew who knew all the crap that came with me, and he didn’t go running.
I thought about that man and the man I knew him to be and knew he’d never tell me, not ever, that he was done with his ex-wife and he was intent to build something with me if he didn’t mean that down to the bottom of his soul.
And after I thought all that, I said to my man’s ex-wife, “Prepare, Hope.”
“We’ll see,” she purred, grinning venomously at me, turning and sashaying down my drive.
I watched her go, now thinking about if I should tell Hix that happened or not.
I decided to give it time. Not too much, if he found out before I told him, he might think I was keeping it from him if only to protect him, but he wouldn’t like that.
However, I had to shower and get to work.
I had a client.
“Right.”
I bit my lip at the way Hix said that after I’d shared with him what had happened with me and Hope that morning over the phone in the back room of the salon I’d just opened up.
That one syllable didn’t sound happy.
“She’s phoned,” he shared in return and my eyes went to the door as Lou walked through it.
Hope had been busy that morning.
“Yeah?” I asked.
“She wants to go to Jameson’s tomorrow night to have dinner and talk.”
Jameson’s?
The swankiest, most romantic restaurant in the county?
That bitch.
I narrowed my eyes at Lou but mumbled, “Mm-hmm,” to Hix.
“Babe, I’m goin’ over to her place tonight. I’m not going to freaking Jameson’s with her. Though,” he said that last word reflectively, “we should make a reservation.”
My eyes unnarrowed and I was pretty sure it was me who now had a smug grin.
Lou’s eyes weren’t narrowed. They were widened at me.
“I’d like that,” I said.
“Right, when the girls are back with her next week, we’ll go. And I’m not goin’ over to hers until after the kids and I get a TV. You wanna come with us? We’ll get a quick dinner after then you can hang at home with them and be there when I get back.”
“Is that what you want?” I asked.
“Do you have to ask that?” he asked in return.
“Probably not,” I muttered.
“When’s your last client?”
“I’m done at six thirty.”
“Right. We’ll have the TV by then. Wanna meet us at Po-Jack’s?”
“Yep.”
“Okay. Let me know when you’re on your way. You have time to hit the Harlequin for lunch?”
I grinned.
Hope was so going down.
“Yep.”
“What time?”
“One.”
“Pick you up or see you there?”
“It’s a block away from me, Hixon.”
“Okay, baby,” he said through a chuckle. “See you there.”
“Yeah, honey. See you there.”
“Later, babe.”
“Later, Hix.”
We hung up and Lou declared, “Your client’s here.”
“Right, I’ll go out and—”
She grabbed my arm. “Unh-unh. I just watched you go from looking like you wanted to commit murder to looking like a cat who got her cream. What’s going on?”
I didn’t have a lot of time so I laid it all out for her as best I could.
When I was done, she was grinning like a fool.
“What?” I asked.
“Yup,” she said.
“What?” I repeated.
“First, you got something to fight for and you’re finally freaking fighting for it, and since it’s worth it that makes me all kinds of happy. And second, when you said to Hix that what you two have is gonna work, he said, ‘yup.’” She leaned right into my space. “And I . . . fucking . . . love that.” She leaned back and cackled before she said, “Yup. That’s it but that’s all he had to say. Yup! That . . . is . . . awesome!”
She turned, nabbed an industrial-sized bottle of conditioner and turned back, strutting right by me and throwing open the door.
She shouted, “Yup!” into the salon as she walked through, and I noticed my client staring at her curiously.
The door swung closed.
And I burst out laughing.
The Ride of Life
Hixon
THAT NIGHT, HIX parked at the curb of the house he’d once called home and walked up the front walk.
He did it staring at his old front porch thinking he needed to invest in some furniture to put on his for Greta.
Maybe some of those Adirondack chairs.
He was at the door with his hand lifted to ring the bell when the door opened.
Hope stood there made up like they were actually going to Jameson’s, but without a nice dress. Instead she was wearing nice slacks and a pretty top, not like she normally made herself up in some jeans and a sweater, with just mascara and blush and whatever she did with her hair when she did it quick for when she had a day of running Mamie around and working for her dad.
Shit.
At least she had bare feet.
She reached to the storm door and Hix got out of the way as she pushed it open, greeting, “Hixon.”
He caught the door and returned, “Hope.”
She turned and walked in. He followed her and he did it thinking he’d forgotten to keep track of the time since he’d last been in his old house. She’d demanded he come get any of his stuff that he’d want, and after they’d gone around about it for weeks, he’d done it.
That had to have been four, maybe five months ago.