“Don’t do that,” she whispers.
“Okay.” I relent easily and pull her to me, and we cling to each other, her tears coming freely as she cries into my shoulder. Even with her close, there’s not an ounce of solace to be found. There’s no solution, and it irks me that I can’t find one. I can’t see one, either—at least, not in the near future. The overwhelming feeling hits that in her mind, she might no longer see a future for us on the other side of that door. The thought starts to eat at my resolve to give her the decision to fight alone as we break in each other’s arms. Preparing myself for war, I pull back and firmly cradle her face. “It’s up to us. It’s our fucking choice.”
“I know.”
“Please don’t let go.”
“Stop! Easton, please,” she cries, “I’m paralyzed!”
My throat burns as my head begins to pound. Every tear gliding down her beautiful face eating me alive. In our shared silence, we fruitlessly search for a potential solution and find none. She’s right. For the moment, we’re completely gridlocked. If we continue like this—the way things are—we’ll destroy our relationships with our parents, eventually destroying us. We can’t allow it. Dad’s warning and our vows reverberate through me.
Love isn’t selfish.
The crux is that I have to share her with a man determined to make that feat impossible. Despite needing her, despite wanting her, despite the pact we made to remain unified, we were just divided by an atom bomb. I have to be the man she needs me to be right now, even as it rips me apart.
With a lump lodged in my throat, I’m reluctant to let her go. Heart splintering in my chest, I tip her chin with gentle fingers. “Okay, baby. Go. We will work this out.”
She looks up at me, a glimmer of hope reflecting back. Cupping her face, I dip and kiss her, our tongues tangling in desperation as I infuse it with all I feel for her. I shake my head when her sobs interrupt it and manage a smile, wiping her tears with my thumbs.
“I love you, my beautiful wife.” Even as I say the words, the ominous premonition threatens again. This time, I can’t shake it, even as the fight continues to build inside me.
Jagged, cutting bitterness takes hold for everything that just went down in the same place we made some of our most significant memories. We tear ourselves apart before she grips her suitcase and shoulders her purse. Our red eyes hold when she glances back at me from the open door of our villa. I fist my hands, forcing myself to remain idle while trying not to let her see what’s raging beneath the surface. She does anyway.
“I love you, Easton,” she declares vehemently. “And despite what just happened, I don’t regret it, and I won’t, no matter what,” she re-grips the handle of her suitcase while gliding her thumb over her ring, a new habit that strengthens my pulse just before she turns and walks out of the door.
We Belong
Pat Benatar
Natalie
Dad slams the garage door behind him as I stalk toward the patio, anxious to escape him, if only for a bit of reprieve. I’m halfway to the sliding back door when he sounds up behind me from the kitchen. “You’re suspended from Speak until further notice.”
My gasp is audible as I turn back to see him bracing himself on our island.
“Daddy,” I choke out, “please don’t take the—”
“You invaded an employee’s privacy,” he cuts in, his tone laced with finality. “Not only that, but you completely fucking discarded your ethics to lure a subject into an interview under false pretenses for personal gain.” With that, he lifts damning eyes to mine as he lists off the crimes he deems fit for his punishment. “You used the guise of my paper to do it,” he exhales as if he doesn’t believe the words he’s saying, “and annihilated my trust… Do you really believe you deserve a desk chair right now, let alone still be considered the best candidate to take over my life’s work?”
I bite my lip as my eyes water and shake my head.
“You can work for your mother until I can trust you to help run my paper again.”
“Yes, sir,” I choke out before I flee, unable to take another second until I can handle it. I’d suspected it would come to this, but the reality of it is too much to bear. Dad didn’t talk to me during the short plane ride home as I stared out the window, stifling tears while replaying the devastation in that villa. Since he arrived in Sedona, I try to shield my occupied ring finger from him while refusing to take it off. The act seems impossible and feels more like a betrayal as my heart continues to mourn for the husband I left behind.
Though he tried, Easton failed to hide his fear, which only made me love him more. As much as I wanted to stay, to convince him we were in this together, he was just as much at a loss as I was. The difference is, Reid was right. I had a clear idea of what we were going to face. It’s the aftermath that I could never have prepared for.
As if his silence isn’t enough punishment, Dad drove me straight to our family home to face my mother without a single word of warning of what I am in for. Ironically, when I was young, Dad refused to spank me, even at my mother’s insistence. He would get me behind a closed door and tell me I better start crying and make it sound convincing. That protection is painfully absent now as dread courses through me. Tears brewing, throat raw, I slide the back door open and jump as my father slams a door nearby before I draw it closed. Glancing around the grounds for my mother, I come up empty and begin the trek to the stable, every step draining more than the last.
Entering the barn, I find her brushing Percy’s coat. Like me, Mom always seeks refuge with our horses when she’s too stressed or distraught to people, so it was a given I would find her here.
The second I near her, I feel the charge shift in the air. Standing beside her outside the stall, I nuzzle a greeting to Percy, waiting for her to speak. Silent, agonizing seconds tick past before she finally does, her eyes trained on Percy.
“Parents live separate existences outside of their children,” she admits, her voice coated in irony and edged in bitterness. “We play ignorant to a hell of a lot, for your sake, so you can experience life and learn your own hard lessons. It’s one of the hardest parts of being a parent.” She swallows. “Your father and I gave you a ton of leeway, because you never—not once—disappointed us, even when you made mistakes.” Her eyes sweep over me in obvious devastation. “You have utterly and completely destroyed that faith and trust.”
My face heats as fresh tears fill my eyes. “Mom, I—”
“I was in love with another man before I met and married your father. He was fucking beautiful…and good in bed.” Shocked by her candor, I’m stunned speechless. “He was everything I thought I wanted, but nothing at all that I needed. Eventually, he took advantage of my love for him and turned me into someone unrecognizable. He used me up before he let me go, and because I loved him so much, I let him.”
A tear glides down her face, her voice surprisingly strong when she starts again. “If you’re lucky enough, you get a few chances at love in your life, but you don’t really get to decide which loves get the best and worst of you…at least at first. In hindsight, that’s the conclusion I came to. A na?ve heart always gets hit the hardest, but a mature heart makes better choices. Some of that comes with age, but a lot of it has to do with the amount of break it can withstand before it wises up. I knew about Stella. I’ve always known.” She resumes running the brush along Percy’s thick mane. “He told me their story not long after we met.”