“And then make love to her. Most women, at least in my experience, are their most vulnerable then. You don’t start there, not with everything going on, but you definitely end up there.”
“You’re making this sound so fucking easy.”
“There’s nothing easy about the road you’re on, but there is a light at the end of the tunnel if you look hard enough.”
“I don’t know if I want to kiss you or punch you in the face.”
He leans away from me. “I’d prefer that you didn’t do either.”
“I don’t know what to do first.”
“First you need a shower. Then coffee. Then we talk to Stu and Ford. Then you ask Sasha to get you on a flight to New York.”
Chapter 38
Summer
By the time I get home I’m beyond exhausted and it’s all I can do to crawl into bed. I sleep for twelve hours, but once I’m awake I realize I have a lot to do this week. I have to catch up with Dolly, go to an appointment at the nursing home regarding my mother, and get to the grocery store. Not to mention get back on the schedule at the diner, bake pies, and then on Wednesday I have the twenty-week ultrasound appointment.
The one Tate expects me to dial him in on via video.
Fuck.
It would be so much easier if I could just cut him out of my life completely.
But that’s not possible when there’s literally a piece of him growing inside me.
Between the worry about my mom and the three flights it took to get back to New York, I haven’t had time to fall apart, so that’s not going to happen today either. I need to pick up both food for the week as well as what I need for my pies…
“You planning to tell me what happened between you and Tate?” Dolly asks when I stop by the diner to work out my schedule.
“It’s not going to work,” I say patiently. “He’s got a life and a career that don’t include me and?—”
“You have a whole life right here,” she puts a hand on my stomach, “that’s always going to include him.”
“I’m not going to marry a guy because he knocked me up. Well, I mean, I’m not going to stay married to him. Eventually, he’s going to resent me and I’m going to wind up alone anyway. It’s easier to end things before we get in too deep.”
“Then why did you go on tour with him in the first place? For that matter, why did you marry him? He was willing to pay out of pocket for the healthcare stuff.”
“Temporary insanity, I guess. He looks at me with those damn blue eyes and I forget my own name.” I manage a feeble smile, but she’s not letting me off the hook.
“Bullshit. You’ve been crazy about him since the night you met him.”
“I never denied that.”
“That trip to Europe was a wedding present and your honeymoon—and you just up and left him there. What kind of message did you give your husband with that behavior?”
“Mom needed me!” I protest but it sounds lame, even to me.
“We were going to find her—there was nothing you could do to help. And let’s face it, she doesn’t even know who you are right now. Come on, Summer. There’s something else going on. Why are you sabotaging the best thing that’s ever happened to you?”
Is Tate the best thing to ever happen to me? I want to say no, but I can’t. Because he is. He’s not perfect, and there’s so much working against us, but when we’re together it certainly feels like the best thing to happen to me.
I don’t even know what I’m doing at this point, and Dolly’s pointed questions just frustrate me.
“It’s a lot of things,” I say after I’ve gathered my thoughts. “I saw what his life is like. Groupies backstage acting like they own the guys in the band, parties that go on for days sometimes, performing for royalty—staying at a damn palace! I can’t keep up. That’s just not my life, Dolly.”
“But it was. Until you walked out on your husband without a backward glance.”
