I leaned in to kiss Clara’s head. “I can promise you that Hannah loves you so much and she will be in your life forever and ever.”
Clara held my cheeks in her little hands. “Forever and ever, promise?”
It took everything in me to hold her eyes. “Promise.”
I had never lied to my daughter.
I hoped to fuck that I hadn’t started tonight.
Hannah did love her. And she would always be in her life. Regardless of the choices I knew I had to make.
HANNAH
Beau had been off since my brother left. I saw it. Felt it. Even after the date night. Especially after the date night.
Beau was free with affection. With compliments. He gave both with an ease that made it seem like we’d been together forever but also with a ferocity that suggested he couldn’t get enough of me. Like everything was the first time.
But something changed. He still touched me. Kissed me. But he was distant. His eyes were far away. His posture was taut, wired. He didn’t smile, much less chuckle.
I tried not to read too much into it. I tried not to let fear get the best of me.
Beau loved me. He said so himself. Beau was done hurting me. I could trust in this. In what we had.
I was so used to a change in someone’s mood signaling hurt for me that I’d been conditioned to prepare for impact.
Even as I tried to talk myself out of it, tried to remember that Beau was different.
Not that different, it turned out.
Not different at all.
I’d put Clara to bed, per her request. Sometimes, she wanted the both of us, sometimes her father or just me. I wondered if she could sense what we needed, who needed to lay with her and smell her hair, tell her stories.
Because Clara was what I needed. A grounding presence in a love so strong, so secure, it was unconditional. I’d never experienced unconditional love until her.
I’d stayed longer than I normally would, lying next to her as she took even breaths, staring at the stars projected on her ceiling. Was I hiding? Did I have the same kind of sense, except for danger? Pain?
Or maybe I was just predictable. Maybe men were.
Beau was sitting in the living room when I came out. From the way he was sitting, the energy in the room, I instantly knew something was wrong. There were no whiskys, no hot chocolates, no candles. Beau surprised me every night with a little treat, which almost always ended in mind-blowing sex.
There was no promise of that in the room. It was cold and foreboding.
His eyes touched me as I entered, pain crackling through my heart at his expression.
“Hannah, will you sit with me?” His tone was low. Soothing. The way a farmer might’ve spoken to an old mare they were preparing to shoot for their own good.
To put them out of their misery.
Except I wasn’t miserable. Not even a little.
“No.” I crossed my arms in front of me.
Beau winced at the ragged tone of my voice before he stood up, walking toward me.
I backed up, holding my hand up to stop him. He stopped immediately. “You’re not allowed to come near me unless it’s to tell me that I’m wrong. That I’m creating scenarios in my headbecause I can’t trust good things. You’re only allowed to come near me if you aren’t about to break up with me.”
Break up.
