Wilder jogged down the porch steps as the man in the car stood to his full height. He was wearing sunglasses, khakis, a blue shirt and a navy blue wool blazer. I would hazard a guess he also wore pure woolen socks and Italian leather shoes. I didn’t have to guess, I knew.
“What the hell are you doing here, Declan?” I hissed.
“Hey, can I help you?” Wilder asked.
Declan Mullaney.
“Hi, there I’m looking for?—”
“Declan,” I repeated his name with venom. “What the hell are you doing here?” My chest heaved with the anger pulsing through my veins at the sight of him.
Wilder shoved his hands to his hips and looked between the two of us. “You two know each other?”
Declan turned his perfectly symmetrical face to Wilder and flashed his expensive teeth at him. “Hi I’m Declan.”
“You didn’t answer my question.” Wilder’s jaw pulsed with the tension that flew off him in waves. “Do you two know each other?”
Declan glanced over at me before turning his attention back to the man who was currently looking angrier than a wounded wolf.
“I’m sorry,” he said, offering Wilder a handshake. “Let me introduce myself properly.” He looked straight at me as he said it. “Declan Mullaney. Tallulah’s husband.”
The air snapped cold. Wilder’s head turned slowly toward me. And just like that, everything blew open.
Chapter 10
Ex’s & Oh’s – Elle King
Wilder
Tallulah’s husband.
Tallulah’sfuckinghusband.
The space between us felt jagged, electric, the kind of tension that prickled against your skin like nettles. Tally’s eyes were wild, flashing like shattered emeralds caught in a lightning strike, flashing discomfort sharpened by fury.
The air itself turned claustrophobic, too tight to breathe. Thorny and raw. And in the middle of it stood this short-ass guy who smelled like his cologne came with a yacht club membership. He was dressed like a trust fund tourist,cuffed chinos, smirking mouth, and hair so stiff with product it looked like it could deflect bullets. Probably pressed his damn underwear too.
And the car. Don’t even get me started on that joke of a car. Shiny and pretentious, like it belonged in a movie where no one ever got dirt under their fingernails. He was lucky he hadn’t lost the bottom half just getting down the drive.
“Declan, you are an utter dick,” she snapped, voice like gravel. “What the hell are you doing here?” She waved a hand from his slicked-back hair down to his gleaming shoes. “You look like a yacht salesman who took a wrong turn at the rodeo.”
A bark of laughter ripped from my throat before I could stop it, rough and hot. Her eyes flicked toward me and for a second, her sneer melted. Just a little. The question in her eyes reached for me. But I had no answer. Hell, I didn’t even know what I felt.
“He's your husband?” My voice was lower than I intended. Tighter.
She dropped her gaze, the toe of her boot scraping across the pale-gray block driveway. The scuffing sound felt loud in the still air. “Was,” she muttered, stuffing her hands into the pockets of her worn denim jacket. “For about five minutes.” Her words hit like splinters.
“Six months, when you left,” the guy corrected, puffing his chest out like six months of legal misery was a damn badge of honor.
“Are you still married?” The words scraped past the lump in my throat. I barely recognized my own voice ; hoarse, hollow. I didn’t have a moral leg to stand on, but I couldn’t stomach the thought of being that guy. The one who sleeps with a married woman and doesn’t care. I couldn’t be my father. Even if walking away from her now would shatter something I didn’t have a name for.
It was supposed to be just sex. But she listened. She let me talk. About dreams and pain and broken family shit. She didn’t flinch when I told her about my mom or my brothers. She didn’t bat an eye when I said I wanted to build a rose garden or swap the fireplace for a log burner because Gunner still had nightmares about losing his horse in a stable fire. She didn’trun. She stayed.
“We shouldn’t be,” she growled, her voice thick with heat as her eyes cutto Declan. “I left you the papers to sign, Declan. Why haven’t you?”
“Divorce papers?” I asked. Dumb question maybe, but I needed to hear it.
“Yes, divorce papers,” she bit out. “My lawyer said you still haven’t signed them. Why?”
