“I am not a child. You do not get to make my decisions for me anymore.”
“When you abandon a career you’ve been building for thirteen years just because your marriage hit a snag, yes, I do get to help you make those decisions.”
Zoe closed her eyes and clenched her fists. She could barely form thoughts, much less words. “A snag? He cheated on me with a married woman and got her pregnant, Mother.”
“All marriages have their challenges.”
She could hear the shrug in her mother’s voice. Challenges? As if having a cheating husband was the same as working too much or buying a luxury car without discussing it first.
“I am done. Stay out of my life.”
“Zoe—”
She pressed the end call button and drew her arm back to throw her phone against the wall, but her wrist was grabbed from behind and the phone pulled from her hand.
“Okay, let’s not do any anything drastic.”
Tim’s calm voice pushed her further toward the edge. “Don’t tell me what to do!”
He held up his hands in supplication. “I wouldn’t dream of it.”
“Quit placating me!”
“Absolutely.”
She screamed through clenched teeth and stormed to the kitchen. Slamming cabinets, she jammed a filter into the coffee pot and grabbed the carafe, filling it with water. She was going to regret not being more careful with the grounds, but at the moment she needed something to take her anger out on.
Flipping the coffee pot one, she rounded on Tim. “Where did you go?”
“I had to let the dog out,” he said calmly.
“What dog?”
“I’m fostering a dog for Denise’s rescue.”
“Oh.” She didn’t have a response for that, but the thought of him fostering a dog dissipated her anger for some reason.
“You ready to talk about it?”
“You’re handling me, aren’t you? Using your police voodoo tactics to get me to calm down.”
His dimples popped out when he grinned. “They don’t teach us voodoo at the academy.”
“You know what I mean.” She took two cups down and pulled the creamer from the fridge.
“I know sometimes it helps to talk about what’s making you so angry.”
Zoe leaned against the counter, folded her arms, and looked down at her feet.
“Mark got a one-year assignment to Korea. He said it would be good for his career and make it easier for us to get an assignment to Florida since he would be coming off a short tour.”
“Did it?”
“Yes. He got a follow-on assignment to Florida and then my assignments manager worked my assignment.”
“But you didn’t go to Florida.” He moved farther into the kitchen and mirrored her position next to her.
The heat from his body permeated through her thin robe and she leaned against his shoulder. “My assignment notification arrived the same day the divorce papers did.”
