I could solve problems. Build companies. Move mountains with the right leverage. But this? This was hers and I hated that I couldn’t make it easier for her.
CHAPTER 29
JANE
Alex pulled up in front of my house just after four, the late-afternoon light thin and gray, our frankly magical weekend together already fading away. I lingered with my hand on the door handle for a second, not quite ready to leave the bubble we’d been in.
“Text me when you get inside,” he said.
“I will.” I smiled at him. “Is it weird that I wish you were coming in with me?”
“We’re weird together, then.” He chuckled, then leaned across the console and kissed me.
Unfortunately, it was quick and restrained, but we were back in the real world now. I supposed it had always been inevitable that not every kiss could be the slow, passionate kisses of this weekend.
Reluctantly climbing out of the car, I waved, blew him a kiss, and then turned to head inside. As soon as the front door shut behind me, I fired off a quick text to him. Then I slipped my wedding ring off my finger.
It was muscle memory by now, threading it onto the thin gold chain around my neck and tucking it beneath my sweater, right over my sternum. Hidden but safe.
I felt light as air. Happy. At ease in a way that almost scared me.
“Jane?” Wyatt’s voice came from the kitchen.
I stopped short, spinning toward him and smiling, but it quickly vanished from my lips when I saw the way he was looking at me. He stood by the counter with his arms crossed and his jaw tight, which was almost as strange as the fact that he was home at all.
He should’ve been out. Sunday afternoons were usually reserved for friends, the gym, or anything that wasn’t home. Seeing him here sent a small jolt of unease through me.
“Hey,” I said carefully. “Are you okay?”
His eyes flicked past me to the front window, just in time to catch Alex’s car turning the corner. His mouth twisted. “Who was that?”
“A friend,” I said automatically, still not quite catching up to the tension crackling in the room. “Wyatt, what’s?—”
“Why are you sleeping with a married man, Jane?”
The words hit me like a slap. I stared at him, my brain stalling completely. “What?”
“Don’t play dumb,” he snapped. “I saw him out there.Alex. He was wearing a ring when he came to dinner with us. When he watched my meet. He just got married, didn’t he?”
I opened my mouth and then closed it. For one awful second, no sound came out and Wyatt took my silence as confirmation.
“Jesus, Jane,” he said, his voice rising. “You’re really doing this? What about his poor wife?”
“It’s not—” I started, but he bulldozed right over me.
“Do you have any idea how messed up that is?” he seethed. “And why are you bringing him around my wrestling matches like you’re a regular couple? Do you have no shame or what?”
“That’s not what’s happening,” I said, finally finding my voice. “You don’t understand?—”
“Oh, I understand just fine,” he said bitterly. “You’re just likeher.”
My chest tightened. “Like who?”
His eyes narrowed into a cold glare, like he was looking at someone completely different. “Dad’smistress.”
The accusation lodged deep, a direct hit to a wound inside that I’d spent years trying to heal. Trying to but never quite managing to make it not hurt.
“That’s not fair,” I said hoarsely. “It’s not true, either. I’m not like Mallory, Wyatt. You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
