I dragged my hand over my chest, rubbing at the constant ache there, before forcing it back to my side. “Can we not do this right now?”
One of his eyebrows ticked up before a look crossed his face that had me biting back a curse.
“I’m fine,” I assured him at the same time Hunter rumbled, “Gonna ask again: You good?”
Doubt settled over his features and worry darkened his eyes as he adjusted his baseball hat, gripping the bill for a little longer before letting his hand fall. “You sure? Because?—”
“Not what this is, Hunt. Just...justMallory,” I said, as if that might explain everything. “But, again, I don’t wanna do this right now.”
An impish smirk tugged at his mouth as relief and understanding transformed his expression, as if her namehadexplained everything. “You know what?” His head bobbed as he started stepping away. “Think y’all coming over might just be for the best.”
My head slanted and brow furrowed as suspicion crept through my veins. “What do you mean?Why?”
“I gotta get back to the booth,” he said instead.
“Hunter.”
“See y’all soon,” he called out as he turned and effortlessly maneuvered through the crowd.
Blowing out a heavy sigh, I ran a hand through my hair and started toward the opposite side of the street, where my aching chest was begging me to go?—
Just in time to catch the brunette launching herself at me with an excited squeal.
“Hi, handsome!” the familiar voice said as the girl wrapped her legs around my waist in a practiced move that had my blood going cold.
Because there, standing at one of our favorite booths, and gripping that chain around her neck as she stared at us, was my wife.
My hands had gone to the brunette’s waist instinctively. But I knew if I dropped them or shoved her away now, it would look so much worse.
Besides,this girl? I had a history with this girl, and Mallory knew that.
“Miss me?” the girl in my arms asked as she leaned back enough to search my face. I had no doubt her ever-present, playful smile was in place, but I couldn’t look away from the girl across the street as my mind raced and heart wrenched...
As I took in where she was—only a booth away from where she’d originally left me, as if she’d expected me to follow her and had quickly gotten swallowed up in the vendor’s crowd instead, when I’d thought she’d bolted...
As I once again reconsidered every snide remark and defensive expression Mallory had thrown at me over the years.
Because the anguish on her face matched the agony I’d been living in for the past three months. The resignation I could see in her eyes echoed the bitter pill I’d swallowed over a decade ago—that she’d never bemine.
In the next second, shield after shield slammed into place until Mallory’s grief was replaced with that ice-cold aloofness and irritation I was so used to.
“You think hitting on every woman in sight doesn’t hurt her? You think picking up countless women in front of her doesn’t hurt her? You ever think maybe she was saying it out of self-preservation? You ever think she needed for you to mean it?”
I hadn’t . . . until yesterday.
I hadn’t been able to figure out why she hadn’t immediately annulled our marriage...until yesterday.
For so many reasons, I’d been sure there was no future for me and that infuriating woman...until yesterday.
And I refused to waste another eleven years or months or even days.
I struggled to swallow past the shards of glass in my throat, my stare never leaving Mallory as I finally managed to respond. “Tessa.” Her name was a rasp as I carefully but firmly removed her from my body.
Not that she let that deter her—not that I’d thought she would.
Her hands slid back to my arms and up my shoulders, squeezing as they went. Not seeming to notice when I automatically reached out like I might be able to stop Mallory when sheactuallyleft.
“Where’ve you been?” Tessa bounced up on her toes, bringing herself closer to me, even as I tried shifting away to go after Mallory. “I mean, Emberly said you’re here all the time, but it’s beenmonthssince I’ve seen you in the shop. And even then, you’re usually with that girl. You know”—Tessa waved a dismissive hand through the air—“that quiet, brooding one, who looks like she might kill everyone she sees.”
