Page 31 of Heartbroken Husband
I shrugged. “We move from there, I guess.”
“Move where, exactly? Move in together. Move straight into a marriage? Where are you moving?”
I gave him a look. “We’ll move forward.”
He groaned. “That’s not a direction, Zach.”
“It is when you don’t have a map,” I snapped. “This is uncharted territory, man. For all of us. As far as I know, neither Dad or Clark, Sr. have ever had to deal with a situation like ours.”
“Okay, but it’s happening, then. You and Adeline are probably getting hitched.” He leaned his elbows on the counter. “How do you feel about that?”
A sharp, dry bark of laughter shot out of me. “How do you think I feel about it?”
“I think that you should be happy,” he said carefully, then rose from his stool, paused, and rapped his knuckles across the counter. “You can let yourself be happy about this. Hell, you deserve to be happy about this. Call me when the food comes.”
With that, he strode out of the kitchen like he had somewhere to be instead of just leaving to make a dramatic exit. I shook my head, but once he was gone, I sank into the stool he’d vacated and turned those words over in my head.
You deserve to be happy about this.
It wasn’t a complicated statement, but I still wasn’t really sure what he’d meant by it. Personally, I felt so torn up by everything that was happening that I couldn’t even see straight.
In the end, I carried my food to my home office when it arrived and texted Theo to let him know the rest of the hugeorder was in our kitchen, waiting for him. The guy ate like an ox. Or a cow. Whichever one ate more.
Usually, I’d stick around to give him helpful hints about healthy eating habits, but tonight, I just wasn’t up to it. Retreating to the sanctuary offered by work felt like a safer bet than talking to my brother about my confused fucking feelings.
As I ate my dumplings and noodles, I tried to answer a few emails and review some documents Colin had sent over, but my focus wasn’t there. It hadn’t been all week.
I was so far gone down memory lane when my phone buzzed against my desk that I nearly vaulted out of my chair. Thankfully, I caught the noodle container just before it went flying off my lap. I glanced down, expecting the message to be from one of my brothers or perhaps even Charlotte, sending another ultrasound photo.
Instead, it had come from an unsaved number and I frowned. My spam blocking software was amazing, so I assumed the message had to be from a client until I opened it—and then immediately felt like an idiot.
Unknown Sender: Tell Theo we said thanks!
There was a picture attached, the image loading to reveal two girls at what appeared to be an extremely cheerful ice cream shop. Bright colors against the walls and vibrant pink booths. Jennifer was beaming, her smile full of unfiltered joy even though her ice cream had already started to melt down the side of her cone.
Lu was wearing her usual frown. Despite the cheerfulness of her surroundings, she looked faintly suspicious of the entire situation. I let out a quiet laugh and wondered if that was Lu’s default setting, a little too serious and faintly suspicious of everything.
When I glanced back up at the number, I was confused for a beat about why it hadn’t come up asAdeline, but thenI remembered that I’d deleted it. Years ago, right after she’d ended things, I’d done it in a moment of clarity.
Or what I’d told myself was clarity at the time, at least.
Heartbroken and deep in the clutches of a bottle of cheap tequila, I’d scrolled to her contact, but instead of giving into the temptation to call her, I’d hit delete. It’d felt like the clean break I needed, removing every possibility of a late-night mistake and making it impossible to revisit a chapter that had very clearly been closed.
It had devastated me the first time I’d typed her name into my phone and she just… wasn’t there. Honestly, it had hurt so bad that I’d screamed into my pillow. Now she was back and Theo thought I should behappyabout it.
God, I’m still trying to blame the breakup on her, aren’t I?
I squeezed my eyes shut and inhaled a deep breath, then looked at the picture again, staring at the adorable little faces looking back at me. The faint echo of all that bitterness I’d been carrying around for so long started creeping up inside, but it wasn’t so bad this time.
For eight depressing, long-ass years, I’d blamed her. I’d thought about her often and then beat myself up for it. I’d done some things I was proud of and a lot that I really wasn’t, and through it all, the bitterness had been there. A constant companion to carry me through every lonely and not-so-lonely night. All because she’d left. She’d chosen someone else and that was where the story had ended.
Except it wasn’t really where it had ended. Deep down, I’d known that for a long time too.
It hadn’t really been her fault. Sure, she’d gone along with it, but I knew she hadn’t really had a choice. I’d seen it with my brothers. With my cousins.
When that hammer came down, it came down fast and hard, when you least expected. Fuck, both Adeline and I were goingthrough itright now. That hammer was about to slam down on her for the second time, before the dust had even settled in the aftermath of the first time.
Glancing back down at the picture she’d sent, I found my fingers moving of their own accord, zooming in just slightly on Jennifer’s smile and then on Lu’s frown. These girls were already going through it in the worst possible way.
