I’d just kissed him, as if I’d done it a thousand times before. But it wasn’t normal; it was anything but normal.
I pulled back and slapped a hand over my mouth, looking at his shocked face, which no doubt mirrored my own. “I am so sorry.” I shook my head, trying to get it on straight again. “I didn’t mean to do that. It—it was just…habit…muscle memory.”
“Yeah,” he said in a tone heavy with confusion. “Yeah, of course.” He cleared his throat. “Just part of the routine, right?”
“Yes. Exactly. I’ll see you later.” I left, deciding that fleeing from the awkward was the best course of action.
I tried to shake off the incident, tried to brush it away as a silly little mishap, something forgettable. It should be forgettable, right? Except that it wasn’t. It wasn’t forgettable at all. It was the opposite of forgettable. It kept playing in my head. And each time it did, it seemed to mean more than the time before.
Kissing Sean had been the most natural thing in the world. Just as natural as kissing Jonas goodbye. And that was…wrong….right? That should be wrong. It felt wrong. It felt like betrayal and like I was forgetting my husband—replacing him. I didn’t want to replace him. I didn’t want Sean.
I didn’t want Sean.
I didn’t.
I shouted that phrase in my head each time the barely-kiss played in my head, and each time I believed it less.
But I couldn’t want him. Not when I knew he still had feelings for me. I couldn’t have a crush on him. That would just confuse my life. That would ruin our friendship. Because if I toyed with that idea….if I allowed us to become something more and then we came apart…
I couldn’t. It hadn’t even been five months since Jonas had died. I couldn’t possibly be ready to move on. My sanity was barely remaining within my grip as it was. Adding the element of a relationship with Sean—Sean—the boy who had used me and left me and loved me and let me destroy myself for him—
I couldn’t.
And the more I told myself that I couldn’t use him to fill the hole of my loneliness, the greater the want became. I found myself wanting more. I wanted the possibility. I wanted the easy love of a man who knew me inside and out. I wanted to love him for everything that he was. I wanted to love the brilliant musician he was instead of resenting that part of him. I wanted to love him for the supreme human being he seemed to have become.
Seemed.
Why was it that I couldn’t let myself believe that his change would stick? Why couldn’t I trust that this version of Sean was the one that would stay? The pieces of my heart that still bore the scars in the places where he had broken me wouldn’t let me trust it—trust him.
♪♫♪
I walked in the door after work, wondering if things would be weird between us. If we were still only friends—or, if I still thought we were only friends and that there weren’t any more complicated emotions between us—it would have been easy. Something to laugh off. Instead, I worried that my accidental kiss that had felt so natural would make him think things that I wasn’t sure I wanted him to think about.
It was certainly making me think things…
So my smile and greeting were probably a little too bright. “Hey, how was your day?” I asked as I collapsed into the couch.
Sean was sitting at my piano, working through a chord progression, altering it just a little each time as he tried to land on the right sound.
He looked up and gave a fleeting smile. “It was fine. I had a conference call with my security people and managed to convince them that I was still just fine here.”
“Think that will last?”
He shrugged. “It has so far.” He knocked on the wooden surface of the piano. “Can you help me for a minute?” He scooted over.
“Sure.” It was a familiar routine. He showed me the piece of music he was working on, playing the tune several times and then going to sit on the couch with his guitar. We worked for the next hour and a half as he strummed and sang, adjusting notes and lyrics while I adjusted the piano to fit into what he was doing.
“I might have to put your name on my next album,” he said as he pushed his hair back.
I chuckled. “No thanks. I’m happy to remain the anonymous muse.”
He did a funny eyebrow-raise-head-tilt as he continued to read over his notes. “You are that,” he murmured.
I was about to ask what that meant, but he stood and stretched, ready to pursue food instead of music, and went in search of dinner.
He kissed my head before he left that evening, like he’d done several times before.
I turned on a movie, trying to distract myself from the roiling confusion that had continued to churn my stomach ever since that stupid peck on the mouth had made me start thinking things.
I fell asleep on the couch.
I vaguely heard the door open and close, but I was too comfortable to move and I quickly sank back into sleep.
A hand brushed against my cheek, then pushed my hair back off my face. “Libby.”
Hearing my name whispered made me smile. I loved it when Jonas woke me up this way. I breathed deep through my nose and turned my face toward his voice. “Hey, hon,” I murmured before letting my eyes flutter open.
Sean hovered over me, his face sad, his dim smile filled with compassion.
A quick breath rushed in and out, and I directed my stinging eyes to the ceiling, blinking away the sleep and the memory and the tears. “For a moment, I thought you were Jonas.”
“I’m sorry I’m not him.”
I closed my eyes, a rogue tear escaping my lashes. Because I did wish he was Jonas, but at the same time—I didn’t.
“Did you sleep here all night?” he asked as he pulled me to a sitting position.
I looked toward the window and saw that it was well past sunrise. “Um”—I tried to blink the sleep from my eyes—“yeah.” I rubbed at my belly out of habit. “I need to get ready for work.”
“It’s Saturday,” he reminded me.
“Right.”
“Why don’t you go sleep in your bed for a while?”
I just nodded and pushed to my feet. I was only half awake, and the cold dose of reality that had hit me when I’d thought that Jonas was there but then realized he wasn’t…I just wanted to go back to bed.
♪♫♪
The article shouldn’t have been a surprise to me. It was a miracle Sean had lasted this long under the radar, but I guess his beard, baseball hat and hipster glasses trick worked well when he was this far away from New York or L.A. No one expected to find Sean in the suburbs of North Carolina.
Then the challenge came out. The title of the online magazine article read, “Where is Sean Amity? Cash Reward for Picture.”
I snarled at my phone and then tossed it across my counter. Stupid, nosy people. Now I was going to be truly paranoid. I opened my fridge and glared at its contents.
There were two quick knocks on the back door before Sean walked in. The once-over he gave me was different, but I couldn’t figure out how I knew that. What was different about it? Had it been a little longer than usual? Was the way he looked at me different?
“You look cute,” he said as he closed the door.