By the time the coffee is brewing and the back door opens, my face is flushed.
“You okay?” Rafe says, clueless I’ve just mentally had my way with him.
“Yup.”
I can feel him staring as I pull down our mugs, until the restless pups finally draw his attention, wanting food. Listening to him fill the dog bowls I keep my back turned, trying to force the blood to slow down in my veins. A hiss escapes me at a slight brush against my hip and I feel his heat as his arm reaches around me, grabbing his coffee from the counter. Just like that my body runs hot again.
“We need to talk.”
Those words are like an ice bath, instantly cooling me down. “About what?” I turn to find him leaning against the kitchen island.
“We never finished our plans for the kids this summer. There’s only two weeks of school left.”
Right, I was supposed to give that some thought. “Well, I got my work schedule on Friday and I have shifts three days a week: Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays.”
“Okay. I can ask Lisa to schedule me in on Saturdays, so I can have Sunday and Monday off.”
“That leaves two days,” I point out. “What about camps? You mentioned something about Sofie being in day camp last year?”
“I asked her about that last night,” he says, a shadow sliding over his face. “It caused a bit of a meltdown.”
“Oh, no.” I instinctively cross the space separating us and touch his arm. “What happened?”
Rafe’s blue eyes turn a dark indigo, and as if burned I immediately pull my hand back. I don’t get far when his fingers snap firmly around my wrist, holding me in place.
For what seems like an eternity, we stare into each other’s eyes. Rafe’s face is impassive, but his eyes swirl with emotions I can’t even begin to identify. Worried about what he might recognize in my own, I finally lower my gaze. Unfortunately that has me staring at the front of his jeans, where a substantial bulge is pressing against the fabric.
Holy shit.
I swing around, ripping out of his hold, and take two wobbly steps to brace my hands on the counter.
My sister’s counter.
In my sister’s kitchen.
In my sister’s house with my sister’s husband—my dead sister.
I drop my chin down and draw in a shaky breath through the pain ballooning in my chest. I’m going to hell.
“Taz…” His deep rumbly voice too close behind me skitters like a dose of voltage over my skin.
I shake my head sharply. “Summer camp,” I grind out, determined to pull us back from what surely would be a disaster.
There’s a long pause before I sense him stepping back. “She doesn’t want to go. Sofie,” he unnecessarily explains. “She was pretty adamant, even though she couldn’t really explain why.”
“It doesn’t matter,” I point out without turning around. “I’m sure she is feeling a lot of things she can’t really explain. Grief is like that; attaching itself irrationally to random things or experiences without real rhyme or reason.”
I know, because I just had a moment like that.
I squeeze my eyes shut at the realization that no matter what my body tells me—what my heart wants—it will always be stained with the grief of Nicky’s loss.
“I’m going to grab a shower,” Rafe says behind me before I feel a light tug on my dreads. “Don’t worry, we’ll figure it out.”
I listen to his footsteps disappear down the hall and up the stairs, wondering what exactly he proposes we figure out.
Rafe
The house smells incredible when I walk in the back door.
After my cold shower this morning, I was almost grateful to be called out for an emergency. Nothing sobers you instantly like a poor dog getting his leg caught in a poacher’s trap. Unfortunately the leg couldn’t be saved, but the dog will live.
There’s no one in the kitchen, so I walk over to the stove to lift the lid off the heavy cast iron pot, and stick my nose in it.
“It’s not ready.” I almost drop the lid at the sound of Taz’s voice behind me. She’s smiling when I whip my head around, but her heart is not in it. “Give it another forty-five minutes and you can have a taste.”
“What is it?”
“Moambe Chicken, I had to tweak the recipe because I couldn’t get everything at the grocery store, but it’s close enough.”
I ease the lid back on the pan and turn fully to face her. “Where are the kids?”
“The four-legged ones are zonked out underneath the coffee table and the two-legged ones are at Kathleen and Brent’s, playing in the pool.”
“Good.” It’s perfect actually.
I reach for her hand and pull her along into the living room and down on the couch beside me. Lilo and Stitch barely seem to notice.
“What are you doing?”
“We need to talk.”
“Again?” She pulls he hand from mine. “We talked this morning, before we went…off track.”
“That’s what we need to talk about.” I reach for her again, determined to get us past this elephant in the room. “I know you haven’t missed the way my body responds to you whenever you’re near. I haven’t missed yours.”
Her mouth falls open in shock, and in the next moment she’s up and standing on the other side of the coffee table, her arms tellingly crossed over her chest. “Don’t…”
“What? Tell the truth?”
“It’s…” she seems to struggle finding the right word until she settles on, “…inappropriate.”
“That doesn’t make it less true,” I insist, trying not to scoff.
“Nicky—”
I quickly press on before she can stop me. “I know she talked to you. She talked to me as well. She knew, well before I was willing to acknowledge it, and possibly right from the start, that my head may have been invested but my heart wasn’t.”
“How can you say that?”
Both dogs startle awake at Taz’s loud outburst and Stitch whimpers confused.
“Because you and I both know it’s the truth, and so did Nicky. There’s always been something between us. I suspect even your mother knows.” Taz claps her hands over her ears and closes her eyes. “Taz…” She doesn’t—or pretends not to—hear me. I get up and step in front of her, peeling her hands away from her head. Her eyes open to reveal them filling with tears.
“It’s not right. She’s been gone less than two months.”
“Normally I’d agree with you, but be honest, Taz, you and I both know whatever is going on between us dates back years, not months.”
“What about the kids? Jesus, my parents? I can’t do this to them again.”
“Stop it,” I snap when she covers her face with her hands. “This is about you and me. Don’t get me wrong; I’m not proposing to flaunt anything in their faces. We haven’t even had a chance to discover what we have.” I gently pull her hands away and hold them firmly in mine. “All I’m asking is we at least be honest with each other. That we explore this. I’ve spent nine years hiding in a marriage that was a lie from the start. On both Nicky’s and my part. I don’t want years of resentment to build up between you and me because of lies and misunderstandings. There’s been too much of that already.”