“It’s okay, you can laugh.”
I dropped my hand. “What time did you have to get up to put that thing in?”
Giving me a sarcastic look, he replied, “Early. It’s actually done, if that temperature thing is right.”
With a quick look at the temperature of the turkey, I reached into a drawer and pulled out oven mitts. I shouldn’t have been surprised that they were in the same spot as well.
“It’s for sure done,” I said, pulling out the oven rack. I looked at Bishop. “I think this is one of those buddy-lift things.”
“Ha ha,” he said, slipping the mitts off my hands and putting them on his. “Back away and let me get this bad boy out.”
Bishop took out the turkey and placed it on the two hot plates he had waiting on the island.
“It smells heavenly!” I purred, drawing in a deep breath through my nose.
“My mom wasn’t very pleased when I called her last night in New York to ask how to make a turkey.”
“I bet,” I giggled.
We got to work in silence as we both moved around the kitchen and got everything ready for our little Thanksgiving lunch. In years past, we had never had to make a turkey—we were always going to my parents’ house or Bishop’s folks. Sometimes even over to the Larsons’ place.
Once everything was laid out on the island, Bishop handed me a plate. “You first.”
My stomach chose that moment to growl. Laughing, I replied, “Gladly.”
We each loaded up our plates with more food than we needed and made our way into the breakfast nook. We sat down and both started to eat without talking. I guessed neither of us really knew how or where to start.
Bishop spoke first. “So…how long are we going to sit here in silence?”
The food in my mouth suddenly felt dry as dirt. I forced myself to swallow, then set down my fork. “I’ve gone over this conversation a million times in my head, and I still don’t know where to start.”
Bishop wiped his mouth with his napkin. “How about starting with why you divorced me, Abby.”
I snapped my head up and our eyes met. “I didn’t want to divorce you.”
He let out a bark of laughter. “Funny, you’re the one who filed. I sat in the same courtroom you did.”
I set my napkin down next to my plate. “I begged you to talk to me before we went in, Bishop. I didn’t want to go through with it.”
“You could have spoken up in the courtroom.”
My voice cracked as I said, “You told me we didn’t have anything to talk about. I tried to tell my lawyer to stop the proceedings, but she said it was too late. I tried to approach your lawyer myself, and he told me I needed to go through my lawyer!”
Bishop frowned. “Your lawyer lied.”
I drew my head back. “Why would he lie?”
“Because you were getting a pretty penny in the divorce settlement, Abby, and he wanted his cut.”
I opened my mouth to speak, then pressed my lips together tightly and closed my eyes for a few moments. How could I have been so stupid?
I finally opened my eyes and met his. “I remember sitting there and just crying because I kept willing you to look at me. I thought, maybe if you looked at me, I could say something. Tell you I still loved you.”
Bishop slammed his hand on the table and I jumped. “Then why fucking leave me, Abby!?”
“I didn’t want to! But I couldn’t give you what you wanted, and that destroyed me. I was so lost and confused and didn’t know up from down, Bishop! I wasn’t thinking clearly at all!”
He glared at me. “You couldn’t give me you? Why? Was there someone else?”
I nearly choked on the air I sucked in. “No! There has never been anyone else.” I frowned, confused by his accusation. “I…I couldn’t give you a baby. I mean, at least at the time, I didn’t think I could try for another baby. I was so messed up in my head, Bishop, and I know I should have talked to you, but looking back…it was as if I wasn’t even in my own body.”
Something moved over Bishop’s face. It seemed like confusion, sadness, anger—then he looked as if he might be sick. “All I ever wanted was you. Only you. Yes, the loss of our baby gutted me, but the loss of you killed me.”
My chin trembled, and I covered my mouth with my hand to keep from bursting into tears.
Bishop closed his eyes and exhaled as he slowly shook his head. “Goddammit, Abby. I don’t want to fight with you.”
“Neither do I.”
He rubbed at the back of his neck. “I’m trying here.”
“And so am I. Do you think there isn’t a second that goes by that I don’t regret walking out that front door? That it doesn’t shred my heart every time I hear people talk about all the women you’ve been with?”
He jerked his head up.
“That’s all my fault. Mine, Bishop. I own up to all of it. I can’t change the past. The only thing I can do is try to explain to you why I left.”
Bishop looked down at his plate, and I could see his internal struggle. When his eyes finally met mine, there was a coldness in them. All the warmth and happiness from earlier was gone.
My entire body sagged, and I felt defeated. Would he ever be able to forgive me?
I opened my mouth to speak—and his doorbell rang.
We both turned and looked toward the foyer. Then Bishop’s eyes shot past me, and I knew he was looking at the security camera monitor.
“Fuck,” he said as he stood, dropping his napkin on the table. “Stay right here, Abby.”
With a nod, I watched him head across the house. Something told me not to turn around, but I did…and what I saw shattered what was left of my heart.
Jax and her daughter were standing at Bishop’s front door.
Bishop
Every muscle in my body ached from holding myself back. All I wanted to do was get up, round the table, and kiss Abby senseless. Fuck, a part of me just wanted to forget the last two years completely.
But that wasn’t going to happen, and I was tired of arguing. Tired of being mad all the time.
An ache formed in my neck, and I could feel my headache moving up the back of my head.
With a slow, deep breath in, I broke our eye contact so I could think for a moment. All that anger from the day I’d gotten the divorce papers and the stupid games…
Yeah, I may not have wanted to care, but I did. I fucking did, and I deserved to know why she left.
When I finally got my emotions pushed down, I met her gaze. Her entire body seemed to deflate, and she suddenly looked so tired. She started to speak, and then the damn doorbell rang. The surprise on her face clearly matched my own. Who in the hell would be at my door at noon on Thanksgiving?
Both of us looked toward the front of the house, and in that moment, I knew who it was.
Turning my head, I looked over Abby’s shoulder to the TV monitor that displayed the feeds from the security cameras. I had put up a few monitors throughout the house a couple of years ago so that Abby could see who was here if she was home alone and someone showed up unannounced.
My heart slammed in my chest and a rush of heat raced through my entire body.
I had totally forgotten that last week I’d invited Jax to bring Ashley by to roast marshmallows before they left to go back to Boston. Since we’d been getting more snow than normal, Jax had been called back to the city with the idea that she’d return in the spring to continue her research.