A Second Chance at Forever (21 page)

She couldn’t force herself to do it now, however—to look into the same brown eyes she’d lost herself in last night and watch him break her heart. She’d had to watch David do that very thing. She didn’t have the strength to do it again.

Shaking from head to toe, she searched the room, finding her clothing. Each piece she pulled on brought with it the memory of how it had gotten onto the floor in the first place and Angela thought for sure her chest would simply split open wide. She would miss him. Terribly. Miss everything about him.

As she pulled her shirt on over her head and went to exit the room, she made the mistake of glancing back. The sight of him pulled at her. She found herself returning to the bed. Leaning over his prone body, she kissed him gently, savored the feel of his mouth against hers one last time, the way he moaned softly in his sleep and reached for her. Then she turned, bit down hard on her bottom lip, using the physical pain as a distraction, and quietly left the room.

She got as far as the front door when he called to her from behind.

“Ang?”

Dread sank like a stone in her stomach. Her fingers reflectively squeezed the knob. The tears she’d barely held in check renewed themselves, dripping down her cheeks.

Oh God, I don’t know if I have the strength to do this…

She swiped at her eyes, prepared herself for what she knew was to come, what she had to do, and made herself face him.

He stood at the edge of the living room, wearing a pair of gray pajama bottoms, confusion knitting his brow. “Where are you going?”

The sight of him was more than she could bear. Pain squeezed the air from her lungs. Her knees wobbled as a wave of weakness washed through her. How could she leave him when she needed him so very much?

“I can’t do this, Alex,” she said, her voice trembling as the emotion bubbled over, “I thought I could, but I can’t.”

He seemed to understand something was wrong, for he took a few, careful steps toward her, as if approaching a scared rabbit. “Do what, sweetheart?”

The term of endearment sliced at her insides. She turned away from him, from the unbearable confusion on his face, and wrapped her arms around herself. “Oh God I know it’s selfish. So incredibly selfish. But I can’t go back there again. I can’t spend my life in love with a man who doesn’t love me.”

“Ang, you’re talking in circles. Sit down and—”

“I love you.” She blurted the words on a trembling voice as she pivoted toward him. His face blurred before her.

For a long, unbearable moment, silence filled the air, tension mounting between them, thick and impenetrable. They’d been so close last night. She’d slept warm and safe in his arms, but suddenly a chasm opened between them. Once again he was the stranger.

Alex froze where he stood, staring at her. He looked…stunned. His eyes widened and searching hers as if he couldn’t quite believe what he’d heard. Then something shifted within him. He moved further into the room, dropping as if weighted by an anchor onto the edge of the recliner in the living room.

It wasn’t until that moment, as she watched him brace his elbows on his knees and drag his hands through his hair, that she realized how much she wanted—needed—to hear him say the words back. As the seconds ticked by, Angela found herself holding her breath and crossing everything she had as she waited for his response.

When he finally lifted his head she knew she’d gotten her answer. Somewhere deep down, she’d expected this possibility. How could she not? The day he’d asked her to marry him, he’d told her he didn’t know if he’d ever be able to tell her he loved her.

Seeing the pain and regret shining like beacons from the depths of his eyes still struck her like a fist to the stomach. A wound ripped open in her chest. The breath rushed from her lungs.

He rose to his feet and shook his head. “Ang, I—”

“Don’t.” Blinking back the tears that refused to stop filling her eyes, she wrapped her arms around herself and backed away. “Oh, God, don’t. I couldn’t bear to hear you say it. I have to go. I need to go.”

Needing to leave, before he tried to stop her, before she let him, before she ended up in the same place she’d already been, she turned toward the door, but he was faster. Just as she reached for the knob, his hand closed around hers and halted her in her tracks.

“Please stay and talk to me.” He tugged her back to him while at the same time moving around in front of her, then took both hands in his own, as if to hold her there. His gaze searched hers, a wild, almost desperation that matched the tone of his voice. “I can’t just let you leave like this.”

“Then tell me you love me,” she whispered, her voice shaking with the emotion she barely managed to hold in check.

Hope surged in her chest, impossible yet undeniable, as she waited. He stared at her, then shook his head, dejected.

“I can’t. Not yet. I’m just not there yet.” He took a step forward, closed the miniscule space between them, so close his body brushed hers and his masculine scent assaulted her senses. His warm palms slid over her cheeks. The slow, torturous stroke of his thumbs over her skin forced her to hold his gaze. “I need time, Ang.”

His face blurred before her. She bit her lip to stem its quivering, struggling with the tide of emotion that washed over her. How desperately she wanted to fall into those arms, press her cheek to that bare chest. But her heart was splitting in two, the pieces already chinking off and falling at her feet.

“What if you never get there? What if she was it for you? Mom never found anyone else after Dad died. She’s spent her life alone.” She shook her head, backed away from the sweet temptation of Alex and folded her arms across her chest, the only barrier she had against him. “I was married to a man who fell in love with someone else. Married to a man who stopped loving me long before he ever left me. I can’t go through that again. I can’t wait around wondering—”

“I’m not David, dammit.” His brow twisted in anger. His hands seized her waist, yanked her against him. He leaned his forehead against hers. “I would never hurt you that way.”

Pain filled his voice, twisted at the knife in her belly, but called to her like a beacon. Despite the unbearable ache in her chest, she couldn’t stop herself from reaching up to touch his cheek, to somehow soothe the impossible wound.

“No. No you aren’t. You’re a better man than David could ever hope to be.” She shook her head. “But the result is the same. I’m in love with you, and you can’t say it back. You don’t know if you’ll ever be able to say those words to me, and I can’t pretend that that isn’t tearing me apart. She has pieces of you I can’t touch, Alex.”

His hand dropped to the soft swell of her stomach, his voice thick with emotion. “So do you.”

Several hot tears escaped to slip down her cheeks. She laid a hand on his chest, over his heart. “But I want this. I need you to tell me you love me too.”

His shoulders slumped in defeat. He shook his head. “I can’t,” he said again. “I’m not ready yet.”

Another piece of her heart chinked off and fell to the floor, the pain shredding her insides. She forced herself to release the minute contact, every inch of her rebelling against it. She took several steps back from the sweet temptation he presented. It was better this way, for all of them.

“I need time, Alex.” She backed toward the door, seized by a need to leave, to be anywhere but there with the awful pain that sat between them. “Please don’t contact me. I’ll call you.”

“I want to be there when they’re born, Ang.”

She nodded. “I’ll call you. I promise. But for now…I just need time.”

He nodded, relenting. She opened the door and left the house. As she emerged into the long hallway, the pain flooded her. Her knees refused to hold her up any longer. She sank back against the wood, taking strength in its solidness, as she struggled to breathe. A year ago she’d divorced David, had sworn to herself she would never put herself in this position again. Yet here she was, in love with a man who didn’t love her. The worst part? She’d become closer to Alex than she’d ever gotten to David. Somehow this wound was sharper, deeper, the pieces more jagged. How would she ever get used to seeing him again?

****

As the door closed behind Angela, Alex let out a curse, picked up the nearest object off the table beside him and hurled it across the room with all the rage that stormed through his system. The stereo remote shattered against the wall over the couch with a satisfying crunch. The pieces tinkled to the ground. Her words rang in his head, cutting through him, slicing deep into his core.

She loved him. Despite everything, she loved him.

Some part of him rebelled against the thought of never holding her again. Her leaving felt like he was watching a piece of himself walk out the door. Everything inside of him screamed at him to go after her, to drop to his knees at her feet and beg for her forgiveness.

But he couldn’t.

She wanted something he wasn’t sure he’d ever be able to give her. She was right, he didn’t know if he’d ever be able to say the words she needed to hear, and that wasn’t fair to her. Asking her to marry him had been a mistake, he could see that now. A selfish one at that. He’d been stupid to ever expect her to settle for less.

He moved to the couch and sank down onto it, dropped his head into his hands. The decision weighed on him like a wet blanket, heavy and oppressive.

He would be the father their babies needed, because he desperately wanted to be, but Angela deserved so much better than what he could give her.

So much better than him.

It was time he let her go so she could find someone who could actually give it to her.

Chapter Fifteen

Angela set the last clean cup into the dish drainer on the counter and heaved a sigh. Her brother ought to be here any moment now. He’d called ten minutes ago from his car to tell her he was on his way over. Mom had called him that morning; the dishwasher had quit working, and he was coming to fix it. Angela didn’t look forward to seeing him. It wasn’t fair to him, but every time she saw or spoke to her brother, the yearning to ask about Alex gripped her chest.

More than two weeks had passed with no word from Alex. Sixteen long, aching days. Oh, she knew she’d asked for this. She’d told him specifically not to call. But every time her phone rang, she’d found herself hoping anyway. That it was him, that he’d called to beg for her forgiveness. Anything that would tell her she’d been wrong.

But he hadn’t. Every time her cell rang the disappointment and pain she’d sworn to herself ten months ago—the day her divorce from David had become final—she would never feel again gripped her chest in a vise. She was left trying, for the second time in her life, to pick up the pieces of her shattered heart.

As she lifted the dishtowel off the counter, the doorbell sounded through the house. Positive she’d left the door open when she’d come home from the office an hour ago, she called out, “It’s open.”

Then she picked up the cup she’d just washed, steeling herself for the contact with her brother. Halfway through drying the dish, the buzzer came again. Obviously she’d locked the door. Her head had been in the clouds lately.

Setting the dish and towel onto the counter with a sigh, she turned and headed for the front entrance.

“What’d you do”—she asked, turning the deadbolt—“forget your…”

The rest of her words died on her lips as she pulled the door open. She barely had time to register Alex’s tall form on the front porch before he stepped across the threshold, took her face in his hands, and claimed her mouth.

HHe kissed her thoroughly, his lips plied hers, tender yet insistent. She braced her hands against his chest, but any thought of pushing him away fled as his mouth shifted, slanted across hers, hungry and possessive. His tongue swept in to slide against hers.

The powerful press of his body, his warmth against her, was too much to bear. His scent encompassed her, torturous and enticing. This was exactly where she wanted to be, where she’d dreamt of being every night these last weeks. A soft, relenting moan escaped her. Her traitorous body leaned into him.

When he finally released her, her hands clutched fistfuls of the blue polo shirt he wore. Her breath came in harsh, shallow pants. His heartbeat hammered in time with hers, twisting at the pain that gripped her chest.

He stroked her hair back from her face. Tormented eyes moved over her features before settling on hers. “I can’t do it, Ang.”

She furrowed her brow in confusion. “Do what?”

“Live without you.”

Pain squeezed her chest, tears filling her eyes. His sweet words weren’t the ones she needed to hear. She shook her head, his face blurring before her. “Please don’t do this, Alex. It’s not fair.”

But he continued anyway, seeming to ignore her plea.

“I tried, you know. To let you go. The first week, I thought for sure I was doing the right thing.” His gaze lowered, moving along with his fingers as they slid over her neck, across the tops of her shoulders, then back up before sinking into her hair, as if he simply couldn’t resist touching her. “Then the weekend came. I kept seeing the two of us in the living room, sitting together in the dark, watching old movies, lying with my head in your lap, feeling your fingers idly running through my hair. God, Ang, that’s bliss.”

She drew her brows together, shook her head. “Alex…”

He looked up then, put a finger to her lips. “Please. I need to get this out. It’s been eating at me for days.”

Once again, he didn’t wait for her acknowledgement, but simply continued anyway. “You filled my house with life, Ang. Life it hasn’t had in fifteen long damn months. But after you left, it went back to being empty. Empty and cold. There’s no life there anymore. No laughter. Just…the hollow sound of my own feet on the floor.” He shook his head, misery rising in his eyes. “Life has no meaning without you. No joy. I don’t want to go back to living like that.”

When he finished, his gaze searched hers. Obviously, he waited for her response, but his sweet words only further crushed her. The hardest thing she’d ever done was walk away from him. Didn’t he understand that?