It was close to five by the time I finally got back to my hotel room.
At the foot of the bed was my suitcase, which I’d packed last night and opened back up this morning, pulling out something to wear to brunch. I’d rebooked my six a.m. flight home for tomorrow, which left me with an entire evening to fight the urge to see Millie.
Dropping back onto the bed, I tossed an arm over my eyes. All through brunch, I’d had to sit across from my son, who’d looked at me with an esteem I didn’t deserve. He was curious and inquisitive, as always, especially about my time in the Navy. After boasting to the table about my being a SEAL, he asked all kinds of questions about what the training was like, whether Hell Week was really as bad as people said, what kinds of missions I’d been on, how I’d been wounded. Everyone there had been attentive and interested, but two straight hours of talking about myself had exhausted me.
It was the exact kind of situation I hated—being the center of attention—but I felt so guilty every time I looked into Mason’s guileless eyes that I couldn’t bring myself to shut down his questions or deflect to another topic.
So as much as I was dreading their “special announcement” and the reminder of what that meant for me, I found myself glad when Mason put his arm around his wife and told the table they were expecting a baby next spring. At that point, the table erupted into happy tears and well wishes. People got up to hug. Someone thumped my back and congratulated me. I think I grunted a thanks.
After brunch, Mason and Lori invited me to see their house. I followed them back to a two-story brick colonial on a picturesque, winding street. They gave me a tour, and then insisted on driving me around town so I could see the houses they’d both grown up in, the elementary schools they’d attended, the playgrounds where they’d played tag and Red Rover, the high school where Mason taught, the track he’d been running all his life, the soccer field where Lori had scored so many goals, the coffee shop where they’d had their first real date, the restaurant where Mason had proposed, and the cemetery where Andi was buried.
“Should we visit?” Mason asked.
My stomach churned, but thankfully, Lori was the one to demur.
“Oh, honey, not now,” she said, patting his shoulder from the back seat. “Another time. It’s so cold today.”
Finally, we arrived back at their house, and although they invited me to come in for something warm to drink, I said I had some work stuff to do. “I have to go on an assignment tomorrow, so I should prepare.”
Mason looked disappointed. “Oh. Okay. Well, it’s been really great spending time with you.”
“You too.” I received long hugs from both of them.
“Thank you so much for coming,” Lori said. “It meant so much to both of us.”
“You’re welcome,” I said. “Thank you for including me. And congratulations.”
“I wish we had more time,” said Mason. “I feel like I’ve barely scratched the surface of all the conversations I’d like to have with you.”
“Maybe you could come back at Christmas,” suggested Lori. “I bet you haven’t had a white Christmas in a while.”
I could see Millie again.
The thought popped into my head immediately. No matter how hard I tried, I could not stop thinking about her and what we’d done.
What I wanted to do again.
“I’ll try,” I said.
“You could stay with us, if you wanted,” Mason offered.
But then I couldn’t spend nights with Millie.
“I’ll give it some thought.” Then I lifted my hand in a wave, said goodbye once more, and jumped into my rental car. On the drive back to the hotel, I’d felt like the lowest human being on earth.
Placing both hands behind my head, I stared at the ceiling in my room and wished I had the energy to go work out. A grueling session with heavy weights or a miserable ten-mile run on the treadmill would serve me right. I needed to be punished for what I’d done. For what I wanted to do. I needed someone to tell me I was being an asshole for even considering going back to her house tonight.
I grabbed my phone and called Jackson.
“Hello?”
“Hey,” I said. “I think I fucked up.”
“That’s nothing new. What did you do?”
“I may have slept with my son’s ex-girlfriend.”
Jackson coughed. Or maybe choked. “May have?”
“Okay, I did.”
“Wow. Let me go in another room. Hang on.” He said something to someone—his wife, probably, which meant I was interrupting their family time on a Sunday and made me feel even worse. The background noise on his end receded, and I heard something that sounded like a door closing. “Okay,” he said. “So you slept with your son’s ex. Can I ask what in the hell you were thinking? Or were you thinking at all?”
“I didn’t realize who she was, at least not the first time it happened.”
“The first time? Jesus, Barrett. Have you lost your mind? Do I need to send in a team?”
“Let me explain.” I sighed heavily. “Remember the woman from New York City?”
Silence, as he put it together. “No fucking way.”
“She was Mason’s ex.”
“No. Fucking. Way.” He started to laugh. “That is so messed up.”
“Tell me about it. I’ve been thinking about her nonstop for a month and then out of nowhere she appears at the rehearsal, and she’s introduced to me as the wedding planner. But before Mason can even tell her my name, she blurts it out. It was obvious we’d already met. And Mason had already mentioned that the wedding planner was his ex, so I put it together immediately—what we had done.”
“But it’s not like anyone else knew.”
“No. Millie and I both played it casual. We said we’d had one drink together and that was that. But Mason seemed on edge about it right away. It was obvious he suspected something had happened that night.”
“You guys were that bad at acting?”
“I didn’t think so, but a few minutes later Mason asked me point blank if anything had happened with her.”
“What did you say to him?”
“What the fuck could I say? I lied!”
Jackson started to laugh again.
“It’s not funny,” I said. “Because then he says how much it means to him that I’ve been so honest and open about everything—the past, my relationship with his mom. He said he’s spent his entire life looking for the truth and never getting it, so honesty is important to him.”
“Oh, shit. Yeah, that’s complicated.” Jackson grew quiet. “But technically, you didn’t do anything wrong—not the first time, anyway. How’d you let it happen again?”
I exhaled. “I don’t know. I swear to God, Jackson, I promised myself I wouldn’t touch her, but I have no fucking control where she’s concerned.”
“That doesn’t sound like you.”
“It isn’t. And it’s driving me crazy.” I slapped a hand on my forehead. “It’s like I’m eighteen again. I’m the same impulsive, horny shithead that got a girl pregnant because he couldn’t keep it in his pants.”
“So get out of there. You went to the wedding, now come home. Take yourself out of the dangerous situation.”
“I am. I’m leaving tomorrow.”
“So what’s the problem?”
I paused, knowing what I was about to say was all kinds of fucked up. “The problem is I’ve got twelve hours left here, and I want to spend them with her.”
“Are you nuts?”
“Yes. She just . . . does something to me, Jackson. I know it sounds stupid and weak, but she does. I can’t explain it.” I closed my eyes. “I keep trying to twist the pieces around, like I’m looking for some kind of loophole that would make one last night with her okay.”
“There isn’t one.”
I frowned. “I knew you’d say that.”
“Of course you did. It’s why you called. You know what you have to do—stay away from her and get on that plane.”
“I haven’t even told you the worst part.”
“Jesus Christ. How much worse can it get, Zach?”
“Mason’s wife is fucking pregnant. I’m going to be . . . I can’t even say it.”
Jackson burst out laughing. “Aww, you’re going to be a grandpa! Or will it be Pawpaw? Grandpappy? Hmm, I think you’re more of a Gramps.”
“I feel like I’m in the Twilight Zone.”
“Well, Pop Pop, you’re not. This is your reality now—you’ve got family. And the Zach Barrett I know would put his family first.”
“I hear you.”
“Good. Because sex with a hot young thing is great, and I’m sure it’s making you feel like you’re drinking from the Fountain of Youth, but dude—find a hot young thing that isn’t your son’s ex.”
After hanging up with Jackson, I went down to the hotel gym and worked out. When I got back to the room, I cleaned up, ate overpriced room service, and watched some stupid TV. The hours I had to kill were dragging.
Around nine o’clock, I called Millie.
“Hey,” she said softly. Just hearing her voice made me long to be next to her.
“What are you up to?”
“I’m watching Antiques Roadshow.”
“Antiques Roadshow?”
“Yes. I’m addicted. Have you ever watched it?”
“Never.”
“Zach Barrett, you are missing out! People bring in their garage sale finds and stuff they inherited from long-lost aunts or shit they just have sitting around in their attics, and they find out what it’s worth. I mean, sometimes it’s just junk—which is terrible if the person paid a lot of money for it—but sometimes people discover they bought a ten-thousand dollar pair of French porcelain vases for five bucks at the church yard sale!”
I laughed. “Sounds . . . exciting?”
“It is! This show has drama, intrigue, suspense, mystery, emotion—whenever I need to escape the real world, Antiques Roadshow is where I go.”
“I’ll remember that.”
“How was your day?” she asked.
“Okay, I guess.” I wondered what she was wearing.
“You survived brunch?”
“Barely.”
“I’m sorry. Was it hard to be around Mason?”
“Yeah.” I frowned. “Harder than I thought it would be. I don’t deserve the way he looks at me or speaks about me—not just because of you, but the whole situation. I wasn’t there for him. I’m not Father of the Year.”
“But he likes you. He’s proud of you.”
“Yeah.” I squeezed my eyes shut.
“I heard they announced Lori’s pregnancy. One of my sisters saw it on social media.”
I didn’t want to think about that. “How was your day?”
“Good.” Her tone brightened a little. “I did a bunch of business research, and then I went to my parents’ house for dinner.”
“What kind of business research?”
“I’m thinking of opening a wedding gown shop,” she said. “Specifically, a shop that caters to plus-sized brides.”
I asked her to tell me more about it, and she talked excitedly about the fashion show she was putting on next spring, what she’d discovered about supply and demand for a shop like she envisioned, how she knew exactly who her ideal customers would be, how nervous she was to make a career change, but also how passionate she was about her ideas. Listening to her was so captivating, I didn’t even realize how much time had gone by until she brought it up.
“Oh my God, I’ve literally just rambled for twenty minutes,” she said. “You’re probably bored stiff.”
“Not bored at all,” I told her. “And believe it or not, I’m not stiff either.”
She laughed. “As soon as the word stiff was out of my mouth, I was like—oh crap.”
“For once, I am talking to you without a hand in my pants, I promise. I told myself before I called you that I would act like a responsible adult and not a hormonal teenager.”
“I like both sides of you.” She paused. “I wasn’t sure if you’d come over or call or . . . or what.”
“I wasn’t sure what to do either.”
“So you’re leaving tomorrow?” There was no mistaking the hope in her voice.
“Yes. On that six a.m. flight. But Millie.” I steeled myself.
“Yes?”
“I can’t see you tonight.”
Silence. “Okay.”
“It’s not because I don’t want to—you have to know that.”
“Totally,” she said, her tone more businesslike than it had been before. “I agree one hundred percent.”
“If things were different,” I said, hearing the note of desperation in my voice, “if the circumstances were anything other than what they are, I’d be on your doorstep right now. Actually, I’d probably already be in your bed.”
“It’s better that you’re not,” she said curtly. “Honestly, what’s the point? This can’t go anywhere. After this weekend, we probably won’t see each other again.”
“Yeah.” It was the truth, but it still made my chest cave.
“Well, I should get to bed.”
“Me too.”
“Have a safe trip back.”
“Thanks. Good luck with your business idea.”
“Thank you.” A few silent seconds ticked by. “Goodbye, Zach.”
“Bye.”
I ended the call and stared at my phone for a minute.
Then I deleted her number.
Then I lay there in the dark, telling myself I’d done the right thing, even if my room felt cold, lonely, and depressing.
Then I reminded myself that sometimes doing the right thing meant sacrifice. I’d always understood that, and I’d put myself in harm’s way countless times to protect others. In this case, I didn’t even have to risk bodily harm, I just had to give up one last night with her.
Then I got off the bed, grabbed my keys, and drove to her house.
