But she knew Liz’s
questions were good ones. Were true ones. Were ones that she really needed to
think about. So she made herself answer them, no matter how it felt like they
were ripping her apart.
“No. Of course
not. It would be a lot more than that. If Seth really did this, I’d be broken,
and furious, and betrayed, and...and...broken.” She sucked in a painful breath
in a harsh gust. “I know that’s not fair, but that’s how I’d feel. I’ve slept
with him twice in the last week and a half, and he’s professed to love me for
the last six months. And I care about him so much. I’d be...broken.”
The words had
started pouring out in an agonized rush, and Erin’s eyes burned painfully. Darting
a glance over to Liz’s sympathetic face, Erin concluded in an embarrassed
quaver, “He has every right to move on, and I can't blame him if he does, but
it’s felt for so long like he’s…”
“He’s what?” Liz
breathed.
“He’s mine.”
There was a
thick silence at the table. Erin closed her eyes and breathed deeply, trying to
find her waiting calm again.
“Erin,” Liz
began carefully. “All this sounds pretty deep. Are you thinking now about
changing your answer to him?”
“No,” Erin mumbled,
confused and overwhelmed. “Maybe. I don’t know. It might be too late anyway. I
need to think about this some more.”
Something
changed on Liz’s face—almost lit up—but Erin was too drained and bewildered to
know what had prompted it.
Then Liz said,
an edge of something in her voice, “Well, as much as I hate to say it, if Seth
has
moved on, I think he’s picked a pretty good woman. From every account, that
woman is not just gorgeous and successful. She’s also smart and really nice.”
Erin’s vision
whited out for a second in a wave of rage and jealousy. Her whole body clenched
up as she visualized the blonde again—that elegant hand disappearing into Seth’s
suit coat. Those hands all over Seth.
Erin’s
Seth.
Slammed with
instinctive, visceral fury, Erin wanted to scratch the woman’s eyes out.
Then maybe Liz’s—for
saying such a thing.
Erin turned on
her sister with a snarl. “What?”
Liz bit her
lip, to hold back...something. “Oh. Sorry. Just checking something. Damn.”
“Liz,” Erin
said reproachfully, covering up Mackenzie’s ears—too late, of course.
“Sorry. Slipped
out. Stress does that to me, and your relationship with Seth has been very
stressful for me.”
Erin watched
her sister suspiciously for a minute, but then relaxed and leaned back in her
chair. “Anyway, I should get home so I can call Seth. All of this is probably
pointless, since I don’t think Seth would have moved on without telling me
first.”
As they were
leaving the restaurant at last, Liz said, “Call me as soon as you know
anything. And, if you need me to rip anyone apart for you—Seth, that woman,
Mary Carlyle,
anyone
—just let me know.”
***
Erin called Seth as soon as she
got back to her apartment with Mackenzie, asking him if he had any time this
evening because something had happened and she needed to talk to him about it.
Before she
could follow up or explain what the issue was, he said, “I’ll be right over,”
and then he hung up the phone.
Erin blinked
for a minute at her phone, rather startled by his abrupt response. Then she
shrugged and tried not to brood about it as she nursed Mackenzie and started
getting her ready for bed.
It was a little
earlier than Mackenzie's usual bedtime, but it would be easier to hash things
out with Seth if the baby wasn’t present and demanding attention.
Erin had just
changed her diaper and was snapping a soft, blue sleeper on when there was a
loud, insistent knock on the door.
Lifting a
drowsy Mackenzie into her arms, Erin hurried to the front door to let Seth in.
“What is it?”
he demanded, as soon as she’d swung the door open. He was dressed in
eveningwear—tailored black suit, with a gray dress shirt and tie. “Is everything
all right?”
Despite the
anxiety churning in her gut, Erin rolled her eyes at him. “Yes. Which you'd
know if you had let me explain on the phone. It wasn’t an emergency. You didn’t
have to rush over here and miss your...your dinner.” She swallowed, having a
horrifying vision of Seth’s having dressed up like this to go on a date with someone
else. “Or whatever.”
Seth’s face
relaxed immediately, now that the crisis was averted, and he arched his
eyebrows. “Last time you called me up out of the blue and asked me to come
over, you wanted me to...” He slanted a quick glance down at Mackenzie’s rosy
face, which was blinking up at him, “…to satisfy you.”
Erin, of
course, knew exactly what he meant.
He smiled
dangerously. “Is that what it is again?”
Surely, Erin
told herself, he couldn’t have fucked another woman last night and flirt with
her so warmly today. Surely, even as smooth a player as Seth wouldn’t do such a
thing.
Not after what
they’d been through together.
She cleared her
throat and stepped out of the doorway to let him into the apartment. “No. That’s
not what this is about.”
“Too bad.” He
reached out for Mackenzie as he entered.
Erin handed the
baby to him without hesitation and then watched Seth and their daughter. He
looked so handsome and sophisticated in his expensive formal clothes, and Mackenzie
was soft and squirming in her blue pajamas, her red-gold hair ruffled and
messy.
Seth pulled the
baby toward him and murmured something Erin almost didn’t hear. Something that
sounded like, “What is your mommy thinking—putting you in little boy’s
clothes?”
For the moment
forgetting the main issue at hand, Erin made an outraged noise in her throat. “They
are not boy’s clothes. Girls can wear blue too. She looks pretty in blue.”
His expression
remained cool and dry, but she knew he was teasing. “They’re definitely boy’s
pajamas,” he insisted, letting Mackenzie play with the lapels of his jacket. “But
at least they match her eyes.”
“Don’t you dare
rile her up,” Erin said grumpily, when Seth lifted the baby higher, making her
giggle. “She was just going to bed. She’s been kind of fussy all day, and she
hasn’t slept much. I’ve finally gotten her ready to go to sleep.”
Seth nodded
with a resigned sigh. Gave Mackenzie a kiss on the forehead and then handed her
back to Erin. “What did you want to talk about then, if it wasn’t an emergency
or a, uh, request for satisfaction?”
“Let me put her
down first,” Erin said, taking Mackenzie into the nursery, settling her in the
crib, turning off the light, and cracking the door.
When she came
back into the living room, Seth was sitting on the sofa, looking up at her
expectantly.
All of her
suppressed fear and confusion came bubbling back up to the surface of her
conscious thoughts. She swallowed hard. Lowered herself until she was perched
stiffly on the very edge of the sofa cushion beside Seth. Took a deep breath
and reminded herself that Seth wouldn’t have done what it looked like he’d
done.
And that, even
if he had, it wasn’t the end of the world.
“Erin?” Seth
prompted softly, his eyes narrowed as he watched her face intently.
“Liz got sent a
link from Mary Carlyle’s blog,” Erin began resolutely, trying to remember the
speech she'd composed earlier.
“What now?”
“She posted a
photo.”
Seth tensed
slightly. “Of what?”
She could read Seth’s
body language by now—no matter how subtle it was. And it seemed to Erin that he
was preparing for something he already knew was coming. The knowledge made her
heart sink down toward her gut. “Of you. And that woman who works for the mayor.
Karla Hart.”
When Erin
darted a look over at Seth’s expression, she saw that his face had closed down.
Shutting her out completely. “And what were we doing in the picture?”
Erin felt like
she couldn’t really breathe. Seth's reaction seemed to be all wrong. She’d been
hoping for an immediate, outraged denial. Not this controlled renewal of his
emotional defenses.
But, holding it
together until she heard what he had to say, she replied, “You two were in a
hallway of a hotel or something. And you looked...intimate.” Not even an eyelid
flickered on Seth’s face, although his jaw appeared to be clenched. Sucking in
a painful breath, she added, “Mary Carlyle implied you were moving on.”
Erin waited. Several
seconds. Which felt like an agonizing eternity.
When Seth didn’t
say anything, didn’t do anything but stare at the opposite wall, Erin rushed
on, “I was sure it wasn’t true. I mean, I don’t believe you would have done that,
after we’d...I mean, after...everything.”
Her incoherent words
hung in the silent room for far too long. Then Seth stared at her, as if his
eyes were piercing her, exposing her.
Erin was holding
her breath as she waited—for his response, for a reasonable explanation, for
some way to put this potential nightmare to rest.
She didn’t get
it.
“You should
tell Liz not to antagonize people who may end up writing tabloids. It will
never end well.”
“Is that all
you have to say about it?”
Seth met her
eyes. “What do you mean?”
She stifled a
roar of indignation—mostly because she didn’t want to wake up Mackenzie.
“Aren’t you going to explain things to me? I was sure the picture was taken out
of context or something because I couldn’t believe you would have done this, after
everything that’s happened between us. I mean, if you wanted to move on, that
would be fine, but I was sure you’d at least tell me and not do it behind my
back.” She gulped, realizing she was babbling again. “But now you’re confusing
me by acting this way. Did you sleep with that woman or not?”
“Would it
matter to you if I had?”
Erin tried to answer
but couldn’t force any words out.
Finally, she
burst out, “Yes! Of course it would." Once the first words were said, the
rest came pouring out in an impassioned stream. "I know we don’t have a
commitment, but we’ve been in some kind of relationship here, and it’s been
getting more and more serious recently. I trust you...almost completely.” She
rubbed her face and tried to pull herself together. “If you’d done this behind
my back, after we’d just made love a couple of days ago and shared everything else
we'd shared, I would feel betrayed...and really, really hurt.”
Seth’s eyes
were narrowed again, and he was peering intently, almost coolly, at her face. “Is
that all?”
“What do you
mean, is that all? Why are you acting this way? Why won't you answer me? Did
you fuck that woman or not?”
He just looked
at her, his eyebrows arched in an ironic question.
Erin’s vision
darkened for a moment, as she was overwhelmed with recognition. He wasn’t going
to admit it, but she knew, she
knew
. There was no other reason for him
to act this way.
She stood up
and walked to the window. Squeezed her eyes shut and breathed deeply, summoning
all of her will to keep herself under control.
This had always
been a possibility. It just hadn’t been one she’d believed would actually
happen.
She'd thought
that, with Seth, things could be different. That life might not always
disappoint her.
She’d trusted
him.
But this was what
happened when you trusted someone who was flawed, weak, human.
Trusting
someone always had the potential to tear your heart out.
“So you did,”
she mumbled at last.
“Erin,” Seth
said. He must have gotten up because he put his hand on her shoulder.
She jerked away
from him, almost violently.
“Erin, you’ve told
me over and over again that you don’t love me.”
“I know,” she
admitted, pleased that her voice was coherent, if not really natural. “I know I
told you that. But it felt like there was still something between us. I hadn’t
expected you to...to...”
“To what?”
Erin, feeling
like she was close enough to control to face him again, turned around. “To do
this. I thought you would have at least told me first. But it’s fine. It’s
fine.”
Seth’s eyes
never left her face. “It doesn’t look like it’s fine. It looks like it’s...“
Devastating.
“…a problem,” Seth
concluded.
“Of course it’s
a problem! I know we’ve never made a commitment, but that doesn’t mean I don’t
feel like…like we’re together. Wouldn’t you be hurt and betrayed if I had
fucked some random other man and then kept it hidden like a guilty secret?”
“Of course. But
you don’t feel for me what I feel for you.”
The words
struck her like a blow.
“You’ve always
said you don’t love me.” His expression might as well have been chiseled out of
marble. “Right?”
“No!” Erin
burst out, wanting to claw some sort of emotion onto his face. “Yes! I don’t
know.” She was about to lose it again, so she made herself stop. “I would
understand if you wanted to move on—I wouldn’t be happy, but I would
understand. But to do it like this. To try to keep it a secret. And so soon
after Saturday night, which…which meant something to me—”
“It meant
something to me too,” Seth said quietly, as controlled as she was uncontrolled.
It was all
starting to make sense. Horrible, heartbreaking sense.
Seth had made
himself too vulnerable with her that night. He'd lost too much control. Exposed
himself too much. Which meant he would want to seek power and independence by
distancing himself from her afterwards.
And what better
way than to fuck someone else.
He was Seth Thomas—could
never be anyone else. And his solitary, controlled nature might prove stronger
than the parts of himself he was learning to cultivate with her and Mackenzie.