Tear You Apart Read online

  I’ve cut myself, I think with a small sense of wonder as the bright blood wells up. I suck my finger automatically. The blood tastes like autumn leaves burning.

  “You okay?” Will pauses in pouring me a glass of wine.

  “Fine.” And I am, the wound so scant you can barely see it, the blood gone. I wash my hands thoroughly, anyway.

  He passes me the glass, along with a kiss that tastes of wine. He nuzzles my neck for a moment and I revel in that touch. I find his mouth again. I can’t get enough.

  He praises my dinner as if it came from a four-star restaurant, so much that, laughing, I have to tell him to stop. “It’s only pasta.”

  “Nobody’s made a meal for me in a long time, that’s all. Food always tastes better when someone else makes it for you,” he says, and refills my wineglass.

  “I like to cook. I used to cook a lot.” I sip the wine, letting the flavor roll around on my tongue while I think about all the meals I’d made over the years. Dinnertime, even when the girls were heavily active in sports and other activities, had always been important. I couldn’t remember the last time Ross and I sat down to a home-cooked meal.

  “Not anymore?”

  “With my daughters out of the house, no. Not so much.” I shrug, twirling my fork through the strands of pasta, though I’m no longer hungry.

  Will leans back in his chair. “You have daughters.”

  “Yes. Twins.” I think about telling him their names, how old they are, where they go to school, but somehow giving him that seems like too much information. “And you have a son.”

  “Yeah.”

  I let the wine make waves in my glass. “And his mother? She’s the ex who left the coffeemaker but took the cat?”

  He looks uncomfortable. “Yes.”

  “Things aren’t good between you two?”

  “No,” he says. Shakes his head. Fiddles with his fork, his attention on the plate as though it’s suddenly important. “No. Not very good.”

  “I’m sorry. That must be hard for you. I mean, you share a kid. No matter what happened between the two of you...” I trail off, realizing I have no idea what happened between the two of them, and it’s not any of my business.

  Will looks up with one of those shrewd gazes I’ve seen him give the city skyline. Framing me. “What about you?”

  “What about me?”

  “Your husband,” Will says. “What would he think about this?”

  It’s not funny, but I laugh. “I’m sure he wouldn’t like it.”

  “I didn’t know if maybe you had an agreement or something.”

  “Oh...no.” My brows raise at the thought. “God. No, not at all. I’m just...”

  We both fall silent. I’m not sure how to finish the sentence, anyway, because I’m not sure what I’m “just” doing. The shining silver thread of silence stretches out between us until finally, I find the words.

  “I was thirsty,” I tell him. “And you gave me something to drink.”

  Will gets up abruptly from the table, plate in hand. He puts it in the sink with a clatter while I watch without moving from my place at the table. His shoulders hunch. He grips the counter edge. He doesn’t look at me.

  He doesn’t move when I stand, or when I step so close to him, although he has to feel my body heat, even though we’re both fully clothed. I want to touch him, but I don’t. I wait.

  He turns.

  “I haven’t...been...with anyone since I broke up with my ex,” Will says.

  I think he means a relationship, but then I understand. I’m flattered. I’m also scared shitless, but can’t make myself move away, not even a step. My fingers curl against my palms.

  “How long?”

  “Since before my son was born.”

  Three years? Four? Either way, a long time.

  “At first it was because I thought maybe she’d take me back. I thought, we’re having a kid together, you know? Surely she’ll give me another chance. We’ll figure out how to make it work, at least for the kid’s sake. And then after...when I knew it was never going to work again, we were never going to be together, I just didn’t want to. It was all so much work and effort and just...” He grimaces, shuddering, shaking his head. He looks at me, his expression raw and honest.

  I’m not sure what to say. “I hope it was worth it.”

  He reaches to twirl a finger in the hair framing my face. His fingertip brushes my cheek and I can’t stop myself from turning toward his palm, from pressing it against my mouth. Then I’m in his arms, against him, my face against his shirt. I feel the press of his lips against my hair.

  “I’m not trying to cause you trouble, that’s all,” Will says.

  My shoulders lift and fall with the force of my sigh. I close my eyes. I breathe him in—the scent of his laundry detergent, his soap, his skin, the sea-smell of his voice.

  “He doesn’t know. He won’t find out,” I say.

  Will’s laugh is short and sharp. “Famous last words.”

  My fingers hook in the hem of his shirt and find the heat of his skin beneath. “My husband does not pay attention.”

  More silence. We breathe together. Will pushes me gently until I look at him; his gaze searches mine. I think he means to speak, and I stop him with a kiss.

  “I have no intention of leaving my husband. Does that make you feel better?” I ask. “Or worse?”

  Will hesitates. “Better, I guess.”

  “I’ve never cheated on my husband before, Will. Believe me, it’s not something I went out looking for. I just...well, I turned around and there you were. I don’t know why. I’m not sure I care, to be honest.” I push onto my toes to brush a kiss across his mouth again. “But don’t worry. You will not be the reason my marriage ends, if it does. Okay? I will never let you be my reason.”

  He nods, just once, looking both relieved and unconvinced. “Okay. Thanks.”

  I kiss him again, slower this time. Lingering. The press of his growing erection against my belly sends a thrill through me.

  “Fuck me,” I whisper.

  “Again?” he asks, as though the idea shocks him, even though he’s already inching my dress up to my hips and his mouth is slanting over mine.

  “Oh, yes,” I tell him. “Again.”

  Chapter Twenty-One

  I’m on a train.

  I don’t know at which stop I got on or where I’ll get off; I only know the train is going, going fast, and the world outside becomes a blur. The trees and sky mesh and meld and become something else. I’m on a train and I should get off, but I don’t.

  The universe is playing a cosmic joke on me. Here I had my life, a good life with everything a woman could need, and suddenly, there is something more I didn’t know I could have or even want.

  “Here,” the universe says, “here is a chance for you to not simply be ‘fine’ or ‘all right’ or ‘resigned.’ Here is a chance for you to be satisfied and content and maybe even on occasion deliriously, amazingly, exuberantly happy and full of joy. For you to have everything you didn’t know you needed, but always felt was missing.”

  So this is where I am, on a train that’s out of control, and I am not just a passenger. I’m the fucking engineer, I’m the operator, I’m the one shoveling the furnace full of coal to keep it going fast and faster.

  I do this.

  This is me.

  It doesn’t seem to matter, owning this, knowing it. If I could make myself believe it all happened by chance and I couldn’t help it—that I’ve been swept away, it’s not my fault, it’s fate, it’s cosmic interference, whatever that might be—would that be easier?

  Everything is always pretty in the beginning. I know this. I’ve been through it a few times, after all. But this...oh, this is something diff