Chapter 10: After

We were still in the den when Tate's text came through at ten past one.

Staying in town tonight. Don't wait up, honey.

I held the phone out so Rafe could read it.

"He's at Cherry Street," I said.

"Yes."

"In the bed I bought."

"Greer."

"I'm not going to cry about it."

"I wasn't going to tell you to."

I put the phone face down on my father's reading chair.

The house was very quiet around us, and the wedding photograph was still on the mantel down the hall.

I did not want to be in the same room with it.

I did not want to be in any room where I had been lied to for six years.

"Not in here," I said.

"No."

"Not in my bedroom either."

He looked at me and understood, and the muscle in his jaw jumped.

"Greer, the terms."

"Term two," I said. "The one where nobody touches anybody. I'm cancelling it."

"You're angry."

"I'm very angry. I'm also standing in front of you, and I've been thinking about your hand on the wall in that hallway all week."

He breathed out slowly.

"Is this in the terms?" he said.

It was my own line, handed back to me, and it undid something in my chest.

"It is now."

I took his wrist and led him up the stairs to the guest room he had slept in on Saturday.

I switched on the lamp.

The sheets were still turned down.

I shut the door and put my back against it.

He stood in the middle of the room with his arms at his sides.

I had never seen a man look at me with so much plain want and do so little about it.

"You're going to have to say it," he said, very quietly.

"Come here."

He crossed the room in three steps.

I took his face in both hands and kissed him.

It was not gentle.

He made a low sound against my mouth, and his hands came up to my hips and held on.

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