She Steps Out Of Betrayal's Shadow To Rebuild Her Broken Home novel · Chapter 22 of 24

Chapter 22: The Grave

Melinda took the message down to the gatehouse that evening and set it on the table between them.

"Leland says I chose him twice with my eyes open," she said. "He wants me to ask who I'm choosing now."

Zachary was at the stove, and he did not turn around.

"Then ask it."

"I know you. I knew you at nineteen, and I've known you for three weeks, and I'm twenty-nine." She kept her voice level. "But the Leland I loved is the one I remember. The Zachary I'm sleeping with is the one I met in a hospital lobby. I don't have the middle."

"You have me."

"I have the one who waited. What if I'd remembered everything? What if the last ten years came back tomorrow, and I was a wife who had chosen him and been happy for some of it? Would I be standing in your kitchen?"

He put the poker down very carefully.

"I can't answer that, Del."

"I know you can't."

"You want me to say you would." He turned. His face was open and tired. "I won't. I'm not going to hand you a promise about a woman who doesn't exist."

"That isn't what I meant."

"It's exactly what you meant." His voice stayed low. "Ten years ago, you looked at me in a garden, and the next day you walked back to him. I got over it the way you get over a broken leg. I limped for a decade. If I'm only the man who was standing there when you woke up, then I'm a landing place, and I won't be that, not for you."

"Zach."

"I'm not angry. I'm telling you what I can carry." He took a long breath. "Go and find out. Take whatever time it needs. I'll be at the gate."

She stood very still.

Then she crossed the room, took the shoebox she had handed him in the study from the shelf over his father's chair, and held it against her chest.

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