Unforgiven: The Billionaire's Amnesiac Ex-Wife novel · Chapter 20 of 24

Chapter 20: Five Forty

His room above the laundromat smelled of hot cotton and fabric softener.

I climbed the back stairs at five in the afternoon.

I had the audio on my phone, the invoice in my bag and Roscoe's photocopy in my coat.

Stefan opened the door in his shirtsleeves.

He had not slept either.

"You don't have to come in," he said. "I can come down."

"I want to talk where Jessamine can't hear."

He stepped back.

The room held a single bed, a lamp and a desk with a legal pad on it, and a window that faced a brick wall.

I sat on the edge of the bed, and he took the desk chair and kept the whole room between us.

"Tell me what you thought would happen," I said. "When I remembered."

"I thought you'd look at me the way you did in the kitchen."

"How did I look at you?"

"Like you were seeing me for the first time." His hands hung between his knees.

"I've been waiting five months for you to remember."

"And?"

"And I've dreaded it every day. I told myself it was for your sake."

"Was it?"

"No. It was because I couldn't stand to watch you hate me with every memory back."

"Then you should know something I got last night."

I made myself go slowly.

"In the kitchen, five months ago, when you said yes, I remember what I did. I put my keys on the table. And before I did that, I reached across and took your hand."

He didn't breathe.

"You didn't notice. You were looking at the floor."

I pressed my palms flat on my knees.

"I held it until you looked up. Then I let go and left."

"You knew everything by then."

"I knew all of it, and my hand still went to yours before the rest of me caught up."

"Lydia..."

"I never hated you. I hated what I'd learned, and I couldn't breathe in the same house with it. That's different."

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