My heart sank as Nora shook her head.

“No,” she said. But then she went on. “It’s not too much for me. But we definitely need to talk about this some more. Figure out how the hell this is going to work from now on.”

I breathed a sigh of relief. I knew I’d just unloaded a world of crap on her, but once she saw Ina, there was no way I could’ve kept the whole truth about my life from her for another moment. I had to tell her, had to let her know that there was a massive roadblock in the way of our fledgling relationship. Namely my marriage.

“I know,” I said. “And we can discuss that. But please don’t leave. This thing with James could get dangerous, so I want you and Oscar to stay here. Hell, I’ll go stay in a hotel if I need to. Just please stay. I need to know you’re safe.”

She shook her head. “You don’t need to stay in a hotel, Jacob,” she said softly. “I really do appreciate what you’ve done; letting Oscar and me into your home like this. I realize you obviously don’t like having women here, but—”

I cut her off. “Nora, I would’ve had you here either way. I want you here. You’re not like any of the others.”

“Well, you’ve still saved us. Seems like you have a thing for saving people.”

“I guess I do. I just don’t see why I should have all this money and not help people when I can. I know someone like my mom would’ve loved some help back in the day.”

Nora was silent for a long moment.

“I think your mom would be extremely proud of you if she was still with us,” she finally said, looking right in my eyes. “Even if you’ve done something incredibly wrong, you’ve done it for the right reasons. Even the way we met… you took me on that freaking awful date, all because you thought you were doing the right thing. You thought I was this terrible, evil dog thief, and you were trying to help James by rescuing Oscar from my clutches.”

I chuckled. “Yeah.”

“So this thing with Ina—it’s the same thing. You were desperate to help her. What you’ve done is illegal as all hell, but I get it. I really do. I think I would’ve made the same choice as you if it came down to it.”

I nodded and stayed quiet for a moment, just staring at Nora’s perfect eyes before I spoke up again. “So you want to talk about how this is going to work,” I finally said. “Can I tell you how I feel first?”

“Go ahead.”

“I want you, Nora. All the way. I want to be with you, I want to wake up next to you, I want to take care of you. I know we’ve only just begun, but there’s no one else right now. Only you. And I don’t want there to be anyone else. I want you and only you.”

I took a deep breath and continued. “But I understand you’re probably still very skeeved out by the fact that I’m married, even if it’s on paper only. So if you want to wait until Ina and I are officially divorced, I’ll wait for you. I’ll wait as long as it takes, and there won’t be anyone else in between. I won’t touch you, no matter how much I want to. I’ll wait. I promise.”

Nora was quiet for a long moment, her eyes on the floor. Then she looked at me and spoke up, her voice clear. “Divorces can take up to a year, Jacob. I don’t need to wait that long, because I understand the situation. But if this is going to work, there’s something I want. Total honesty from now on. I don’t want anything else kept from me.”

“Done,” I said, looking at my feet.

“Why do you suddenly look uncomfortable? There’s something else, isn’t there?” she asked, her eyes flashing with suspicion.

I nodded. “Yes. And it’s probably worse.”

Her eyebrows shot up. “Worse than you having a secret wife?”

“I think so. I think it’s my fault your house got broken into,” I said. I’d nearly come clean about this yesterday, but then we were interrupted by Angie calling, and the moment hadn’t come again for me to admit my wrongdoing to Nora.

She wrinkled her nose. “Huh? How?”

“I went to visit James the other day. I think he thought you sent me.”

She jumped up. “What?”

I filled her in on the petty revenge plan I’d enacted to piss him off, and how I’d gone several steps too far by blowing up his date and then punching him. Twice.

“You beat him up?” she said, her eyes wide and incredulous.

“He called you a cunt.”

“So you felt the need to defend my honor by punching him in the face?”

I shrugged and looked at her with a shamefaced expression. “I’m sorry. It was fucking childish and stupid. And it’s my fault he came after you and trashed your house.”

She sat down again and sighed. “No, it’s not.”

“It is,” I insisted.

“Not really. Maybe you provoked him a bit, but it’s his fault. No one forced him to break into my place and trash it. And he’s still been messaging me on Facebook from a bunch of fake profiles over the last few weeks. So occasionally I’ve lost my temper and replied, telling him to fuck off. I’ve probably provoked him just as much. But no more. Now that he’s done this shit to my house, I’m never replying to him ever again, and I’m taking out a restraining order.”

“I hope they sort it out soon.”

“Yeah. Work is starting up again tomorrow, and I’m going to the police afterwards to start the process with all the paperwork and so on. There’s a station not far from the studio.”

“Good. Speaking of work, how are we handling ‘us’ there? Are we telling anyone?”

Nora shook her head. “I’d rather we kept things quiet for now. I don’t want people to think I’m unprofessional and sleeping with the talent. Even though I guess I am.”

“Fair enough.”

She leaned back. “So are there any other bombshells you want to drop on me in the name of honesty?” she asked.

I shook my head. “No,” I said. Something suddenly occurred to me, and I furrowed my brows. “Wait… there is something, actually.”

Her shoulders slumped. “Really? There’s more?”

“Yes, really. Sorry. I completely forgot about this, because I got more than a little distracted by walking in on you stark naked the other night. But there was something else I wanted to tell you. It’s about your parents.”

Nora’s eyebrows arched upward. “Oh?”

“I walked in on them in the kitchen when I went downstairs to get a drink before bed. It sounded like they were talking about you and some sort of big secret.”

I filled her in on what they’d said, as best as I could remember. She frowned. “Are you sure they were talking about me?”

“Yes. I mean, they never said your name, but I’m about ninety-nine percent sure.”

Nora bit her bottom lip as she mulled things over for a moment. “Hmm… I don’t know if you noticed this about my mother, but she’s a bit of a gossip,” she said. “Honestly, they were probably talking about the neighbor or something.”

“I don’t think so. It sounded pretty serious.”

She shrugged. “Well, I’ll ask, but I bet it’s just something silly and minor. Like I said, my mother is a big gossip. And what big secret could my parents even have, anyway? Mom’s only so gossipy because their life is just so normal and peaceful, and she needs something to entertain herself with. I doubt they’re hiding that they’re secretly CIA agents, or anything like that.”

“I guess. Well, I just wanted to let you know.”

“Okay. Thanks.”

I paused, and then I spoke up again. “So that’s it. Everything is out in the open now.”

“Yeah, I suppose it is.”

“So… are we okay? Are we gonna get through all of this?” I asked.

Nora smiled and reached over to squeeze my hand. “Yes,” she said softly. “I think we’re going to be okay.”