25
Imogen
I’m aware that I’m walking into the lion’s den when I open the door to our marital home.
My lawyers alerted me to the fact that my father told them to go ahead and serve Theo, without my permission while I was still on holiday in the popular ski town of Vail.
After giving my father a stern talking-to, I hopped on our private plane and immediately flew home. Theo and I had so many things to talk about … and I hadn’t meant for the divorce to be filed so quickly.
In all honesty, I’d taken the trip with my family so that I could get out of Cape Cod and clear my head. After the night with Theo, I’d been too suffocated by memories and post-orgasm bliss to get perspective. When we’d finished, we’d laid there, him on top of me, for what seemed like and endless moment. I wanted so badly to break down, to tell him everything, but something was still holding me back.
The first couple of days in Vail, I’d done nothing but sequester myself in my suite, sipping cocoa by the fire and looking out on the snowy mountains in deep thought.
I thought about the predicament I was in, and how both Theo and I had gotten ourselves here. I wasn’t the same person I’d been three months ago. If I’d been pregnant, if I’d known how difficult my family would be, if I knew how deeply I’d miss Theo, if I’d realized just how entwined our love for each other was …
I wouldn’t have left. I shouldn’t have left.
I didn’t want a divorce.
The thought had come in an aha moment the day after Thanksgiving, and I’d wanted to call my husband right then. But I’d given myself another day, just to plan out how I’d approach him, how I’d break the news to my family. Except my father had landed an evil blow, sending those papers without my permission.
So, it was the first day of December and I was walking into the home I shared with my husband … hoping that after the bomb I was about to drop on him, we could share it once more.
The stench of whiskey stings my nose as soon as I open the front door, and it brings me back to our first date. I look down at my own clothing, to make sure there isn’t actually a stain from yesteryear’s past.
“I could use a shot, you?”
Theo’s leg bounces up and down under the table, and I know this because he’s hit it a few times and jostled our waters.
“A shot?” I wrinkle my nose.
He wants to do shots of liquor on our first date? Okay, technically, this is probably a second date … considering the first time we’d met three days ago, we’d had life-altering sex without knowing the other’s last name.
“Oh, I’m … I …” Theo sighs. “Listen, I’m not usually this uncool. Actually, I’m usually told I’m the James Bond of Nantucket. Strong and silent … well, if Bond had a beard, worked construction and enjoyed surfing in his free time. It’s just … you make me nervous. You’re beautiful, and—”
I cut him off. “And we had irrational, mind-blowing sex in a closet and now we’re sitting across from each other on a date.”
I wasn’t usually so bold, but something about this man made me want to shuck all of the pretenses I’d held up until this point in my life.
“Yes.” Theo laughs, the rugged lines of his face creasing in happiness. “Sorry, let’s just eat, yeah?”
I let my fingers wander to where his sit on the table, and again, surprise myself. “I wouldn’t be here if I weren’t just as interested in you. I’m nervous, but I think you’re genuine and … so handsome it’s difficult to stop staring at you.”
His eyes, a mixture of dark storm clouds and milky black tea, twinkle. “Maybe we should find another coat closet in this restaurant.”
It’s my turn to laugh. Forty-five minutes, delicious food and some wonderful conversation later, we both put down our silverware.
“I’m stuffed.” Theo pats his washboard stomach.
My eyes go to his hand, rubbing circles into the abdomen that I know sports a six-pack. I felt it under his suit shirt the other night. And all I can think about now is how I want to see it in the soft light of a bedroom lamp.
“Maybe we … could we possibly get that shot?” I could use the liquid courage.
Because I’m fairly certain we’re going to end up back at his place, or my hotel. And I’m ready for that, only I’m not. I’m used to sophisticated pretty boys with gentle hands in button-ups. All-American men who use hair gel and wax their eyebrows, who use the word invest in every other sentence and like to play polo on the weekends.
Theo Walsh is an entirely different breed. A man’s man. He’s rough and a little bit brooding. Mysterious with all of that dark hair and the unshaven face. He took me to a nice bar that serves burgers, but it’s still a bar. That’s an actual flannel he has on, and he didn’t stand when I got up to go to the bathroom. He is so sexy and normal and smooth … that it’s making me nervous.
Theo’s grin is loaded with sexual energy as he holds up two fingers to the bartender, who he must know. Within seconds, a shot is placed in front of each of us. I pick it up, smell, gag.
“It’s Maker’s Mark, so it’s good whiskey. It’ll burn, but trust me, it’ll take the edge off.” Theo winks, and I feel myself blush all the way down to my toes.
He holds the glass up to clink mine, and then I’m tossing it back, steeling myself.
At first, I taste nothing. And then my reflexes kick in, get a feel for the brown liquid sliding down my throat, and sputters it all back up.
Correction, I spit it all over my white cashmere sweater.
“Oh my God.” I’m so embarrassed and shaken from the alcohol and the aftermath that my face is flaming as I dab at myself with a napkin.
Theo jumps up, helping me, and I feel tears spring to my eyes. How embarrassing.
“Oh, no you don’t, beautiful. Stop that right now. There is no need to feel embarrassed, hell, I’ve done much worse shit in this bar and they still like me. Come on, I don’t live too far, we can wash your sweater, because I feel like that is expensive, and have an actual drink. Like wine, which I assume you swallow better than whiskey.”
His banter makes me feel that much better, and I let him lace his fingers in mine as he leads me to the car after nodding to the bartender and telling him to put it on his tab.
That night, we ended up tossing the sweater on the floor of his adorable house the minute we got through the front door, and the smell of whiskey stayed on our skin long after we’d torn the sheets off of his bed.
“Well, look who decided to grace us with her presence!” Theo comes stumbling into the living room from the kitchen.
He’s drunk. Like … really drunk. I’ve only ever seen him this loaded a handful of times. Something is off.
“Hi.” I try to smile a friendly smile. “Having a little party?”
He sets the bottle of whiskey, which is half empty, down on the coffee table. I cringe thinking that there is no coaster under it.
Flapjack scampers out of the den, right past me, and I know she’s probably spooked. Theo has been making a lot of noise, because our usually mellow cat would never look so freaked out.
“Having a divorce party, baby, and you’re just in time. The other half of the bottle is yours! Or have you come to mock me with your victory?”
Shit … he’s been served. I’d hoped that by the time I got home, I could intercept anything my lawyers were told to do. But clearly, Theo has already seen the divorce filings.
“Theo, listen to me. We need to talk about that … I didn’t ask them to be sent. My father, he acted without my permission.”
He cuts me off, waving his finger in the air. “Your father, your fucking father! Always the little puppet master, and you’re his servant. Doing whatever it is he demands. Well, don’t worry, you’re getting rid of your peasant husband, he’ll be fucking happy now!”
Swaying, he plops onto the couch with a loud sigh and looks up at the ceiling.
“Theo, I don’t want to get—”
“Come on, baby, have a drink with me. It’s the least you can do. You’re about to break my fucking heart, at least drink whiskey with me.”
I’m still standing in the foyer in my coat, and I want to cry. What have I done to us? I’ve been so damn stupid and selfish.
“I can’t have one,” I tell him truthfully.
But he’s too drunk to get my meaning. “Can’t have one? Psh, of course you can have one. You just don’t want to.”
“I can’t, Theo.”
“You can’t drink? What are you, pregnant? Yeah right, you can’t have a baby. That’s why we’re in this hellhole.”
It’s as if he’s sliced my stomach open with a thousand knives. I have to steady myself on the wall, I’m that blown away by his words.
I’m not doing this, not now. Not when he is belligerent and sad. So I leave, trying to tape my heart back together after the torture his words just put it through.