Fall Into Temptation (Blue Moon Book #2)(82)

She shivered from the ice in his voice. He too felt the cold from the inside out.

“You can’t take a man’s family from him, Gianna.”

“I’m not taking anyone’s family away from anyone.”

“You just decided you were done. He’s clearly not done with you or the kids. Not all families are lucky enough to get the choice to stay together. Sometimes we lose people and we can’t get them back.” His throat clogged with emotions. Anger, frustration, and that bitter sadness that had never dulled, never faded.

“I did what was right for my family,” Gianna snapped. “I would have thought you of all people would understand that.”

“No, you did what you thought was right for you. You’ve got a chance to make it right for everyone and you’re selfish if you don’t.”

“So that’s it then? You don’t even want to hear what I have to say?” Gianna’s words were clipped. “Once again you make a sweeping decision that affects me and my kids and we don’t even get to talk about it?”

The ice lodged in his gut. Somewhere along the line, he’d started to think of all of them as his. But they weren’t. They belonged to a man named Paul who was waiting for his wife to come back.

“Go home, Gia.”





30





Gia had never been so grateful for Paul than when she went back in the house. He took one look at her face and volunteered to watch the kids. Her expression must have said it all. She was so angry, so hurt. A rage headache pounded behind her eyes. Even the heavy bag wouldn’t be enough to work off this mad. Nothing short of pounding in Beckett’s face would make it stop.

She climbed in her car and briefly entertained a fantasy of taking out Beckett’s mailbox as she backed down the drive. She’d found early on in her marriage that entertaining violent fantasies usually prevented her from physically following through on them. She thought of Trudy and suddenly felt a kinship to the crazy woman.

How dare Beckett place judgment on her like that? How dare he filter her life through his own issues? He missed his father? That was no excuse for trying to make her feel guilty for doing what was best for her kids.

It was best, wasn’t it? Dragging Evan out of the school he’d just started to get used to because Paul had a “new gig” with a “guaranteed record deal.” The permanent ambivalence with which he’d viewed his parenting responsibilities. He wasn’t a “bed and bath-time” kind of dad. He was a “spend the night at the recording studio” or “call from the road” dad. He’d missed birthdays, anniversaries, story time, groundings, and bad dreams.

She brought up the last straw in her mind’s eye. She’d come home from a yoga class. She’d just started teaching a few months earlier as a way to earn some extra money. When Paul had lost his job again, she picked up a few extra classes at one of the studios where she worked.

It was after nine, she hadn’t eaten, she still had to pack Evan’s lunch for the next day, and the school bake sale she’d promised brownies to had snuck up on her.

She stopped at the grocery store for brownie ingredients and crossed her fingers that her debit card wouldn’t be declined. Money was tight and Paul once again was making noise about following his music career rather than buckling down and making ends meet.

It’s my dream, G. Can’t you understand? If I lived like every other stiff in a suit out there, I’d wither up and die, he’d told her over and over again.

But things were different when there were little mouths to feed and feet to cover and back rent to pay. Dreams had to be shuffled into the luxury folder, at least until basic necessities were met. She’d had dreams too, and, had nearly given up on every single one of them while she became the sole breadwinner, the primary caregiver.

Carrying her measly bag of eggs and brownie mix, she’d come home to chaos. A couple of Paul’s friends had stopped by. The sink was filled with empty beer cans and Stale cigarette smoke and raucous laughter wafted into the house through the open patio door. She could hear them out there, someone fiddling with an acoustic guitar while another one told a loud story about a prostitute who played a mean keyboard in Des Moines.

There was an ashtray with a joint in it on the third-hand coffee table.

And Evan was in his pajamas on the couch trying to comfort a crying Aurora.

Gia had been mad then, too. But then it had been more resignation than rage. Because she’d expected it, she realized. Paul was up front about who he was and what he wanted out of life. She’d been the one to think she could deal with it or worse, change it.

But watching her 10-year-old play parent to her daughter while their father chased his dreams in the backyard, she realized she couldn’t do either anymore.

She’d shut the patio door, tucked the kids into bed, and made three dozen brownies. And when Paul came inside to try to charm a plate of brownies out of her, she’d quietly told him she was filing for divorce in the morning.

There had been no fight, no discussion. No requests for custody or even visitation. And that’s what broke her heart for her kids. He should have wanted them. He should have wanted her. But he didn’t. Not then.

And not now, either. Beckett was wrong.

She parked on the street and stared at the cozy townhouse. She could see the TV flickering in the front room through the window.