Love Her or Lose Her (Hot & Hammered #2)(83)

Could they have a successful union if he kept these kinds of things from her? After everything they’d been through over the past few weeks, if he still couldn’t be honest, what hope did they have of him opening up in the future? She’d been so positive they’d laid it all on the line, but it turned out she didn’t even know where the line was.

She just needed to talk to someone. Her friends were an amazing choice, but honestly? Rosie was almost embarrassed to tell them about the secret house. How could she have been kept in the dark so long? So here she was. Not only did she need to vent, but she wanted to know why Armie didn’t think her marriage to Dominic could work. What had he seen?

Anxiety turned over in her stomach as she climbed out of the Honda. She closed the driver’s-side door and idled there for a few seconds, measuring her breathing and fingering the shoulder strap of her purse. Armie was definitely open for business—she could smell the pot wafting from beneath the building door. When she walked inside, she found him in a meditation pose in the center of his waiting-room floor.

She shifted. “Um . . .”

His eyes cracked open. “Mrs. Vega.” A smile lit his face. “Hello.”

“Hello!” Rosie did her best to subdue her too-bright tone. “I know we don’t have any more appointments scheduled, but I was hoping we could speak for a few minutes.”

Armie rose to his feet, not without some effort, and tucked the end of a joint into his shirt pocket, patting it closed. “Dominic isn’t with you?”

“No.”

He studied her expression. “I see,” he said, nodding once and turning. “Come on into my office. Something to drink?”

“Tequila, please.”

His crack of laughter almost made her smile. “You’re not the type to show up for a spontaneous therapy session.” He leaned back against the front edge of his desk. “Why don’t you tell me what’s happened?”

Rosie fell onto the couch and stared at the therapist, although she wasn’t really seeing him. Visions of flower beds and patios and a dock extending into the sound played in front of her eyes like a slideshow. “Last time we were here, you said our marriage wasn’t going to work. That you could tell these things.” She blew out a breath. “Well, I guess we didn’t believe you, because . . . hearing your opinion only seemed to bring us . . . closer. Dominic talked to me about his insecurities and he really came through, supporting my dream of opening the restaurant. He even proposed a second time.”

Armie only rested his hands on his belly and nodded. “Go on.”

Rosie swallowed hard. “The whole time, he was keeping something from me. I found out by accident that he bought us a new house with money he’d been setting aside since he returned from Afghanistan. He bought it a year ago—and never told me.”

Armie whistled through his teeth. “Oh dear.”

“Yes.” She threw her purse to the side. “He sold it to pay for the restaurant.”

A beat of silence passed. “To give you your dream.”

Rosie nodded and trained him with a look, nerves building in her stomach. “You said our marriage can’t work. Why? Is it because he can’t be honest with me?”

Armie sighed and rounded the desk, settling into his chair. “Rosie, I know you’re not in the mood to hear you’ve been duped twice in one day, but I have to come clean.” He tapped his fingers on the desk. “I knew you and Dominic were going to make it the day we met.”

“What?”

He definitely looked like he wanted to light up his joint again. “Not only had I never seen two people who love each other more, I’ve never seen two people whose hopes, fears, and sexualities are so intertwined. You share a heart.” He laughed a little under his breath. “Not to mention, there wasn’t a chance in hell that man was letting you go.”

A vision of Dominic walking into Bethany’s kitchen to ask for a second chance caught her off guard and she had to take several deep breaths to kick-start her lungs.

Rosie spoke through numb lips. “So why tell us we wouldn’t make it?”

“A little wake-up call, to present you both with the reality of living without each other. Permanently. Kind of a scared-straight program for husbands and wives.” He arched an eyebrow in her direction. “Tell me it didn’t work.”

“It worked,” she mumbled, thinking of how Dominic had arrived in the club that night, his heart in his eyes. How he’d let her shine. Encouraged her.

“I didn’t see the secret house coming.”

She leaned her head back. “That makes two of us.”

Armie stood up again and came around his desk, sitting beside Rosie on the couch with a kind smile. “It wasn’t right for him to keep the house from you, Rosie. Both spouses should be involved in decisions regarding household finances.” He started to hedge.

She turned her head. “But what?”

“Change within a person doesn’t happen overnight. They have to work on it every single day. Their significant other has to help,” Armie said. “Dominic bought this house a year ago, when communication had broken down between you. It’s reasonable for him to think revealing it now might cause the worst damage.”

Rosie chewed her lip and waited for him to say more.