Conflicted (Everlasting Love)(37)
“Stop calling me that!”
Her shriek made him take a step back, had him looking warily at the numerous items the room provided for her to throw at him. Even so, a man had to stand his ground sometime—even if it meant getting beaned in the head with a paperweight. “Stop what?”
“Stop calling me darlin’ in that sarcastic, condescending tone! You’ve been doing it all day, all month, all year. And I’m sick of it.” Her voice escalated, threatening his hearing with every syllable.
“How dare you? How dare you hurt me by using the one and only endearment you’ve ever had for me to humiliate me now? How dare you spring this on me on the day of our daughter’s wedding? How dare you tear apart our whole goddamn marriage and never give me a reason why!”
Crossing to the window, she wrapped her arms around her waist defensively.
He regarded her for a minute, unsure of what to say or do. Crossing the room before he could stop himself, he laid his hand on her shoulder before he thought better of it.
“Look, darlin’, I’m sorry. Maybe I should have waited a couple of days to give you—”
She shrugged his hand away angrily. “I told you not to call me that.”
Shock pulsed through him at the strange thickness in her voice, a thickness he hadn’t heard in many years. “Are you crying?” He was so startled that the question slipped out before he could stop it.
“Of course not,” she said bitterly. “Over you?”
Grabbing her shoulders roughly, he spun her to face him. “Don’t be ridiculous, darlin.’ I know better than to think—” He stopped abruptly as he stared at her wet cheeks, at her gorgeous blue eyes, wet and rimmed with red.
“Desiree?” His voice was quiet now, his touch tentative as he brushed the tears away with a few sweeps of his thumb. “I don’t understand what’s going on here.”
“That makes two of us.”
Uncertainty swept through him as he stared at the wife he thought he knew, and the tears he’d never expected. “Look, I’m not trying to hurt you.”
Her chin came up. “As if you could.”
“Then why are you crying?”
“Because I’m angry, you jerk. Because I was completely blindsided by your little announcement, and it’s taking me some time to get used to it.”
“Blindsided?” He gaped at her. “How the hell could you be blindsided? What have we done together in the past year? In the past two years?”
“The races—”
“Besides work. Besides the ranch. Besides the Triple Crown. What have we done together?”
“I thought you liked it that way.”
“Liked living with you like a stranger or worse, like a boss and her employee? You thought I liked that?”
“You keep saying that.” She stared at him with baffled eyes. “It’s never been like that.”
“It’s always been like that, whether you admit it or not.”
“How can you say that? After twenty-seven years, how can you say that to me?”
“How can I not?”
“You’re insane. Completely nuts. I don’t know what kind of sick thoughts you’ve got twisting around in that head of yours, but I won’t be a part of it. I won’t let you blame me for your own indifference.”
“Indifference? Where the hell do you get that?”
She strode away from him. When she turned to face him, her chest heaved with exertion. Though he damned himself and his suddenly out-of-control libido, he couldn’t tear his eyes from her. From her high, proud breasts that moved with every harsh breath to her flushed cheeks and burning eyes—she was magnificent and always had been. This woman he’d married who had always been too good for him.
“You throw divorce papers at me—you don’t even tell me what they are—then you walk away like I’m nothing to you. Like we never raised a family together, like we never built this ranch together. Like we never even loved each other. What am I supposed to think, Jesse? It’s been months since you moved out of our bedroom without so much as a word. Longer than that since you’ve held me or kissed me or made love to me. What the hell am I supposed to think?”
“You never said a word when I moved out!” The words burst from him defensively.
“What was I supposed to do? Beg you to touch me? To love me?”
“I wanted—”
“Someone else!”
Silence reigned as his heart stuttered in his chest, as he struggled to assimilate her words. She didn’t believe…couldn’t actually think…
“Is that what you think?” His voice was nearly unrecognizable when he finally spoke. “That I’ve been having an affair?”
“Don’t you dare look so offended. What the hell else am I supposed to think? From the time we first got together you haven’t been able to keep your hands off me, Jesse. And not just for sex, though we’ve had a hell of a lot of that, too. You’ve always responded to me, always touched me. Even if it was just a kiss or a hand on my cheek or the small of my back, you’ve always reached for me.
“When that stops as abruptly as it did with us, when you don’t make love to me for over a year, when you don’t even see me when I’m right in front of you, how can I think it’s anything but another woman?”