“Stop that,” she says sharply. “I know you; you’ve found something else to flog yourself for, but it’s not on you. Just like Mom dying was not on you. It just happened. Shit happens and you deal.”
That may well be, but she shouldn’t have had to go through one hit after another alone.
“What happened?”
“Ruptured cyst,” she says, but her response sounds a little too practiced. Then she lifts her chin almost defiantly. “Wasn’t the only cyst. They ended up doing a hysterectomy. They left me the one ovary, but clearly that’s not going to do me much good without a uterus.”
I can’t swallow down the fucking log lodged in my throat, so before I have a chance to respond she’s already putting words in my mouth.
“So yeah, no kids. Not an option, and I wouldn’t blame you if you—”
I stopped listening and am moving toward her at lightning speed.
“Shut up.” I cup her face in my hands and look beyond the layer of bravado to the sadness she’s hiding. “Don’t even finish that thought.”
“You wanted kids,” she says softly, searching my eyes.
“Yeah. I remember we talked about it once back then,” I recall. “We both did. That was then.”
I don’t say, “before I fucked us up and we lost our chance,” but it’s implied, and my silent apology comes in the form of a brush of my mouth.
I watch as her eyes blink a few times and a sigh slips from her lips.
“Whether or not you have a uterus does not define who you are or what you mean to me.”
She tilts her head and I’m glad to see humor in her gaze.
“You’re a surprise, Mr. Mazur.”
“How’s that?”
“Your vocabulary has come a long way. You’re using a lot of words, and they’re good ones,” she teases.
“Good to know.”
With a light kiss, I head back to the kitchen to get going on dinner. Probably not a bad idea to let this process for a bit before I try to dive into the marriage part and what went wrong there.
The safest way forward is a planned path—it’s a rule I’ve lived by—but I can only do that if I know where the landmines are buried. It’s essential to a successful mission and I don’t want to do anything that can fuck this up.
We eat inside, talking a little about my parents and work, avoiding anything heavier. It’s not until long after dinner, Bree briefly returns to the subject.
“I want you to know I may have been angry with you, hurt by you, but I never blamed you for things that weren’t even in my control, let alone yours. So please don’t take this on.”
I look up from my laptop, where I’ve been doing a little work in preparation of my trip to the Jelnyk mine, and meet her eyes.
“Perhaps not, but I should’ve been there for you and I wasn’t. That is something I own,” I state simply, and she seems to accept that with a nod before she turns back to the TV program she was watching.
By the time I shut down my computer and look up, she’s slumped over on the armrest, snoring lightly. When I pick her up to carry her to the bedroom, she mumbles something incoherently before her head drops to my shoulder. I should probably wake her so she can do her bathroom routine.
“Bree, let’s get you ready for bed.”
A disgruntled groan is all I get.
I carry her through into the bathroom and use my elbow to throw the switch.
“Come on, lazy bones. You can sleep in a minute.”
I carefully put her on her feet and, half-asleep, she manages to strip her pants down. She’s beyond caring I’m in the bathroom with her and that’s fine by me. I help her into the oversized jersey she likes to wear to bed and tuck her in before heading back to the living room. There I shut off the TV, turn off the lights, and walk to the sliding door to make sure it’s locked.
A glint of light draws my attention to a row of cars parked on the opposite side of the street. I can’t place it and wait for a minute to see if I can spot it again.
Nothing. Probably just the reflection off a sideview mirror or a piece of chrome.
The street is deserted.
I turn my back and head for the bathroom to grab a quick shower.
I need to feel Bree close tonight, breathe in her scent, but there’s no fucking way I’m going to climb into bed with my dick still hard.
Apparently, age hasn’t diminished the effect she has on me.
For the past days I’ve been walking around with a semi hard-on, but with that kiss before dinner I shot straight from half-mast to maypole.
I bend my head down under the stream—the image of Bree lying on the couch engraved on my retina—and close my fist firmly around my cock. Relief comes fast and furious.
But when I slip under the covers and curve my bigger body around Bree, she moans, pushing her ass against me.
I’m instantly hard again.
Fuck.
Chapter Twelve
Bree
Well. I haven’t been bored these past days with Yanis gone.
Anna and Max made sure of that.
The Mazur family is very persuasive, which is how I ended up staying at Yanis’s house with his parents. What had me give in was a dry comment Max made. He basically suggested it would save people driving back and forth to my place. The last thing I want is to be a burden and Max—in his nonconfrontational, laid-back manner—used that to bring his point home.
So Sunday night we had dinner with the Mazur family and Monday morning we were back. Yanis had a nine o’clock flight to Lima on Jelnyk’s corporate jet and dropped me off at his place. He carried my bag into his bedroom, decreed that’s where I’d be staying, and then kissed me soundly in front of his parents before taking off.
It’s Thursday already and to my surprise the days have flown by. My ankle has gotten a little more exercise now Yanis isn’t here to tote me around, and I feel a lot less helpless already.
I keep Anna company in the kitchen in the mornings while she juices, bakes, and lets me help with dinner prep. I’ve certainly eaten a lot healthier than my usual on-the-fly meals. Then in the afternoons she heads over to Willa’s, giving her a chance to catch up on the sleep little Max deprived her of during the night.
Big Max kept me busy while his wife was tending to the little one, taught me card games to play and talked endlessly about the plans and dreams he still built onto. For a completely self-sustainable farm, with livestock and crops—including of the cannabis variety—and a large communal lodge where people could stay and work the land. A bit like a dude ranch for city folk wanting a taste of living off-the-grid. I didn’t have the heart to remind him that well into his seventies that might be too much of a venture to undertake, but he seemed happy just musing about it and I enjoyed listening to him.
I received a few texts from Yanis, and a phone call last night, telling me he was wrapping things up but wasn’t sure he’d be back in time for my appointment at the clinic today. Max offered to take Anna to Dimi and Willa’s, and pick me up to go to the hospital later.
That’s why it’s unusually quiet in the house right now. They just left and I’m settled on the couch, flipping through the channels on the large screen TV.