Page 14 of Don't Say a Word

“You’re busy.”

“What else is new?” she said with a light laugh that always made his heart swell. “You sound better now than your message this morning. Is everything okay?”

“Mostly.” He didn’t want to dump his problems on her, but she would understand. “Whitney found out that I’m seeing someone. I should have told her, but I knew it would be a ridiculous conversation and I kept putting it off.”

“You’reseeingsomeone? Who?”

Her voice was light and humorous. His heart lifted.

“Yeah, I am. A beautiful strawberry blonde with the most amazing green eyes I’ve ever seen. Smart too. Beautyandbrains.”

“You’ll have to introduce me sometime,” Laura teased.

“I know we had plans tonight, but I have to cancel. I promised Whitney I would have a sit-down. When she started bringingmen around Austin, I made her sit down and agree to terms, so I have to live up to the same agreement.”

“I understand,” Laura said, and he knew she did. “You’re a great dad and want what’s best for Austin. That means maintaining a good relationship with his mother.”

“She barely says more than two words to me if it’s not directly related to our son, until she found out I was seeing you. I actually preferred the noncommunication.”

“That’s not good,” Laura said. “You need an open line of communicationbecauseof Austin. Avoiding her only prolongs the inevitable and makes conversations that much harder.”

“You are a wise, wise woman.” Laura was right, but conversations with Whitney made him tense and angry—probably because he forced himself to be calm and agreeable when around her. The tension always gave him a pounding headache.

“Call me when you’re driving home,” Laura said.

“I won’t be in a very good mood.”

“Be an optimist, Jack. And I don’t care if you’re in a crappy mood. We all have our moments, right? And before you say I don’t, remember when I yelled at you and poked a finger in your chest?”

“You were scared about the safety of your children.”

“That’s no excuse for my bad behavior. And still, you like me.”

“I more than like you,” he said quietly.

He could hear the smile in her voice when she said, “I more than like you too, Jack Angelhart.”

“I’ll call tonight,” he said and hung up.

They weren’t far enough into their relationship that Jack had told Laura he loved her, though he knew he did. They were cautious not just because they’d both been burned in their first marriages, but because they each had kids. For Jack, Austin would always come first. For Laura, Sydney and Cody were her life. Her devotion to family was one of the reasons that Jack had fallen for her. And though cautious, in the two and a half months they’d been seeing each other, they were exclusive. Jack had never datedaround—it was one girlfriend at a time, even in high school. And Laura, though divorced longer than Jack, hadn’t started dating until now.

Warts and all, I loved Charlie. Still do, but I see him now for who he is, not who I wanted him to be. After the divorce, I had to think about my kids, and then my job. Dating was the last thing on my mind.

When Jack brought Austin home last night, Whitney had started the argument about why Jack hadn’t told her about Laura. It angered and depressed him that she pushed it. Whitney had wanted the divorce; he hadn’t. He’d begged her to go to counseling; she’d refused.

You couldn’t force someone to love you, even when you had a child together.

Jack wasn’t the kind of man who cried. But when Whitney told him to leave—that she wanted more than he could offer, that she couldn’t love a man who couldn’t give her everything—he did.

He’d given her all he had: mind, body, spirit. But it wasn’t enough. The house wasn’t big enough or in the right zip code. The clothes she wanted blew past their budget—and why should she have a budget, she asked. The car she coveted was far beyond his means, and the one he could afford she complained about constantly. She compared their life to her friends who had more, did more, traveled farther, spent bigger.

He’d had two parents who loved each other and raised five kids in good times and bad. They worked through problems and came out stronger in the end. He wanted, expected, the same.

For the first time since he signed the divorce papers, he thought he might have found someone who wanted the same things in life as he did: home and hearth, children and family.

It gave him hope.

It was nearly twelve thirty by the time Jack walked into police headquarters.