Page 35 of Everything After (Everything Trilogy)

ALFIE

I hadn’t felt whole since the moment I’d left weeks ago.

But her visit to London alone had been a blow I hadn’t seen coming.

“Why now?” I asked myself after I’d apologized that I’d read our situation wrong, and I’d accepted we hadn’t communicated better.

Looking back, it was easy to read what I’d thought was neglect by Lily, when in fact we’d both been at fault.

We both lived in band bubbles created by our management. Most of the time we’ve been controlled to the extent we’re told where and when to eat, sleep, perform, who to talk to, who not to. When I thought about it, there was hardly any time for free thinking with our more than full schedules.

My biggest regret to date was that I hadn’t stuck that argument out instead of letting my temper get the better of me and storming out.

In hindsight, I’d been a fool. And once I had understood that I accepted I’d behaved poorly.

I should have understood Lily’s accepting nature would have made her hide her discontentment and see her feelings as the price she paid for marrying a touring musician when she was one herself.

With those thoughts, I decided if Lily was going anywhere, I’d be damned if I wouldn’t go with her.

Lily’s skin looked pale when she walked into her parent’s sitting room.

Her normally bright, vibrant appearance had been snuffed out with what I suspected was the combination of feeling travel weary alongside the emotional turmoil she must have been in during these past few weeks.

Knowing I was the reason for how she looked tore me up inside.

Despite her drawn look, Lily was still the most beautiful girl in the world to me, even when her expression morphed from excited to crestfallen when she saw me. Personally, I was so relieved to see her again, that I rose from my chair, I reached out and wrapped my arms around her.

Instead of resisting, I felt Lily yield to my touch, sink into my tight hug, and my fast-beating heart instantly slowed. Squeezing her tight to my chest, I wallowed in how perfect the connection felt, despite all the unrest between us.

My chest expanded when I breathed her in and I felt her body stiffen, then remembering her parents were watching us, I reluctantly let her go. “How was your flight?” I asked behaving so normally, like the last few weeks hadn’t happened.

“Sick making,” she replied, scowling. “Why are you here?” she asked, doing a bad job of hiding her anger when her lips clamped into a line.

“I’m my own man now for a while. The band is taking a break, remember?” I reminded her. Charlie’s eyes narrowed like he’d clicked that something was amiss, but he thankfully didn’t comment.

Lily’s mom interrupted the conversation and ushered Lily from the sitting room into the kitchen. “Come on, Lily, eat.”

Steam rose from the scrambled egg that her mom had flash-heated again in the microwave.

“Unfortunately, I have a small surgery scheduled for 4:00 p.m., so I won’t get home much before 8:30 p.m. Your dad is driving me to work, then he’s taking some books back to the library.

” Turning to address her husband she said, “On second thought, Charlie, book The Campaner restaurant for 8:30, I’ll meet you all there. ”

My heart pounded when Lily side-eyed me when I’d followed them into the kitchen. Once she’d taken her seat in front of the eggs, I dropped down onto a chair across from her. After she’d lifted her fork, I noted her free hand rested on the table and slid my hand beneath it.

Even though she didn’t resist, holding her hand hadn’t felt nearly enough.

I couldn’t apologize again because we had an audience, besides in that moment I suspected saying sorry couldn’t begin to repair the damage I’d done to us.

“No worries, I’m sure Lily and I can find something to amuse ourselves with,” I said, faking a warm smile.

“I’m sure,” her mom muttered, her change in tone sounded suggestive.

I chuckled, although sex was the farthest thing on my mind.

“It’s not often I get time alone with my girl,” I teased, to which Roslyn laughed.

Lily cast me a dry look and turned her attention to her eggs, stuffing them into her mouth, like she hated both them and me which in that moment I guessed she probably had.

The bustle around us as her mom and dad prepared to leave, gave Lily a moment’s reprieve. Once her parents had said their goodbyes and left, Lily dropped her fork and gave me a death glare.

“Why did you follow me?” she snapped, all cordial behavior having left with her parents’ departure.

“I’d follow you anywhere,” I replied in a soft tone, hoping it would break the barrier I had seen going up.

“This isn’t helping… you being here,” she insisted, shaking her head.

“I beg to differ. I thought we were just beginning to meet in the middle toward reconciling with that last conversation, until it blew up in my face.”

“What exactly do you want, Alfie? I’m not a mind-reader, and frankly, physically, I feel too weak to play games right now.”

“You’ve never been weak. It’s your strength and drive that attracted me to you in the first place.”

“Nonsense, it was my arse. We were fuck buddies first, if you remember… there wasn’t supposed to be any feelings involved.”

“True, but once you got under my skin, I believed you’d be there for life.”

“Until a few weeks ago, right?” she corrected. “What was that about? You put a ring on my finger,” she said, holding her hand with her wedding ring on it up for me to see. “We were fine—more than fine, apart from the limited time we’d gotten to spend with each other.”

“Marrying you has still been the best contract I ever made,” I admitted. I squeezed her hand and couldn’t resist stroking her soft, satin skin with the pad of my thumb.

Lily leveled me with the wounded look in her eyes that did nothing to hide the pain she felt inside.

“Apart from wanting children you never once expressed that you weren’t happy. But looking back, that’s what all those little jibes that you made toward me were. Jibes that I’d written off as irritable tiredness or stress because your schedule had been overloaded at those times.”

“That’s why I couldn’t stay away. I’m here desperately trying to put things right,” I stated.

“Put what right? Insulting me by asking if this child was yours?”

“Lily, I was so mad, finding out the way I did, so I lashed out. If I could take back one sentence I’ve ever said to you, it would be that.”

“You can’t begin to understand how wounded that made me feel. I’m pregnant with an unplanned baby to the man I love with all my heart. A man who left me because of my lack of effort. So you’ll excuse me because I don’t know what to think anymore.”

“Think? About what? You doubt that I love you?” Lily’s gaze held me captive as I stared back at her, willing her to believe me. The disbelief she could even question my love for her was evident by my incredulous tone. My gaze fell from hers to our joined hands resting on the table.

“Weren’t you the one who said love isn’t always enough?” she countered just as her cell phone rang, interrupting us.

Lily pulled her cell phone out of her jeans pocket, rejected the call without looking to see who it was, and placed it face down on the table. But not before I saw Cody’s name on the screen.

The timing of his call almost made my lungs burst out of my chest in frustration, and I almost lost my temper. But I knew I had to rein it in and focus on what was important.

“I did say that, but it was before I understood how you’d perceived us getting together.

I’m so fucking sorry for going off the way I did.

I regret not talking to you about my feelings now.

Baby or no baby, I can’t live without you, Lily.

Now that I know you weren’t indifferent, I can see how unreasonable and irrational you must have found me. ”

A text notification alert sounded on Lily’s cell phone, and I hadn’t needed to guess who it was from. Fortunately, Lily knew the importance of the moment between us and didn’t look to see what it said.

In the silent moments that followed, I’d never been more self-aware as when I watched the warring emotions of hurt and acceptance while she appeared to digest my apology. When the pause in our conversation became unbearable, I flashed her a small pleading smile.

“I hate this,” she eventually muttered.

“Hate what?” I prompted.

“Fighting. Feeling confused. Feeling betrayed.”

“Betrayed?” I asked, shocked at that word, because I’d always put her first until now.

“Don’t think I didn’t get to hear that you had dinner with some pretty girl,” she snapped, sounding jealous for the second time in the past few weeks.

First with Sienna, now the student. I thought Lily had shed her insecurities a long time ago about other women’s attraction toward me, and figured she must know I only have eyes for her.

My heart stuttered and I shook my head. “You mean Delilah?”

“God! She even has a name. While you were dining with some other woman, I was home, devastated that you’d left… that the worst possible moment in our whole relationship had happened to us, and you were going about your business like my feelings didn’t matter.”

“Of course your feelings matter. They’ve always mattered, but you must admit how the situation between us might have looked to me,” I pleaded, and figured I sounded like a broken record, repeating that phrase over and over now.

“Alfie, I thought we were fine… solid. The band’s schedule hardly gives me time to breathe. If I’m honest, I’ve felt worn out for months. And now that I’m pregnant, the fatigue I felt before pales into insignificance.”

“I said I was sorry,” I pleaded again.

“So am I. Sorry I’m struggling to decide whether you’re here because you need me or because I’m having your baby.”

“Stop fucking saying that. You know how I feel about you. Baby or not, I love you with everything in me. You’re the love of my life.”

“And I believed you whenever you told me that, but I trusted you and put my faith in you… then you left.”