Page 33 of Resonance
“Not the way you think.”
I twisted around and leaned against the counter’s edge as she picked up the knife and began slathering butter over the fluffy interior of the biscuits. “So what happened? He cheat on you?”
“Not once that I know of. There’s a lot of him that’s probably still the same as you remember. Honesty, that’s a big one. Kept our marriage solid for years.” She glanced at me, then put her attention back on her buttering. “It was me. I strayed. Told him about it, told him why, and what I wanted out of all this, and he agreed. I don’t even know that he was that upset over it.” She lifted one shoulder. “Sometimes I think you had it easier. Quick and clean. It took me years to figure out that I couldn’t deal with music always being his first mistress. Fooled myself, I suppose, then looked in the mirror one day and realized I was getting old, felt like I’d split off somewhere along the way and was living somebody else’s life. I wanted my own.” She set the knife down and swiped her hands on a towel, still avoiding meeting my gaze. Her voice was brisk and matter-of-fact. “Anyway, you didn’t ask all that, but I guess I needed to tell it.”
“I’m sorry all the same,” I told her, and meant it.
Iona waved a hand dismissively and then passed me her coffee mug for a refill. “So anyway, if you know of anyone looking for a new place…” She arched a brow. “You can tell them it has a great indoor pool.”
I passed her mug back and cocked my head, waiting.
“Heard the splashing. Not much else.”
My mouth opened, some explanation trying to form, but the sound of a throat clearing drew both our attention toward the doorway as Owen entered and pointed to the coffee maker. “I’ve got a dire need for caffeine, although I’m already reconsidering because moving through here is like moving through mud. Should I come back? I’m totally interrupting, right?”
“Not at all.” Iona plastered on a welcoming smile and broke eye contact with me to skirt around to the cabinet and extend a mug to Owen. “You want a biscuit? I was fixin’ to make some eggs and bacon, too.”
“Mmmm,” Owen purred, and the sound was too close to some of the noises that’d fallen in my ear and on my lips last night. I took a long swallow of my coffee as he wandered closer to Iona, taking the mug and holding it still as she filled it from the pot. “That sounds good. I’m starving. And happy to help you, too.”
Iona ticked a look toward me. “Breakfast?”
“No,” I said shortly. “I’ll be in the basement when you’re done eating, Owen. We’ll finish, load up, and head on.”
Then I turned and left them to it.
I showered and could still hear them talking and laughing in the kitchen as I headed down to the basement. A small, immature part of me felt a ridiculous sting of betrayal after everything I’d told Owen last night, but by the time he joined me, it was gone, superseded by the photo album I’d stumbled across. I knew I shouldn’t look. I knew it. And I did it anyway, old masochist that I was.
“Tour photos?” Owen spoke softly as he came up behind me and then lowered to a crouch beside me. He smelled freshly showered, too, and the ends of his hair were still damp, catching on his forehead and cheeks.
“Yeah.” I turned the page and we both studied the 8x10 pasted on faded backing paper. The memory came fresh, not even time-worn at the edges as I looked down at the photograph, bolded in my mind like it was yesterday instead of years ago. My arm was around Ryder, a possessive curl in my fingers, though I was looking off to the side. Ryder angled toward me, a big, gleaming grin on his face. A half hour after Iona had taken that picture, Ryder and I had gotten back on our bus, shut the door, and gone after each other like rabid dogs. That was what it’d been like with him. Desperate passion in fitful bursts. I should’ve known that there was an expiration date on it. I stared at the photo another moment. That was all a photograph was, one frozen second of a story that either got finished or didn’t, with no one but the subjects the wiser.
“Wow,” Owen breathed, and I waited for some comment on how young we looked that didn’t come. Instead, he leaned closer, thumb anchoring to the edge of the page as he peered down. “You were happy, huh?”
“I—” The words got caught in my throat, and it’d been so long, so damn long since I’d felt that sensation, that the way it overtook me was a foreign discomfort. I pinched the bridge of my nose to offset the faint sting in my eyes. “Shit,” I muttered.
Owen must have lifted the photo album from my lap, but I didn’t dare move. I waited until the pressure subsided. I’d said goodbye to all that. I had. And when I could, I let my hands fall back to my side. Owen’s big, patient eyes were like starlight on me, like the great big skies I’d dreamed of as a kid. His fingers skimmed over my shoulders lightly, tentatively. There and gone, but somehow calming all the same. “Did you ever talk about all of it with Ryder? Like really talk about it? I’m not trying to tell you what to do or anything, I’m just—”
“We did all the talking we needed to. Let’s finish packing up and head out.”
Owen put his hands up in a gesture of surrender and nodded. “You’re the boss.”
By 10:00 a.m.,we had everything we needed and loaded the truck while Iona looked on from the porch.
Owen waited in the cab as I trotted back up the steps. “I’ll index everything, type it up, include qualifications and references, cross-references, and then cc both your lawyers on the email.”
Iona nodded. “It won’t be an ugly divorce, you understand.”
“I’m glad.”
“Me too.” She smiled then, and it was one I recognized from decades before. It erased the crinkles at the corners of her eyes, cast a raw glinting warmth over her features. I reached out and pulled her into my arms before I could second-guess what I was doing.
“I missed you, too, you know.” Her hands curled against my shirt, fisting the fabric and squeezing. “In a different way than he did. But you were my friend, too. Wish you could’ve seen a way to stick around, though I get why you couldn’t.”
“I was angry and hurt and young and stupid.”
“I know.” The tips of her fingers played over my collar. “Are you still?”
I lowered my chin and brushed a kiss over her forehead. “Mostly just stupid now. Wouldn’t have minded if the youth had stuck around a little longer, though.”