Page 42 of The Husband Contract

Katherine bursts out laughing at that point, and Willow gives her a look. I wonder if this is something they’ve talked about previously?

“You ready to go?”

“Yeah, I guess.” She bites down on her lip. “Are you sure you want to do it today? I know that’s a long drive.”

“It’s fine,” I say. “I’ve got my car ready with gas. And you got the water bottles, right?”

“Yeah.” She nods and lifts her backpack. “I have four water bottles and some protein bars.”

“Great. I figured after the hike, we can grab lunch.”

“Yay,” she says, though she doesn’t sound super excited.

“We should get going. See you later, Katherine.”

“Have a good day, Sebastian. You, too, Willow. Hike your heart away. You know how much we both love nature,” she teases.

“It’s going to be so much fun.” Willow offers me a wan smile, and we head outside to the car. I open the car door for her, and she looks at me in surprise. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome,” I say as I close it behind her and walk over to the driver’s side. I slip inside, start the ignition, and watch as she buckles her seat belt.

“I’m glad that Katherine was able to work for you this morning,” I tell her, and she nods.

“Yeah, me, too. She normally works in the afternoons, other than on the days that she…” She pauses. “Well, yeah. Anyway, you don’t want to hear about work stuff.”

“I guess that’s one of the perks of being the boss,” I say to her. “You can take off whenever you want.”

She looks at me for a few seconds and nods slowly. “I guess it is.” She grabs her phone and frowns as she looks down at the screen.

“Everything okay?”

“Oh, it’s just...” She makes a face. “This guy. I thought I blocked him, but he’s still texting me.”

“Oh.” I try to look at her screen, but she moves it to the side. “Who is he? Is it someone you want me to talk to?”

“Oh, no, no, no, no,” she says quickly and slips her phone into her handbag. “He’s no one important.”

“Someone you dated?”

“I mean…” She pauses. “I guess he would say we dated, but I don’t know that?—”

“Oh, so it’s someone you dated, but you didn’t necessarily feel as strongly as he did?” I pry.

She smiles at me, but it doesn’t quite reach her eyes. I can tell that she’s nervous and unsure of what to say. It suddenly strikes me that she’s talking about Sergio.

Sergio is calling her, messaging her, probably telling her he loves her and wants to get back together, and here she is, speaking about him like he is nothing.

“Did you love him?”

“Love him? God, no.” She quickly makes a face of apology. “I mean, I’m not trying to be mean or rude, but it really wasn’t that serious a relationship. We didn’t even sleep together.” She pauses. “Well, it’s just… it wasn’t, I wouldn’t call it a relationship.” She stumbles over her words. “He was kind of calling me his girlfriend and was asking me to do laundry and stuff, but…”

“So he considered you his girlfriend? Did he love you?” I feel for Sergio, but somehow I am grateful to know they never slept together. Even though it makes what happened to Sergio feel even more pathetic. He must have really loved her.

“Oh, no way. There’s no way he loved me.” She shakes her head. “Literally no way. If he did, he would be crazy.”

“I suppose any woman who doesn’t love a man would call a man who loves her crazy.” I try to keep the coldness out of my voice, but it’s hard. Sergio does fall quickly, but still, it hurts to hear someone talk so badly about him.

“He’s just someone in my past whom I blocked. But I guess he got another phone and is still able to contact me.” She frowns. “I guess I’ll just block this number, as well.”