“I was so confident about what we were doing,” he muttered.
“I …was, too.” Jamie could barely stand the suspense, but she wouldn’t say anything to encourage him one way or the other. They both had to be completely sure that they were doing the right thing. “Would you prefer to take a couple of days to think it over?”
Rich’s gaze found hers. “Maybe I should. I thought I knew, but maybe I don’t.”
Disappointed, Jamie nodded. “I’ll wait to hear from you then.” She secured her purse strap over her shoulder and smiled. “Good night, Rich.”
“’Night.”
As she headed toward her car, which was parked four or five spaces from his, she struggled not to reveal any of what she was feeling. Rich surprised her by walking the short distance beside her.
“I’ve really made a mess of this, haven’t I?” he asked. For the first time since she’d mentioned the divorce, he didn’t look as though he wanted to bite her head off.
“We both have,” she answered in a small voice. She tried to smile at him and failed. When they reached her car, she opened her purse, searching for her keys.
“It may not make any difference,” Rich said, and his eyes burned into hers, “but I’d like you to know I had to work Saturday morning. I probably should’ve woken you. I assumed my singing in the shower would have—” he gave a lopsided grin “—but when it didn’t, I decided to let you sleep. It was thoughtless of me not to leave a note.”
“You were at work?”
Rich nodded. “When I did phone, you weren’t there.”
“But there wasn’t any message.”
He shrugged. “After what I went through on Friday, I was done with leaving messages. Anyway, you might’ve phoned me.” The last remark was made as an offhand suggestion, but it didn’t disguise his frustration.
“I did! But you weren’t home. I didn’t leave a message, either.” What a fool she’d been. What fools they’d both been. Jamie wanted to groan at their stupidity.
“You phoned?” His sigh of frustration was audible.
“You did, too?” Her sigh joined his.
Jamie resisted the urge to weep. There’d been so much she’d wanted to say, and hadn’t. So much she’d longed to tell him. And couldn’t.
“You’ll phone me…soon?” she asked, trying not to sound as anxious as she felt.
Rich nodded. One corner of his mouth lifted in a half smile. “I’ll leave a message if you’re not in this time.”
“If you don’t call me, then I’m calling you.” She refused to leave room for any additional misunderstandings. Not again.
* * *
Before he realized where he was going, Rich found himself at Jason’s apartment complex. He sat in the parking lot for several minutes.
When Jamie brought up the idea of divorce, he thought he’d explode. Rich couldn’t remember ever being angrier in his life. Angry and hurt and confused. They were minutes away from making love, and she dropped the word as though she was talking about something casual, something unimportant.
Divorce.
At one point he’d decided there was no reasoning with her, and the best thing to do was walk away from the whole mess. Then the unexpected happened.
She’d started to make sense.
Jamie had always been the logical one. The perfectionist. Everything had to be just so. It had driven him to distraction when they were on the yearbook staff together. He should’ve realized that although thirteen years had passed since then, Jamie hadn’t changed.
She wanted everything as clear as they could make it. Those were her words.
Rich knew what he wanted, too. He wanted her back in his bed so he could make love to her again. Naturally he didn’t say as much. How could he? She claimed that they were denying what had happened, that they couldn’t pretend nothing had changed when everything was different. Well…yes, that was true—and no, it wasn’t.
Hours later, Rich was still sitting in his car, and he still didn’t know what to make of their meeting. He needed someone to talk to, so he elected Jason, whether his brother was willing or not.
The lights were out in Jason’s ground-floor apartment, but that didn’t deter Rich. He leaned on the buzzer until a sliver of light shot out from under the door.
He waited until he heard the lock snap open, then stepped back.
“Rich?” His brother groaned, tying the knot in his bathrobe. “What the hell are you doing here? Do you have any idea what time it is?”
Rich checked his watch, surprised to discover it was after eleven. “I need to talk,” he said, marching past Jason and into the kitchen.
A yawning Jason followed. “Is this going to take long?”
“I don’t know. Why? Have you got a woman with you?”
“If I did, I wouldn’t have answered the door, no matter how long you rang the bell.” Jason pulled out a kitchen chair, sat down and slouched forward over his folded arms. “In case you haven’t noticed, I’m not in a talking mood.”
“Don’t worry, all you have to do is listen.”
Rich walked over to the refrigerator and opened it. He took out two cold sodas and pushed one at his brother. “When’s the last time you bought groceries?”
“I don’t know. Why?”
“All you’ve got in there is a tin can with a fork sticking out of it.”
“Dinner,” Jason said, covering his yawn. He waited a moment, then gestured. “Go on…talk. I’m listening.”
Now that he had the floor, so to speak, Rich couldn’t figure out where to start. He wasn’t ashamed of having made love to Jamie, but he wasn’t sure how she’d feel if she knew he was talking to Jason about their night together.
“You need some help with this, little brother?” Jason asked, straightening and opening his soda.