Chapter 5

He didn’t deny this, which gave me a pang, but his silent criticism was well deserved after my outburst. “Okay, you’re right,” I said. “I should do the wedding on my own, face up to things, to my life. Oh, God, my life.” I rolled away from him.

“You go to the wedding,” Tom said as he pressed his body to my back. “You’ll do fine, you’ll see your sister on the happiest day of her life, and it will get you away from your pain for a while.”

“Then can I come back here?”

“I don’t think so,” he said.

I couldn’t speak. I was losing all over again. Tom explained himself as he held me. “You’re coming off the worst pain in your life and I’m very lucky to have met you, but if we’re at the beginning of something, I don’t want it built on that. Whatever we have should stand on its own.”

I sat up. “Are we at the beginning of something?”

“Feels that way.”

I laughed and my laughter morphed into a teary mess. “Me, too,” I said, reaching over to stroke that gorgeous fur.