The Best Next Thing ((Un)Professionally Yours 1)

“Speak to you, you mean?”

“No, sweetheart.” His voice was so painfully gentle it just about broke her heart. “You don’t have to tell me anything. But you do have to tell someone. If not your parents or your sister, then a therapist.”

“I think for me, the worst of it all, was that he stripped me of my self-worth, my self-confidence, my dignity…and I allowed it.”

“Charity you’ve clearly lived through, and survived, hell. I can tell you that I think you’re an amazing woman. The strongest, most capable, and interesting woman I’ve ever met. But until you look in a mirror and believe those things about yourself, my words are meaningless. And because that fucking bastard has controlled your life for so long, I know how hard it must be for you to do so. You’re the only one now who can take that power away from him.”

Tears had been silently streaming from her eyes throughout his little speech. Logically and emotionally, she knew that his words were true. But Blaine had kept her imprisoned in a cage of fear and intimidation for so long, that even now, years after the door had been left open and unlocked, she was too terrified to step foot outside of those familiar confines.

She had fled, sure, but she had taken her cozy cage with her. She had painted it, decorated it, and deceived herself into believing that the bars weren’t there. Fooled herself into thinking that she was free. But she wasn’t. She was still in the cage Blaine had put her in.

And she was only now beginning to recognize that fact.

She had allowed her parents, her sister, the people who loved her, to mourn her abuser. As if he warranted that consideration. As if he was worth a single one of their tears. She had permitted his parents to silence her with their stoic disappointment in her. The oh-so-subtle jabs that perhaps he wouldn’t have killed himself if she had only been a better, more loving wife, had been a different kind of abuse.

He did not deserve to live on fondly in people’s memories.

He deserved to be known as the hideous, repulsive monster who had raped her and beaten her almost daily.

She was shaking. Violently. She became aware of it when she heard her teeth chattering.

“W-why are you so invested in this?” she asked him, her voice unsteady. “This isn’t fun, or flirty or anything close to a holiday romance. You should be running in the opposite direction and avoiding me like the plague after what you’ve learned about my marriage.”

“Give it time.” The words were placid, his smile soothing. “There’s always tomorrow.”

“Always tomorrow for what?” she asked blankly.

He responded, still in a ridiculously serene voice. “Running scared and avoiding you like the plague.”

His words coaxed a reluctant laugh from her and he reached for a napkin and gently dabbed the moisture from her face.

She took the napkin from him and gave her nose a good blow before speaking again. “I’m serious, Miles. I’m clearly a mess. This thing between us isn’t developed or strong enough for you to stick around for this crap.”

“Charity, I didn’t come here looking for a holiday romance. I’m here to hide from the world while I recover from a debilitating illness. I wasn’t expecting to find you here.”

“Of course, you were.”

“Don’t be pedantic, Charity,” he chastised without heat. “You know what I mean. I admit that at first, I did consider you an intriguing mystery that had to be solved. It was that fucking power outage. I was bored out of my mind. You and Stormy were the only diversions around. And she sleeps eighteen hours a day. But after that night at the pool…things changed. I was still interested but on a more, shall we say, personal level.”

“You wanted to shag me you mean?”

“So bloody desperately. I mean, there was sexual interest before that. But mere twinges compared to how much I wanted you after that night.”

“This is a lot of baggage to tolerate for a little nookie,” she pointed out acerbically, and he gave her a lazy smile.

“While I may feel like a perpetually horny teenage boy around you, Charity, I am not an adolescent. And I do have a modicum of hard-earned control over my hormones and base desires. Look, what I’m trying to say is that there’s no one else here for us right now. So why don’t we each be what the other needs us to be.”

“And what do you need me to be?” she asked in frustrated confusion. “A sexual partner?”

“No. Not because I don’t want it but because it’s probably not what you need right now. And that means it’s off the table.”

“So, what do you think I need right now?”

“The same thing I need…A friend.”

A friend? How…novel. And yet the notion of having someone in her corner, someone to confide in, spend time and laugh with, after so many years alone was incredibly appealing.

“And you can switch off the sexual thing? Just like that? Why would you even want to? What if I don’t want you to?”