The Best Next Thing

She smiled and left the doorway to slowly walk over to where he still sat on the bed. The sway of her hips in that figure-hugging dress was mesmerizing. Sonnets have been written about lesser things.

She didn’t stop until she was standing between his parted thighs. He took a moment to appreciate the fact that his eyes were level with her perfectly pert and delicately scented cleavage.

And she grasped his jaw to slant his head until his gaze met hers.

“Eyes up, sir. I’m over here,” she instructed him cheekily, and he grinned. Her soft hands smoothed the hair back from his forehead, and she held his eyes for a long moment, while his breathing ceased completely, and his heart raced out of control in his chest.

“I’m terrified that if I forgive you for this, it means I’m falling into the same patterns again. Forgiving a man for a wrong he has done to me and thereby allowing his behavior to escalate.”

“Not all men are like Blaine Davenport, Charity. Sometimes we think we know best and fuck up. Because we’re idiots. We apologize, learn from our mistakes, and move forward.”

Miles wasn’t a short man, and he had rarely had anyone tower over him in this way before. But he found that he didn’t mind it. And he enjoyed the power and control it gave her. Because he knew that, in this moment, she needed the added security. And he definitely didn’t mind how close she was standing. How he could feel the heat coming off her, hear the escalation in her breathing, and feel the slight tremor in the soft fingers entangled in his hair.

“What you need to do,” he continued, his voice hoarsening with the desire he was trying to keep under rigid control. “Is figure out which men are which.”

“How do I do that?”

“You start by trusting yourself again. Stop punishing yourself for Blaine. What happened in your marriage was not your fault, Charity. It was all him and the parents who enabled him.”

“I don’t want you to stay in tonight,” she said, the shift in topic abrupt yet somehow not jarring at all. “I want you with me when I tell them. I love them but I want, I don’t know, a neutral party at the table, I suppose.”

“Okay. But I have to warn you…I’m not neutral. I’m like 150 percent in your corner.”

She beamed at him, and he sighed in relief. Grateful that, for now, she seemed to have let his dumb mistake slide.

“Well, that’s okay too. But not a word. I don’t need you to make things easier for me. I just…need you.”

“You have me.”

It was a promise. An oath. An utterly unbreakable vow.

She had him. And she would always have him. Now and forever.

When Charity and Miles reached the hotel foyer, it was to find her parents and Faith already waiting at reception.

“Where’s Stuart?” Charity asked, confused by her brother-in-law’s absence.

“He’s staying with Gracie. We don’t have a ‘sitter here. And I’d rather not have a stranger watching my child. He told me to tell you he’d see you at breakfast.”

“So, it’s just us?”

“Sandra and Paul couldn’t stay. She wasn’t feeling very well,” her mother explained, with a sympathetic smile. “I’m sorry. I’m sure you were looking forward to spending some time with them as well.”

Charity bit the inside of her cheek to prevent herself from responding, and she felt the back of Mile’s hand lightly brush against hers. The touch was so delicate she was sure no one present noticed. But she noticed…and she sucked in a grateful breath at that silent show of support.

“What’s the plan?” Charity asked, with a forced smile.

“Dad’s made a reservation at a fabulous restaurant on the neighboring estate,” Faith said. “The one here is very nice, but we wanted a quieter venue, so that we could talk and catch up in relative peace.”

“Great. Can Miles and I bum a lift with someone? His rental car is only being delivered in the morning.”

“We can all fit into Daddy’s showboat of an SUV,” Faith piped up. “I don’t know why anyone needs a massive vehicle like that.”

“The only way to safely transport my golf clubs,” their father quipped. When their tiny mother jabbed him in his ribs, he winced and added, “And my lovely wife, of course.”

Their parents were a sickeningly cute couple. Both were surgeons—their mother cardiothoracic and their father neuro—and yet they were polar opposites in so many ways. Their mother was five foot one, and their father six foot three. He was pale, blond and hazel-eyed. She had a rich brown complexion, a shade or so darker than Charity’s skin, midnight black hair and sultry eyes. He was slender and muscular. She was comfortably curvy.

He was loud and jovial. She was quiet and contemplative. He made stupid dad jokes, and she rarely got them.