“Honey, I said I’m sorry.” He cut his eyes to her and saw her back straighten from her anger. When Poppy was upset, she tended to hold that damn grudge for eternity.
“Jon, you lied to me.”
“Honey, I didn’t lie, not technically.”
He felt her icy glare but couldn’t bring himself to meet it. He knew he had been in the wrong, but really, it wasn’t that bad.
“Purposefully not telling me that you had lunch with a female coworker, one that has been after you since you started working at the firm, is a lie in my book, Jonathan.”
Fuck, she’s bringing out the full first name.
“Honey—”
“Don’t honey me, Jonathan.” Her words sliced, because deep down he knew she was right. “What if I had gone to lunch with Alex?”
Just the mention of that prick’s name had his knuckles turning white and his jaw locking tight. “That’s completely different, and you know it.”
“Really?” She sounded incredulous. “Because last I heard from you, Michelle has been flirting with you so thick you were drowning in it.”
Yeah, she was right, like always, but still. “Alex is in a whole other category, Poppy.” He looked at her but found her staring out the passenger side window again. “Honey, please let’s not fight. I promise you it was only lunch.”
When she looked at him, all words failed him when he saw the hurt in her gaze. “Why did you lie when I asked who you ate lunch with?”
Jon sighed and rubbed at the back of his head. “Because if I told you I had lunch with Michelle, this is the reaction I would have gotten. Honey, please, you’re overreacting.”
“Overreacting!”
Jon winced at the high-pitched squeal that came from his wife.
“I love you.” Maybe saying those three little words would make her forget she was mad at him. The narrow-eyed look she gave him told him his answer. “I swear it was a completely innocent meeting. We were going over the Anderson account. Poppy, love, you know we’re working on the account together.”
She sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose. “Let’s just stop talking about it, okay?”
“Okay.” He drove home, the silence stretching wide and getting under his skin.But before anything more could be said, as the silence grew thick enough it could have been cut with a knife, the sound of metal bending and glass shattering filled his ears.
Then there was nothing.Chapter 1Two years laterThe headstone was a marker for death. A fat tear slid down Poppy’s cheek, and she angrily brushed it away. Poppy didn’t want to cry anymore. Exhaustion filled her from the sadness that consumed her and wouldn’t let her rest. Two years had passed, and it still hurt so damn much.
When will the pain end?
She looked at the headstone for what had to be the millionth time in the past twenty-four months.Jonathan William Ellis
Beloved Husband, Son, and BrotherShe had traced the engraving so many times she could close her eyes and see the exact placement of each of the letters.
“It’s time for me to go, Jon, to move on.” The ground was cold and frozen beneath her ass, but she didn’t care.
A gust of wind whistled past her, rustling the bare tree branches and scaring a flock of birds. Tilting her head to the sky, she watched the cloud of black twist and turn, as if ink had been spilled into water. The birds squawked high above her but disappeared across the murky grayness of the sky.
It had taken her two years to finally have the strength to make the decision to move out of Ohio. Being around their friends and family was just too hard, even years after his death. Looking at them, the home they shared, and the possessions they bought together was a reminder of what they had and everything she lost.
She was healing, had gotten so much better over these years, but she was ready to start a new chapter in her life. Poppy had accepted that with life came death, that she’d lost Jon, but that didn’t mean she had to lose herself. He wouldn’t have wanted that. Jon would have wanted her to live, to be happy.
And that was what she was going to do.
Poppy was sick of the sympathetic looks everyone gave her and the whispers they thought she couldn’t hear. Yeah, she had one hell of a time dealing with Jon’s death, but what the fuck did they know? She would take all the time she needed to heal—at least that’s what the shrink told her. Honestly, Poppy didn’t know if she would ever feel whole again, or if the emptiness that now lay in her heart would ever be filled.
Getting away from everything seemed like the perfect thing for her to do at the moment. Jon and his family had been an integral part of her life growing up. Their parents had been close friends, and their families did everything together. But since Jon’s death, she felt pulled away from them and disconnected from her own family.