Dare To Love Again

“Right, um, like I said, the number Sorenson had comes back to the Winthrop estate. The only one we can find there so far who can pull off something like this seems to be his widow. The only other people left are staff, and I doubt any of them are being paid enough to afford something like this.”

“The woman’s name is Anna Winthrop, nee Salvo. According to the records, they had a daughter who would’ve been about six or seven when the husband died. He committed suicide, or so they say, but apparently, there were a lot of people who didn’t believe it at the time. As for the daughter, the kid seems to have dropped off the face of the earth after that. She was still alive; some people had seen her, but within a year, she was gone, and it was a while since anyone saw or heard from her.”

“What was her name, the daughter?”

“Uh, let me check my notes; we were going to do some digging on that tomorrow so that I could give you everything. Uh, here it is, Kynlee Winthrop; if she’s alive, she’d be twenty-seven this year. So far, we have nothing on her, no photos, no school records, nothing past the age of five.”

The name didn’t sound familiar at all, but what did any of this have to do with my wife? I have to stop tripping myself up like this. If I keep thinking of her like that, it will only be a matter of time before I stupidly open myself up and let her back in. “Keep digging; let me know what you find as soon as you have anything.”

“Sure thing, sir.”

I hung up the phone no closer to the truth than I was before I came in here. What could Sterling Winthrop’s widow want with my ex? And who is this daughter? Her and Giselle would be about the same age if the daughter is still alive, but from the way, Silas spoke it doesn’t seem like the kid had made it. But if so, why is there no record of it?

Just as I stood to go back to bed, the phone rang again; it was Silas. “What do you have for me?”

“I forgot to mention that I found an old friend of Sterling Winthrop’s who’s willing to talk to us if you need it. He seemed to have a lot to say, but I’m not sure what use he will be to what we’re doing here.”

“Set it up, first thing in the morning.” I hung up the phone and went back to her.

Something about seeing her in my bed with her hand resting in the space where I was supposed to be as if seeking me out in her sleep did something strange to my heart. I never saw myself as one of those people who would fool themselves into believing something that wasn’t true. I always thought that I was the sort to face shit head-on. So how is it that the walls I thought I’d so meticulously built around my heart had so easily crumbled in just a matter of days?

And why am I now more confused than when she left? Could mom be right? I’ve never had reason to doubt her before, never known her to fly off the handle and be so staunchly set against something only to have her be proven wrong in the end. I could tell myself that she was doing this for the sole purpose of gaining and keeping access to her first and only grandchild, but I know for a fact that if she believed that Giselle was at fault, I’d have to be the one holding her back from doing my ex harm.

I climbed back into bed with her, once again conflicted. There is no danger of the same thing happening again, of her disappearing from my life, ghosting me as efficiently and heartbreakingly as she had, but now my thoughts seem to be shifting from taking my son and booting her to the ends of the earth, to how to keep them both. But how do I protect myself from being destroyed again?

I’d barely made it out intact the last time. Friends like Dana and Donovan had been the ones to keep me from dissolving into nothing. I didn’t even know back then, as much as I loved her, that it was as deep as it turned out to be. I never understood that love, once lost, could leave such despair in its wake. I never want to feel anything like that again. But what if I’d been wrong? What if she was afraid of something or someone?

My thoughts had me turning to her, and she mumbled in her sleep before curling into me the way she used to, and I felt another little piece of my heart open up to let her in. “Wake up!” I whispered the words against her temple before making my way down her cheek to the corner of her lips with mine. She came slowly awake to the feel of my tongue slipping into her mouth and me pressing her naked body onto her back before slipping my cock into her still wet pussy.