I nodded as she made her way to me and placed a kiss on my lips. “Why don’t you go shower and I’ll finish this up?”
She looked so damn surprised, and it only made me feel worse. “You sure?”
“I got this,” I reassured her, and she headed down the hallway toward our bedroom.
As she walked away, I knew exactly why I’d fallen in love with Shelby all those years ago. After my baseball career ended, I hadn’t been easy to deal with, but she never wavered. She loved me when I was unlovable. She hadn’t quit on me, and I felt like it was my obligation to not walk away from her in return.
When my feelings started to change, I’d been too chickenshit to admit it to her—or to myself, for that matter. I was too wracked with guilt over all she’d done for me, all she’d lost in her life. There was always something keeping me put . . . if it wasn’t one thing, it was another. And for as unhappy as I was, it seemed easier to stay with her. That was a shit reality to accept, but it was the truth. It was easier to stay than to upend our lives. The last thing I wanted was to hurt her feelings, to break her heart and force her—and me—to start over.
I’d almost worked up the courage to end things between us once before, but then her dad got sick. Her mother wasn’t in the picture, so it had only been Shelby and her father for her whole life. Within five months of getting sick, he was gone too, and only I was left. I carried the weight of that squarely on my shoulders, and mourned the loss of my own happiness for the sake of hers.
“Take care of my little girl,” her dad had begged me on his deathbed.
How the fuck did you disappoint a dead man and look at yourself in the mirror each day?
I should have stopped things before I moved back to California to open Sam’s, but I hadn
’t. It was the perfect opportunity to ask for space to see where we stood, to see if we had a future. But Shelby had assumed that she would be moving with me, and once again, I didn’t have the balls to do the right thing and tell her she wasn’t invited. Instead of speaking up—or breaking up—I sucked it up and watched unhappily as she packed her bags, eager for this new phase in our life, assuming it was what I wanted as well.
But I hadn’t wanted it.
And she hadn’t even asked if I did.
Somewhere along the line, I’d begun to feel like a passenger in my own damn life, making decisions based on a sense of obligation instead of what I truly wanted. And now I didn’t know how to stop it. I was in too deep. Or, at least, it seemed that way.
“Wine?” Shelby asked from behind me, and I turned to face her, her brown hair still damp from the shower.
“Already on the table.”
I pointed to the bottle, and as she opened it, the oven timer buzzed. Praying the enchiladas were okay, I pulled them from the oven and looked them over. Huh, I might have actually pulled it off. They looked edible.
“This was really nice of you.” Shelby came back with two wineglasses and handed me one.
I leaned over to place a kiss on her cheek. “I know things with us haven’t been the way you hoped—”
Interrupting me, she waved me off. “I know how much the bar needs you. It’s just that I need you too.” The last part was almost a whisper.
I swallowed hard, wondering what to say and how to say it without hurting her. “I just haven’t figured out how to balance it all yet.” It wasn’t entirely a lie. Pulling her into my arms, I held her close.
“I miss you. We never see each other anymore,” she said into my chest, her breath warm against my beating heart.
Pulling back, I placed a kiss on her forehead but didn’t say anything more about it. “Let’s eat.” She moved toward the table, and I grabbed the casserole dish and carried it over.
I asked her about work, and she filled me in on all the latest news with her students. It was only when she talked throughout the entire meal that I realized just how little conversation we actually had anymore. Everything she told me about her classes was news to me.
“Megan got engaged,” she said as she finished off her glass of wine. Megan was her best friend from Arizona.
“Really?” Surprised, I held my breath, hoping to avoid this topic of discussion.
“Well, she and Christian have been together for four years.” Shelby cocked an eyebrow at me, and I ignored her not-so-subtle hint. She and I had been together much longer. “Are we ever getting engaged, Frank?”
Shit.
Any hopes of her not going there were suddenly dashed, along with my appetite. I didn’t know what the hell to say. I refused to lie about it and pretend I was ready to get married when I wasn’t sure that I’d ever be.
“My friends all think if it hasn’t happened by now,” she said, “it’s never going to happen. Are they right?”
Great. She’d talked about this with her friends. If I knew anything about women, and I did, this couldn’t be good. Women fed off each other, each thinking they knew more about a man’s psyche than the other. They were usually wrong.