axe to fal on her throat.
“I made a picture,” Conner told her at the breakfast table the next morning. While she poured his Cheerios, he ran to his art station. Conner was official y on Christmas break from school, and she had an event planned for a local charity that afternoon at the Four Seasons. Normal y, she’d take Conner to his day care, but Sam wanted to spend time with him before hitting the road for Chicago later that night. She expected him at eleven after his morning practice.
Conner ran back into the dining room and set a piece of white notebook paper on the table. “Come look, Mom.”
Autumn poured herself a cup of coffee and sat next to Conner. On the paper beside his cereal bowl, he’d drawn a picture of her and Sam with himself in the middle. The figures were al holding hands and had big lopsided smiles. For the first time, he’d drawn them al as a family. “This is you and me and Dad.”
Her stomach fel as she drank her coffee. “That’s a good picture. I like my pink skirt.” She swal owed hard. “But you know your daddy just comes over sometimes to see you. Right? He doesn’t live here.”
Conner shrugged. “He can if he wants.”
“He has his apartment downtown.”
“But he can move here. Josh F’s dad lives at his house with him.”
“Conner, not al dads live in the same house with their children. Not al families are like Josh F’s. Some families have two dads,” she said to take his mind of things that weren’t going to happen. “Or two moms.”
Conner shoveled Cheerios into his mouth. “Dad can move in if he wants to, Mom. He has a big truck.” Like it was just a matter of Sam packing up his truck and moving in. “And then you can make me a little brother.”
She gasped. “What? You want a brother?”
Conner nodded. “Josh F. has a little brother. So Dad has to move here so I can have a brother.”
“Don’t get your heart set on it, Conner.” He suddenly wanted his parents under the same roof
“Please, Mom?”
“Don’t talk with your mouth ful ,” she said by rote, her mind tumbling as fast as her stomach. A brother for Conner wasn’t going to happen. She pushed her coffee aside, the acid burning a hole in her chest. There had been a time when she’d wanted the same thing as Conner. She’d wanted it in Vegas, and the day she’d signed the divorce papers. She wanted it the night she’d discovered she was pregnant and the morning she’d given birth to their son. She’d loved Sam. It had taken her a long time to get over him, and somehow, she’d fal en in love with him again. Only this time it was worse. This time it felt deeper, comfortable. Like they were friends and lovers. She actual y knew him now, and it was so much worse than the first time. The first time, she’d fal en in love with a charming, intense stranger. This time she’d fal en for a charming, intense man. He was real. She rose from the table and moved to her bedroom. She took a shower as if her nerves weren’t a wreck. As if her mind wasn’t racing and her heart not pounding. She got ready for her day and dressed in a pair of black wool pants and cashmere sweater with pearls on the col ar. Her hands shook as she pul ed her hair back into a ponytail.
She loved him, and there was a tiny piece of her sil y heart that held out hope that maybe he loved her this time, too. He’d joked about it twice, but that’s al it had been. A joke. Like before.
This time she wasn’t a scared twenty-five-year-old. This time she knew the outcome.
The sound of Conner’s current favorite movie blared from the television as Sam walked downstairs to Autumn’s basement office. He wanted to talk about Christmas and spending it together that year.
He paused in the doorway to watch her profile for a few moments. Her red ponytail slid over one shoulder and brushed her white throat as she slid a planner into her tote. He swal owed past the sudden constriction in his throat. He remembered a time when he’d looked at her and hadn’t even thought she was beautiful. Hadn’t
“When wil you be home?” he asked.
She looked up and quickly glanced back down. “Late. You should probably stay at your own place.”
Something was wrong. Different. It was there in the ridged stil ness that suddenly surrounded her. “I’l be gone for eight days,” he reminded her. She turned and grabbed a pen off her desk. “Conner wil look forward to your nightly cal s.”
He cleared the constriction in his throat. “Wil you look forward to my cal s?”
She pul ed open a drawer but didn’t answer.
He moved into the room and took her arm. “What’s going on, Autumn?”
She looked up at him, and he saw it. In her green eyes. The look he’d never hoped to see again. Pain and uncertainty and withdrawal. Like the first time she’d laid Conner in his arms. “Conner is confused,” she said, and she took a step back, separating herself from him with more than just space. “I think it’s best if we don’t spend as much time together.”
This had little to do with Conner. Frustration tightened his skul , and he wanted to shake her. He purposely loosened his grip and dropped his hand.
“You can’t keep blowing hot and cold. You can’t pul me in even as you push me away.” He took a step back, too. To protect himself from the pain rushing at him. “You can’t keep looking at me like you expect me to break your heart at any moment.”
“And you can’t expect me not to.”
Something happened between the time he left last night and now. What it was didn’t matter. “I’m not going to hurt you, Autumn. I promise.”
“You can’t make that promise.”
He held out a hand. “Honey, just trust me.”
She shook her head. “I don’t know if I can.”
“This is about Vegas.” He dropped his hand. “Stil .”
“It happened, Sam.”
“You’re right. It did, but we were different people then.” He pointed to himself. “I was different. I’m not asking you to forget what happened. I don’t believe that’s even possible for either of us. But if you can’t get past it, then how can we move forward with our lives?” How could they make a life together? Something he wanted as badly as he’d ever wanted anything in his life. More than winning the Stanley Cup, he wanted to win his family. She shook her head, and the pain in her eyes tore at his heart even as it pissed him off. “I don’t know.” She picked up her tote and headed toward the door. “I have to go.”
Sam watched Autumn leave, and it was one of the hardest things he’d ever forced himself to do. Over the sound of Conner’s movie, he heard the garage door shut down the hal . He loved her. He wanted a life with her. But he didn’t know if it was going to happen, and he didn’t know what to do. He moved up the stairs, past Conner lying on the couch with a remote in one hand. “Can you turn down that TV?” he asked as he moved into the kitchen
The sound faded, and he opened the refrigerator. “Thank you.” Al of his life, he’d fought hard for everything. He’d fought and, most of the time, he’d eventual y won. He was dogged that way, but he wasn’t so sure he could win Autumn. She was an immovable force. Stubborn as hel , and he didn’t know if he had enough fight left in him to change her mind.
He took out a bottle of water and twisted off the top. The telephone hooked to the wal rang until it went to voice mail. Maybe he should just walk away. He wanted a future with her, but maybe there was too much damage for her to ever get over it. Maybe he should just get out now before he sank himself even further. Until he choked and went under completely.
The telephone immediately rang again. He was angry. If he was a violent man, he’d go kick the living shit out of someone. If he hadn’t just returned from the injured list, he might ram his head through the wal . The telephone kept ringing, a nagging annoyance snapping his control. He walked across the floor and glanced at the cal er identification. Normal y, he would have just picked up the receiver and slammed it back down. Instead he picked up. “Hel o?”
“You have a col ect cal ,” the automated voice said, “from…
