Page 37 of Chasing his Ex

And I want to scream at everyone in the room; they made her feel like crap, and she’s the one apologizing.

“I’m tired, Mommy,” Emmy says, and I want to pull her into my arms and cuddle her. My heart beats loud, seeing Ava sweep her up in her arms.

Her arms embracing her, never letting her go.

And I know Ava and Emmy are all I want in my life.

I hated her for hiding her from but I love her for everything else.

I never stopped loving her.

I want her.

I need her and my daughter in my life.

I’m in love with her, always have been and always will be. She makes me crazy; she makes me do things I would never have done. But she’s my forever.

She has always been mine, and I have always been hers.

How do I get her to believe it?

Chapter 18

Ava

Emmy’s head rests on my shoulder, her mouth at my neck. I hold my hand against her upper back and the other to keep her legs locked around my waist as she drifts off to sleep.

I stand and dance slowly with her in my arms as everybody talks around us. If anyone is talking to me, I wouldn’t have a clue. This is an important part of my day, saying goodnight to my baby before she goes to sleep.

But it’s the conversation about death that beats me up inside. I push my face into Emmy’s neck as memories flood back.

I’m sitting in a pew, staring forward as Dad clasps one hand, and I feel bereft my mom isn’t holding the other.

She can’t.

It’s her coffin laid on the table near the front altar of the church. My tears silently flow down my cheeks. Stella is loud with her sobs. Dad sits in silence, too stunned for tears. It’s too hard to look at his face; I try to keep my gaze ahead. And afterwards, when relatives squeeze my sister and me, telling us everything will be fine and slapping a hand over my father’s back.

But it never is.

He gets sadder, the pain in his eyes never disappearing. The quiet is the worst; he’s lost his soulmate and doesn’t know how he will survive.

And now it isn’t only hard to talk about my mother because of her death, but because my father is slowly dying inside.

His heart is buried with her.

I watch Emily loop her arm around Gaston’s lower back; they look at each other with an adoring smile. I can’t do anything to destroy that now. She needs nothing but joy in her life.

But the digs at me for not letting Finn into Emmy’s life really hit a deep, grating nerve.

I turn, kissing the side of my daughter’s face. Finn is staring at me, and my heart roars. It’s the same as he always used to look at me, the same heat in his eyes as the day in the elevator.

“Can I take her?” Finn says, holding his arms out. I’m sad that it’s only Emmy he wants in his life. But, at the same time, I’m glad she finally has a father she can call her own. “Just a little cuddle while she’s asleep.”

I smile and stand next to him, holding her body as he gently eases her from me. He holds her in the same way I do. Emmy sleepily opens her eyes. “Mommy,” she whispers.

“It’s okay, sweetpea, I’m here, but Daddy is holding you.”

There’s a brief murmur, and I see as she holds him tighter, then falls back to sleep. I turn away, trying for Finn not to see the tears. It’s too much, the love he has for her, the hate I have for myself and his father for not giving him that chance.

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