Page 68 of This Wild Heart

Something devastating happened when you found yourself in a position where you couldn’t trust your own judgment. It led to questions. To doubts. My entire life, I’d been a decisive person. I knew what I wanted, and it wasn’t hard to jump straight into whatever that was.

For years, I stopped jumping. I stopped acting when I should have taken a step forward. There were always reasons. We could always justify our choices at the moment. That was the easy part, telling yourself a story about why you acted the way you did. And as long as you weren’t hurting anyone, then it was simplified further. It didn’t require nearly as much self-reflection.

But each small internal shift chipped away at something fundamental until you could hardly recognize who you’d become. I wanted to shove that truth into a locked box too, keep it out of reach so I didn’t have to try to answer all those hard questions.

Doubts, to someone like me, felt a little bit like failure. If I couldn’t trust my own gut instinct, what then? It felt like I never would again.

Should I have knocked some sense into him when the baby showed up? Maybe. Maybe not.

Should I have let him take me to bed? Unlikely. Not if I wanted to come out of this with my heart intact. The questions, the doubts, the second-guessing, it was endless like I was running on one of those hamster wheels that never really got me anywhere.

Kiss him. Don’t kiss him. Give him space. Figure him out. Figuring him out was one short freaking step away from trying to help. To fix. And Parker Wilder wasn’t mine to fix, but it was hard to remember that when he looked so lost.

But that haunted look, the lost look, theI know what you feel like from the insidelook didn’t mean he wasn’t capable of really pissing me off. Like now.

Unhooking my seat belt, I angled sideways, resting my knee on the console separating us. “You’re like Jekyll and Hyde,” I said. “One minute, you’re flirty and arrogant and using your”—I waved my hand at his face—“fuck-me eyes like a weapon.” Those eyes heated instantly, and I jabbed a finger in the air. “Yeah, see? That right there. Not the time, buddy, and I am not in the mood.”

He sighed, swiping a hand over his face. When the eyes were closed, I could breathe a little easier. “And then what? If that’s Jekyll, who’s Hyde?”

I sighed too, a matching sound laced with frustration. “You go all quiet. Broody. Intense. It’s like you’re walking around with a storm cloud parked right over your head, and if anyone stands in your proximity, a stray bolt of lightning will come shooting straight out and electrocute whoever gets too close.”

Parker’s eyebrow arched wryly. “That sounds like one of your drawings.”

My mouth fell open becausedammit, an idea unfurled almost immediately. “I … yeah, maybe. But that’s not the point.” I cursed under my breath, yanking my phone out of my purse. “Hang on, let me write that down.”

He smiled, so fucking smug, and yup, I wanted to smack him again. When I finished typing up a note in my phone, which I prayed made sense later, I set my phone down and gave him a pleading look.

“If we’re going to do this”—I gestured at the two mailboxes—“if we’re going to try to fool your entire family, I need to know when I’m getting one or the other. At your house? No problem. I can give you space and let you ignore your feelings all you want.”

“That’s not what I’m doing.” He had the gall to look offended. Like I hadn’t watched him do it almost daily since this whole little matrimony thing took over our lives.

“Whatever you say, husband.” It was the verbal equivalent of a patronizing littlepat, pat, paton the head, and based on the annoyed look in his eyes, he fucking knew it. “If you feel yourself shutting down, or it’s too much, maybe … maybe give me a sign. Or we could have a code or something.” His fingers drummed restlessly on the steering wheel, and I sat up straight. “Like that. Lay your hand on my leg or the back of my neck and tap three times.”

Parker gave me a dubious look. “You think that’s enough?”

“It’s something.” I pinched my eyes shut and struggled to find the right words. “With Leo showing up, we haven’t been able to talk about … about what happened yesterday.”

“I know.” He sighed. “I know we need to, it’s just?—”

“It’s a lot,” I finished.

He nodded.

“For me too,” I told him. “It’s not just us anymore. The simple business arrangement feels really freaking complicated, doesn’t it?”

Parker let out a huff of quiet laughter. “Yeah.” His eyes lingered on my face. “It was good, though, Anya. It was really fucking good. I hope you know that.”

Memories of him inside me made my skin tight and achy, and I let out a slow, unsteady breath. “It was,” I agreed. “But maybe …”

When my voice trailed off, he said the thing I didn’t really want to say. Today, at least, Parker was doing one of the hard things. “Maybe we shouldn’t.”

I could practically hear the incensed wail of my lady parts because they really,reallythought we should. But my head, and my heart, they hit the mute button on those baser desires really fucking quick.

“We’ll have to have some touching,” I told him. “In front of your family, at least.” Lord, I could hardly breathe through the sexual tension strung tight between us, and that muscle ticked in his jaw again, so he must have been feeling it too. “But look, at least we know we can sell them on our physical attraction, right?” His eyes dropped down to my mouth, back up a heartbeat later, and I pushed down the responding flip in my belly. I took a risk and grabbed his hand, moving it over to my thigh like we’d done at the photo shoot. “All the other stuff, though. Just give me a signal. I know this is a lot. Me and Leo and you’re trying to convince your family that you’re fine.” His hand tightened briefly, and that flip in my belly grew larger, hotter, far more dangerous. “But you’re not fine, and it’s obvious to anyone with working eyeballs. I can’t look like I’m just as lost as they are when you change masks.”

Parker’s eyes were searing, and I could practically see the words that he didn’t know how to say. His jaw tightened, and when it unclenched, he pushed his tongue into the side of his cheek. “They’re not masks,” he said in a ragged voice. “They both feel real. One is more like the old me. When everything was easy. And the other is, I don’t know, it’s just … sometimes I feel like there’s this invisible minefield in my chest. Someone says something, or I think something, and …” He settled his free hand over his heart, spreading his fingers wide. “And right here, it’s like a bomb goes off, and I can’t stop it.”

I knew that feeling. I knew it so damn well.

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