Page 80 of Push

“What if I do all that and still have doubts?”

“Talk to me. Yell at me. Send me a message. Anything you want. But please promise you’ll stop hurting yourself by reading whatever fantasy life Kayleigh’s inventing for herself.”

I knew Toby. The crease between his eyes, the bob of his Adam’s apple on each painful swallow, the sag of his proud shoulders—all genuine. He was upset. He spoke the truth. I couldn’t give him my heart, but I could agree to this one request.

I managed a nod.

“Yeah?” His expression brightened.

“I won’t check Kayleigh’s social media anymore.”

“That means a lot to me.” He lifted his gaze to the clouds, and he was quiet for a few minutes, lost in his thoughts. “Nothing’s ever easy these days, huh? I always thought we could make our problems disappear if we just loved each other enough. Pretty dumb, right?”

“Not dumb, Tobes. I thought the same thing.”

“It’s wrong, though. I love you more than Noah loves bananas, but we still have problems. Do you think…” Shaking his head, Toby stopped there.

I huffed a sigh. “We suck at this whole rebuilding trust business if you’re holding back already.”

“Stop being so stinking cute and hitting me with facts.” His shoulder bumped into mine. “I was going to ask if you think you could ever love me again.”

Letting the next words slip quietly from my mouth took a lot of courage. “I never stopped.”

He shuffled closer to me on the blanket. “Really?”

“I’m not sure I’ll ever be able to stop,” I admitted. “That’s why what you did still hurts so much.”

A helpless plea clouded Toby’s eyes. “What can Ido? Tell me. The only thing I want in the whole world is for us to be a family again. I’ll do anything if you’ll take me back.”

“Sometimes you can’tdoanything. There’s no magic gesture. No secret words. All I’ve ever wanted was for you to be there…to listen…and choose me.”

“Is that really enough?”

“Sometimes, that’severything.”

26

He Rejected the Girl

Toby

Zach pushed his glassesup his nose. He squinted at me like I was a tiny bug under a magnifying glass and not a six-foot-two dork in daggy running clothes.

“Mate, don’t take this the wrong way,” he said. “But you look like shit.”

I grunted a laugh. “Fair.” The bags under my eyes were hauling their own bags. “I haven’t been sleeping much.”

Or…at all.

Last night had been rough. So damn rough. The smack to my heart had come as a shock after such a perfect afternoon.

Gwen and I lazed around on the picnic blanket and put aside enough of our problems to talk.Reallytalk. She even laughed at a couple of my jokes. Did she know how that sound shot me into the tallest man in the world? Noah woke from his nap full of beans, and we laughed some more as he gummed his bananaand babbled a story I translated for Gwen—she was skeptical the dragon had been slain by a bottle of prosecco.

But family time had ended too soon.

And after I’d waved goodbye and the two most important people in my world drove home without me, I slumped in the driver’s seat, unable to move. Tears were impossible to fight.

I’d failed my wife.

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