A clammy feeling attacked her appendages as she sat lounging by the pool with a book on yet another stunning Caribbean day while her husband worked in the office. She was terrified. A powerful voice inside her couldn’t help pointing out the parallels with her mother and father’s relationship. It would only ever be Coburn for her. Did her weakness for a womanizer like her husband make her as much a victim of the cult of Coburn as her mother was for her father?
The realist in her knew she was risking her heart. The optimist was sure her husband felt more for her than he was willing to admit and they could build on that.
Coburn finally made an appearance as the late-afternoon shadows chased each other across the surface of the pool. He wore the same distracted, aloof look he’d sported for days now, this new foreign version of her husband that eluded her attempts to reach him. Always with Coburn there had been emotion, whether positive or negative throughout their roller-coaster highs and lows. He was an extrovert, a man who needed to express himself as much as she needed to crawl inside herself at times.
She swam toward the edge of the pool and clutched the side, studying the tension etched in his face.
“I thought you were going to be in there all day.”
“I’m sorry. There’s a lot going on.” His gaze singed her skin as it moved over her curves in the coral bikini. “You’re burning.”
She looked down at her shoulders. They were a bit pink. Coburn offered her a hand and pulled her out of the pool. She bit her lip as he wrapped a towel around her. “You could share, you know.”
“I won’t distract you from the choices you need to make.”
She lifted her chin to look up at him. “I’m willing to give this a shot, Coburn. I’m willing for us to give this a shot. But this is it. We make it work this time or we walk away. I grew up in a war zone between my father and mother, and I won’t put a child through that.”
The tense line of his mouth slackened. “And you are going to let me in? Trust me?”
She nodded. “I am committed to making this work. But I won’t give up my job. A huge issue in our relationship was not being able to give for the other person’s needs. I want to be there for my child, but I’m not prepared to put my career on hold until they’re in school. My skills would never recover from it.”
A war went on in that dark blue gaze of his. “Nonnegotiable,” she underscored.
“You don’t trust me. You don’t trust us.”
“It’s not about trust. It’s about my identity, what I love doing. I need to practice.”
He tucked the towel tight around her and let go. “All right. We compromise.” His gaze held hers. “We’ve screwed up a lot of things, Diana, but I promise you we will not screw this up. It’s too important.”
Their marriage had been important, too. She forced herself to nod before the panic rising up in her throat enveloped her. “I know.”
He inclined his head. “Arthur is back. He’s invited us to dinner tonight with some friends. Are you up for it?”
Her mouth curved. “So you’ll let me loose now that I’ve fallen into line?”
He moved his gaze over her. “I’d prefer to indulge myself on a whole other level and forget the socializing entirely. But since Arthur is a good friend, it will have to wait.”
* * *
Her insides were still vibrating from her husband’s clear indication of exactly where their relationship was going in short order as Diana dressed for dinner with the Kents. She didn’t know why she was so nervous to embark on a physical relationship with Coburn again. She’d done it that night at his apartment when they’d conceived their child. But this time it was about walking into it with her heart open. Fully invested. She felt as if she was twenty miles out in that sea sparkling outside her window and being told to swim for her life.
She pressed clammy palms to the soft, clingy fabric of her dress. Its sea-blue color reminded her of her husband’s eyes—rich and endlessly fascinating.
Coburn was waiting for her on the terrace when she arrived, ridiculously handsome in a white shirt and dark trousers. His eyes as they ate her up suggested her nerves were highly warranted. Measuring, calculating, they swept over every curve of her body in the sexy dress, lingering on the swell of her newfound cleavage with an uncensored appreciation that made her knees wobbly.
Her steps slowed as she approached him, hesitation written in every line of her body.
His gaze moved back up to her face. Cataloged what he found there. “You look...devastating.”