BWWM Interracial Romance 3: Family Heart (7 page)

“What did you need to meet with the accountant for?” Jessica asked, trying to keep her voice level. She wanted to pounce on the subject that filled her mind with shrieking, shrill anger, but knew better than to immediately start screaming at the man she loved—even if he was doing her wrong.

“He wanted to go over the numbers again—both for the taxes and for the purpose of hiring a few more people to the company.” That was a reasonable answer—but it didn’t satisfy Jessica. She couldn’t get the image of Rosanna visiting Logan at his office out of her mind.

“Someone mentioned that you’ve been spending a lot of time with your ex-wife,” Jessica finally said, steeling herself as the anger and betrayal surged through her. “Do you have anything to say about that?” There was a pause on the other end of the line, and in Logan’s silence, Jessica’s heart pounded, her blood roaring in her ears.

“Rosanna and I have a kid together, Jess,” he said, and the reasonable tone of his voice was like coal on the fires of Jessica’s blossoming rage. “I don’t see how it’s anyone’s business how much time I spend around her—but we have to spend a certain amount of time together for Zachary’s good.” Jessica clenched her teeth, feeling the acid and tequila creeping up from her stomach, making her queasy.

“If you weren’t doing anything you thought you needed to hide, you’d have mentioned it to me yourself, instead of letting me deal with people gossiping!” she heard her voice starting to go high and shrill, and while she knew she might wake her mother up, Jessica couldn’t quite bring herself to care. “It’s my business how much time you spend with your ex-wife, because I’m—I’m your girlfriend, even if you don’t want to commit to me. Well guess what, Logan? You don’t have to commit. I’m through with you.” She heard Logan sputtering but didn’t wait for him to say anything in objection or rebuttal. Jessica hit the button to end the call and threw her phone blindly onto the bedside table, turning over onto her stomach as the first sobs began to wrack her body.

Logan stared off into space while the video played on his TV; for the moment, Zachary was transfixed. Ever since Jessica had called him and broken up with him, Logan had found it difficult to focus on the things he used to love doing with his son. It gave him a guilty feeling—after all, Zachary was supposed to be his greatest joy in life—and he was still present for the important things like making sure his son ate healthy meals, and checking his homework. But Logan couldn’t quite work up the enthusiasm that he used to feel in playing with the five-year-old. A few days earlier, with Jessica’s phone call still fresh in his mind, Zachary had asked him what had happened to the lady friend he was seeing. Logan had explained his dates with Jessica to his son as casually as possible, only saying that he had a new friend who was a lady, and that he liked spending time with her—and maybe Zachary would get to meet her soon.

“Well, she and I had a bit of a fight,” Logan had told Zachary over dinner. “You’ve had fights with friends before, right?” Zachary had nodded solemnly.

“But if you had a fight, why can’t you just apologize? What did you do to make her mad?” Logan had chuckled at his son’s insight.

“It’s kind of complicated, Zac. But I can’t apologize just yet, because she won’t talk to me.” Logan had tried to call Jessica back—both that night and in the days since—but she never took his calls. He had given up on the idea after a handful of attempts; he might miss her, he might feel miserable without her in his life, and he might even be determined to explain, but he was not going to put himself out on a limb and beg her to listen to him if she’d already made up her mind.

As Zachary chanted along with the “spell” that was going on in the movie, Logan wondered who he was most frustrated with: Rosanna, himself, or Jessica. His mind had settled on a different source of irritation every time he had thought about the situation. He didn’t know if Rosanna really wanted to get back together—if she realized, really and truly, what had contributed to their breakup and wanted to try again with those lessons learned—or if he was just kidding himself. He didn’t know if Jessica had been so determined to break up with him because of her embarrassment over the gossip among their friends, or if she was just being over-sensitive to the fact that he had to spend a certain amount of time with Rosanna as the mother of his child. And he wasn’t sure what he really wanted; there was something so comfortable, so seemingly virtuous about spending time with Zachary’s mother—with the woman who had been his wife. It was a salve to his ego for Rosanna to be so interested in spending time with him, after the way their marriage had ended.

There was a knock at his door when the movie was almost over, and Logan stirred himself to answer it, knowing that Zachary was too wrapped up in the story to even notice. Logan disentangled himself from the five-year-old boy’s grip and walked quickly to the door. Without even looking through the peep hole, he opened it. Rosanna was on the other side, beaming broadly, a mess of takeout bags in hand. “I thought you might like a night of no meal prep,” she said, holding up the bags. Zachary leaped from the couch at the sound of his mother’s voice.

“Mom! Mom!” Zachary wrapped his arms around Rosanna’s legs. “Can we start the movie over?” he asked his father. Logan sighed, but smiled, taking the bags from his ex-wife and stepping back to let her into the house.

“Sure we can, Bud. Let’s get our food on plates and we can all watch it again.” Zachary danced with excitement; Logan rarely let him eat in the living room, insisting that meals should be at the kitchen table. It was a special occasion when Zachary could eat and watch TV at the same time. Amongst the bags of fried chicken, slaw, baked beans, and macaroni and cheese, Rosanna had also included a couple of bottles of chilled white wine. Logan felt a stab of suspicion, but got a couple of glasses down and poured for them both.

Zachary sat on the floor a few feet away from the TV, while Logan and Rosanna took the couch, sipping their wine and eating the takeaway food. Logan wondered why Rosanna was there; he was grateful for the meal, but it was strange for her to show up. As he finished his plate, Logan realized that Rosanna had been showing up more and more; she’d stopped by his office the week before, unannounced, after everyone else had gone home—supposedly to get information about Zachary’s upcoming school play, but she had lingered. Stuffed with his favorite foods, Zachary dozed off on the floor; Logan decided to let the movie run through anyway, and picked up his plate and Rosanna’s to take them into the kitchen.

His ex-wife followed him. Rosanna sat down at the table and put her glass in front of her, wordlessly asking for a refill. Logan poured, sitting across from her as a matter of habit. “What brings you out?” Logan asked levelly, glancing at her face but not holding her gaze for more than a moment. Rosanna shrugged.

“Can’t I just want to spend time with my son?” Logan sucked on his front teeth, taking a sip of his own wine and sitting back in his chair.

“I suppose; but why wouldn’t you have called beforehand?” Rosanna laughed.

“Well it’s not like I’m a stranger—I used to be your wife. Besides, I didn’t think you had any real plans since you broke up with that girl.” Logan felt a surge of irritation.

“She broke up with me, and that’s a fact. And it’s at least in part because of how much time I’ve been spending with you.” Rosanna’s bright eyes flickered with an emotion Logan didn’t quite catch.

“So you have been spending time with me—not just for Zachary’s sake.” Logan sighed, scrubbing at his face. This was not the conversation he’d wanted to have.

“Look; you and I have history, there’s no denying it,” he said. “And I need to get along with you for Zac’s sake. But I don’t know if you’ve changed. Things weren’t right at the end of our marriage, and I don’t know if you even care what went wrong between us.” Rosanna’s face fell into a deep frown.

“I’ve been trying to get you to understand, you big idiot!” she said, barely keeping her voice down—neither of them wanted to wake Zachary for what could be a fight. “I want you. I feel bad about what I did, but can you really blame me? Yes, I cheated on you. I wasn’t ready to be a good little wife and mother. But you weren’t exactly fast to reassure me that I hadn’t gone boring, either.” Logan shook his head, frustration mounting inside of his mind, though he let her speak. “I’m sorry I cheated on you, and I’m sorry I wasn’t the wife and mother you wanted me to be for Zac. But you know good and damned well that you want me, and I want you. We can make this work if you’ll make up your mind to it.” Logan took another sip of his wine and tried to think of what he wanted—and what he wanted to say.

Jessica ran her fingers through her hair and sat back in the driver’s seat of her car. It was as if she had a headache—but there was no actual pain, no physical sensation that she would pin her low sense of misery on. She closed her eyes; there was no use in denying it. She was miserable because of the way she had broken up with Logan—not even giving him a chance to explain. She knew that she should have at least given him an opportunity. She had been so angry, so humiliated and insecure, that she had just ended things without even thinking about what could have been going on in Logan’s life. Jessica ran her fingers through her hair again, feeling a cringe of guilt for how she had spoken to the man she loved. She had never thrown angry words at Evan the way she had at Logan—she had always given her former lover a chance to speak.

Jessica realized that she wasn’t very far from Logan’s house, and decided that she would go there. It might not relieve the ache in her mind at how things had gone wrong between them, but it was something that she could do. Jessica wondered if Logan was even at home—if he was with Zachary. Jessica steeled herself as she drove, telling herself that under no circumstances would she cause a scene. She would stop off at Logan’s house, ask to speak with him—assuming he was home—and give him a chance to explain.

Jessica’s mind was full of her plans. She rehearsed what she would say over and over again. “Logan, I’m sorry I went off on you,” she said out loud in the car as she drove past the Astrodome. “I wanted to give you a chance to explain—because I know I didn’t give you the chance before.” Words flowed through her mind and past her lips as the car moved through traffic. She was going to be calm; she was going to give him an opportunity. She was too miserable to move on without the chance to know just what had been going on in Logan’s mind. Jessica knew also that she had to know if Logan was just as miserable as she was; if he had moved on just fine, Jessica thought, if he was already dating someone else, then she would have justification for being bitter towards him, for putting him out of her life altogether.

Jessica was so focused on her task that as she pulled into the driveway at Logan’s house, she barely noticed the second car—and even noticing it, she didn’t think of the significance. She walked up to his front door, wishing absently that she had taken the time to go home and change into something nicer, maybe put on a little makeup; but there was no time for that now, she told herself firmly. She knocked on the door, taking a deep breath. “Dad! Mom! There’s someone at the door!” Jessica heard a sleepy, young voice on the other side of the door. Zachary was home, then. And—her mind fastened on the fact that the young voice had said ‘mom.’ Rosanna was there. Jessica briefly debated making a run for it. This had been a bad idea from the start; she should have called Logan first.

But before she could put her apprehension into action, the door was opening, and Logan was in front of her. “Jessica,” he said, his eyes widening at the sight of her. Jessica pressed her lips together.

“I came over to talk to you,” she said, her whole body feeling slightly numb. “But I can see this was a bad time.” Logan glanced over his shoulder and closed the door behind him.

“No, I can talk,” he said. Jessica noticed that while he was clean and well-dressed, there was a slight puffiness around his eyes, a drawn look to his face that implied that all was not well.

“I—I wanted to give you a chance to explain,” Jessica said, taking a deep breath to control the trembling that started in her hands and knees. Logan licked his lips.

“That’s really nice of you,” he said. Jessica shook her head.

“No, this was a mistake. I shouldn’t have come here.” Jessica’s eyes stung and she knew that in a matter of moments she would begin crying—the last thing she wanted to do in front of Logan. She swallowed against the growing lump in her throat. Before she could continue and excuse herself, however, they were joined by Rosanna, who slipped through the door and closed it behind you.

“Oh, Logan—I thought you said that your girlfriend had dumped you,” the woman said, putting a hand on Logan’s shoulder. Jessica was briefly torn between growing rage bubbling up from her stomach and the miserable sadness that had prompted her to drop by Logan’s house; but her pride brought the anger to the surface.

“I was going to give you a chance to explain to me,” Jessica said, looking at Logan and paying no attention to Rosanna at all. “We had something good going, but I guess that wasn’t enough for you.” Logan was shaking his head, his dark eyes full of sadness and something like fear.

“Jessica, hold on—Rosanna just dropped by. Come on, you came to hear my side of things, so will you at least let me tell you my side of things?” In spite of her desire to ignore Rosanna, when the other woman spoke—hot on the heels of what Logan was saying—Jessica couldn’t help but look at her.

“What is your side of things, Logan? You’ve been spending all this time with me—are you saying you aren’t interested in getting back together and giving Zachary a stable home with two parents?” Logan brought his hands up to his head and combed his fingers through his hair, closing his eyes.

“Rosanna, this conversation has nothing to do with you; it’s between Jessica and me.” Rosanna shook her head.

“It has everything to do with me! I’m Zachary’s mother—I should have some say about who you bring into his life. And anyway, you said you were broken up with this girl.” Rosanna gestured absently at Jessica, almost ignoring her, her expression full of contempt. Logan’s brown eyes flashed with anger.

“You are not my wife; you have no say about whom I date.” Logan turned towards Jessica, holding her gaze. “Jessica, there’s been a lot going on,” he started. Jessica shook her head.

“What I see going on is your ex-wife isn’t through with you,” she told him, crossing her arms over her chest. “Are you done with her?” Logan hesitated.

“Jessica—she’s the mother of my child…” Jessica set her jaw.

“That’s not important to
our
relationship. What is important is whether you’re done with her for yourself. Are you?” Next to him, Rosanna had her arms crossed over her chest as well, her bright eyes glancing between Logan and Jessica.

“Yeah, Logan, are you done with me? Tell her the truth—tell me the truth.” Logan covered his face with his hands.

“I can’t deal with this right now,” he said, pulling his hands away and shaking his head. “Jessica, you were right—now isn’t a good time. But we will talk, if you still want to.” Jessica saw the pleading in his eyes and for a moment she felt sympathy for him—it was definitely an uncomfortable situation for Logan, even if it had been at least partially his own fault that he was in it.

“Fine,” Jessica said, turning on her heel and walking quickly to her car. She decided that she wasn’t going to wait up for him to call her, to try and explain—or to schedule a meeting where they could talk. She was just going to let him go. It had been a bad idea from start to finish, Jessica told herself as she rummaged in her purse for her keys, nearly dropping them in shaking hands. As she got into the car, she looked over her shoulder and saw Logan in intense conversation with his ex-wife; their voices were low enough that she couldn’t hear what they were saying to each other. Jessica quickly pulled out of the driveway and took a deep breath, restraining herself from speeding off the way that she wanted to, deep down. She wasn’t going to let some man—even one she had loved very much, even one who had hurt her—make her drive like a maniac and possibly kill herself. Jessica felt her eyes stinging with new tears and took another deep breath. If she could just hold it together until she got home, she thought, she would throw herself into a hot bath and cry her eyes out in privacy.