Chapter 182

Tyler nodded, his gaze never leaving Lexi's face. “I’ll take care of her.”

She didn’t need anyone to take care of her. If she’d taken care of herself in the first place, none of this would be happening.

Her father nodded and stepped close to give her a hug. “I love you, pumpkin.” His voice dropped. “Please don’t do anything drastic. Not right now.”

Lexi kissed her father's cheek. “Thanks for driving me home, dad.”

Sending Tyler a glance, her father left the room and headed down the hall. Lexi picked up her spatula and began stirring the rapidly thickening glob again.

“You should be in bed.”

She ignored his attempts to take the spatula away from her and slid the bowl farther down the counter away from him, adjusting her position in the process. “The doctor said the soreness would lessen if I moved around.”

“I doubt they meant for you to do it as soon as you stepped out the hospital doors—early, I might add. Do you know how I felt when we realized you were gone?”

“Sorry.” She glanced up at him from beneath her lashes and noticed his suit. “You shouldn’t have come. I’m fine. You walked out on your meeting, didn’t you? You said it was very important. You need to fly back tonight. That way you can have it tomorrow.”

Tyler stared at her and fought for patience, incredulous. They were surrounded by a good six dozen muffins and she was fine?

“I mean, the baby’s gone.”

“Sweetheart, come here.”

“So I was thinking,” she continued determinedly, “since it’s the only reason we got married, there’s no reason for us to stay married anymore.”

Shock poured through him. “Lexi—”

“We’ve barely been married two months, and most of it has been spent apart. Phone calls and chats don’t really count, you know?” She poured the mix into muffin pans, acting like they were discussing something as inane as the weather, and set the bowl aside. “Your lawyer can handle it without a lot of fuss.”

“Handle what?” He had to hear her say it.

“Our divorce.”

She said it without any hesitation. Just like that. A part of him wondered how she could be so cold and unfeeling, so detached, but when she lifted her hand to her chest and rubbed hard, he focused on the bright red hives. She wasn’t as blasé about this as she wanted to be. She was scared and sad and trying to stay on her feet even though she’d been kicked.

He reminded himself that Lexi had not only lost the baby, but crashed her car, had a medical procedure performed, a slight concussion and was probably still medicated. She wasn’t thinking straight. It didn’t make her words any less painful, though.

“We can talk about this in the morning.”

“What’s to talk about? There’s no reason to be married now.”

No reason? He loved her for gods sake. The words came out gruff because his chest was so tight, but he cleared his throat and tried again. “There is a reason to stay married, Lexi. I love you.”

She wouldn’t look at him. “I’m sorry. The baby’s gone, Tyler.”

“Our vows haven’t changed.”

She grabbed the muffin pan and yanked the stove door open, sliding it onto the racks with a clatter.

“Lexi, it’s okay to be sad. It’s okay to cry. We lost something precious tonight.”

Her gaze lifted to his, completely dry. “We lost something that wasn’t meant to be. Haven’t you figured that out yet? I didn’t want to be pregnant in the first place. I told you it was a mistake. Why would I cry?”

Despite the sight of her obvious pain, the words sent shock waves through him. It was one thing to be cold, another to be cruel. “Don’t say things like that. You’ll regret them later.”

“Just stating a fact.”

“A fact? You said you liked the name Gabriella for a girl or Gabe for a boy.”

She set the timer on the stove, her hands quaking. “And now it doesn’t matter. The reason why we got married is gone. It’s over, Tyler. How many times and ways do I have to say it? The only reason that pregnancy happened in the first place was because I didn't want to marry Victor. You know that and yet you’re still trying to twist the truth into some romantic fantasy when it was sex, simple as that.”

Lexi washed the mixing bowl in the sink, her whole body moving because she scrubbed it so hard.

“Sweetheart, that's not true.”

She stilled, her hands in the sudsy water, her body tense and tight, her eyes clear but bleak. “And everything happens for a reason. You said so,” Lexi pulled her hands from the sink and dried them with a towel. “We kidded ourselves into thinking we could make it work, but this is proof that it was never meant to be. I told you it wouldn't last.”

“You’re wrong.”

“I’m right. You know I’m right.”

He moved toward her, wished she’d let him hold her. They could get through this together if she’d just let him try. “Just because things are tough right now—just because the baby didn’t make it—that doesn’t mean we have to give up on each other.”

“What are we giving up on? How does a person give up on something they never believed in in the first place?”

“I believed in it, in us.”

Lexi laughed. Laughed. And it was her laughter that finally got through to him. Tyler stared at her and grew angrier with the sound. He felt like a fool. Was it all a fantasy in his head? A game he couldn’t win?

“Tyler, you know me. When the going gets tough? I get going. That's the truth. We were never supposed to go this far. We should have stayed friends. We thought this attraction was something to build a family on and we were wrong. It was a mistake.”

A hot flush rose in him. She was striking out, hurting. He was hurting, too.

“What we had was a few fun weeks that life just shattered all to hell. We were playing at marriage, playing at being a family but…it wasn’t real.”

She made her way to the door, slow but with measured, decisive steps. “Go home to Olkfield, file for divorce and sign the papers as soon as you get them.” She held his gaze, not so much as a flicker of regret in her eyes.

“Goodbye, Tyler.”