Find Me--Part One by Michelle Mankin

Author:Michelle Mankin [Mankin, Michelle]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Finding Me Series
Publisher: Michelle Mankin
Published: 2015-09-04T16:00:00+00:00

I SLEPT INSIDE for the first time. I wanted to linger between the sheets that smelled like citrus and the ocean. I doubted there would be another time with Johnny. His eyes had been so guarded when he had kissed me on the forehead and slid out of bed at dawn.

But eventually caffeine beckoned. I showered, drank a cup of coffee and ventured out on the deck. A swift sharp pang of loss hit me in the midsection, doubling me over when I confirmed what I had feared. His sailboat was gone.

It’s okay, Annabelle, I told myself. We shared the best day of my life and a night of mutual pleasure. Glorious, mind-blowing pleasure. But it was over. This was the way his generation operated if current film and fiction were to be believed. Hook up and move on. I had been foolish to say yes. Sex was too emotionally connected for me.

Too bad the one who wore the matching band to mine didn’t feel the same way.

Sad for me that I got carried away by the dream of another.

I did some washing. There wasn’t a washer or dryer, so I made due with the sink and hung my wet clothes on a line on the side of the house. I went for a run, jogging all the way down the hill to where the road ended past dozens of other villas tucked into the lush, tropical foliage, invisible from my apartment. I had to briefly pause and run in place on the way back to let a large iguana lumber across the road.

Once back at the villa, I showered for the second time and then called to check on my boys. They were in good hands. They loved Claire. She watched JoJo with them and let them order an extra pizza so that they could eat it for leftovers in their school lunches the next day.

“Hey, Belle. How are you?”

“I’m fine.” I twirled a curl around my finger, staring out at the water, telling myself to stop looking for his boat.

“You don’t sound fine.”

“Just homesick for the boys, I guess.”

“Hmm. Did you make any decisions yet?”

“No.” I knew the one she wanted me to make. She wanted me to leave Charles immediately. From the very beginning of our friendship, it had almost seemed as if she had a built-in dislike of him even though he was totally indifferent to her. What if I did leave him? What about my boys? They needed their father, though he traveled so much nowadays searching for new talent that they rarely saw him. How would I provide for them? My prenup with Charles was pretty restrictive. If I left him now, I would get some kind of settlement and child support for CJ who would still be at home two more years but that wouldn’t pay tuition for a university education for Trent. Asking for help from my parents was out of the question. Cooper, my brother, had enough problems of his own after coming home from his last tour in Iraq.

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