Total pages in book: 86
Estimated words: 85399 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 427(@200wpm)___ 342(@250wpm)___ 285(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 85399 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 427(@200wpm)___ 342(@250wpm)___ 285(@300wpm)
After twenty years, the cracks in Lauren Reed’s marriage are showing. She and her husband, Jack, feel more like roommates than a loving couple. What they have in common are two wonderful teenagers, Michael and Maddie, and the same wistful When did it all go wrong? Now that Lauren’s decided to get on with her life—alone—divorce is inevitable.
Not to the kids. They aren’t giving up so easily.
Michael and Maddie have conspired with their grandfather to bring everyone together for a vacation in the family’s favorite summer getaway, a rustic lakeside cabin in Story Brook, Ohio. Awkward? Yep. A little deceptive? Sure. But as far as traps go, Lauren and Jack agree—the meddlers couldn’t have set one that was more scenic or filled with so many bittersweet memories.
This trip is going to be life-changing for the whole family. Fourteen days of hope, heartbreak, and unexpected possibilities—like maybe falling in love all over again.
*************FULL BOOK START HERE*************
PROLOGUE
LAUREN
You promised me you’d come home tonight, Jack.”
Ice pelts the windows. It’s been a continuous assault on both the glass and my nerves—my very last one—for the past thirty-six hours. Fog paints a barrier between the inside of the kitchen and the snowy outside world as the electricity flickers. Again.
Cabin fever has officially settled in for the winter. The kids are in desperate need of time apart after being home from school for seven days in a row. I’m in desperate need of adult conversation, a moment of peace, and maybe a large glass of wine. But, by the looks of it, I won’t be getting any of those things tonight. Or ever.
“Jack?” I ask, gripping the phone entirely too hard.
“Lo, I’m sorry.”
“You said that last night and the night before that too.”
“I know, but—”
“Damn it, Jack.”
I grit my teeth, flexing my jaw so hard it aches.
I used to handle this better. For years, I lied to myself and said things would change. He’s putting food on the table. He’s keeping the electricity on—when it’s not storming. Jack is providing a great life for me and the kids.
It won’t always be this way.
“Do you even want to be here?” I ask. “Do you want to come home at all? Because it’s really starting to feel like I’m a roommate that’s taking care of my part of the rent over here and not your wife.”
“What the hell? What do you want me to do, Lauren? What choice do I have? I’m working my ass off for you and our kids, and you call me and act like I’m—what? Out here having fun?”
I laugh, the tone edged in as much anger as his voice is in frustration. What choice do you have? A lot more of them than I do. “Well, I happened to catch your social media post this afternoon. Let’s just say your lunch at the wings place was a hell of a lot more fun than mine. I had cold chicken nuggets because the kids started fighting and Maddie knocked over a glass of lemonade that I had to clean up.”
“The guy I was with—I built two of his cars. Superchargers, carbon fiber—all of it. He spent a shit ton of money in the shop this past year and probably single-handedly paid our mortgage payments. What was I supposed to say? ‘No, I can’t go to lunch with you because it’ll piss off my wife’?”
I pace the kitchen, struggling to keep my voice down. The last thing I want is for the kids to hear me shout at their father. Again. But the fact that I don’t even have the luxury to express my own damn emotions in my own damn house compounds my frustration with . . . my life.
I’m not pissed he’s having lunch with a customer. I’m resentful that I don’t have a life outside these walls.
“Maybe,” I say, working hard to stay calm. “I mean, I would’ve worded it differently. Something like, ‘I would love to go to lunch with you, but I haven’t been home for dinner in a month. So I’m going to pass so I can get out of here before my family is asleep for once.’ But, you know, that would mean that you wanted to come home.”
“Will you fucking stop it?”
I gasp. “No, I won’t fucking stop it. I am so . . .”
I search for the right word.
My bones ache and my eyelids are heavy. Sleep sounds as nice as the haircut I desperately need. But I’m too exhausted for either one.
“I’m tired. Lonely.” My bottom lip quivers, and that frustrates me more. “I miss you.”
He sighs.
My heart sinks even further.
I stare at the picture next to the cookie jar sitting on the windowsill. Jack has an arm around me and another around our daughter, Maddie. Michael stands next to his father with a goofy grin on his face. We look so happy, so comfortable. So much like a family.
When did things change? When did we stop being that and start being . . . I look around the dark, empty kitchen. This?
It’s a question that’s been licking at my subconscious for weeks now.
The first time it entered my mind, I was crying in the shower at midnight. I had been up since five that morning hustling Michael off to a wrestling tournament, sat in the bleachers for nine hours to watch him on the mats for a total of thirteen minutes, and coordinated with my best friend, Billie, to get Maddie picked up from cheer camp, since the tournament had run late. A red blister had formed on my forearm from trying to fry chicken for dinner—a dinner that no one ate—and the back of my ankle was raw from the trash can scraping it as I hauled it to the road for pickup. In the midst of it all, I realized I’d forgotten to pick up chocolate to finish the dessert I had to make for the grand opening of Jack’s new auto shop location the next morning.