LITMIR.BIZ

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Only in my dreams can I imagine how adorable our kids are going to be.” Nuzzling her neck, he’d follow up with, “Any idea how soon we can expect to be expecting?” And toward the end of their marriage, “Come on, Candy Cane. I’m just asking for a couple of kids. How bad could they be?”

      Candy swallowed hard, watching through watery eyes as the only man she’d ever loved sauntered to the fridge.

      Head inside, giving her an entirely too attractive view of his tight, jeans-clad derriere, he said, “I’m hungry, woman. What’s to eat around here besides—” he pulled out a jar, squinting at the label “—mini-gherkins?”

      Hurriedly wiping at a stray tear, she said, “Ketchup or mustard. Take your pick.”

      “You need to go to the store. This is no way to live.”

      “Ordinarily, I’d say you’re right, but in case you forgot, I’m leaving for Peru in six days, so there’s not much need for stocking up.”

      He closed the fridge, eyed the now soggy bag of fries. “Wanna order a pizza?”

      “Nah, let’s save money and play food scavenger hunt.”

      “Why? There’s no need to save money.”

      “For you, maybe.”

      “Candy,” Jake said, softening his tone. “Half of everything Galaxy Sports has ever made is sitting in an account with your name on it. Why won’t you use it?”

      “Simple, because I don’t want your money.”

      “It’s our money. Dad gave that business to me and you on our first anniversary. Remember? The divorce papers say all profits are to be split fifty/fifty.”

      “For the last time, Jake, please listen. Thank you for the offer. It’s sweet—beyond sweet. But really, I don’t want or need it. Give the money to charity. Send a few kids to college.” She turned her back on him, knotting her arms across her chest.

      “More than a few kids. We’re talking millions of dollars, Candy.”

      “Oh, so is that the going rate for a woman’s heart?”

      “What’s that supposed to mean?”

      She spun around to face him. “What do you think it means? Sure, we fought a lot about how you wanted kids, but beyond that, Galaxy Sports also contributed to our marriage falling apart. Because you started caring more about proving to your dad how good you were at selling everything from footballs to fishing poles than you ever cared about being my husband.”

      “Wrong. If memory serves me correctly, you spent an awful lot of time at Candy Kisses, too. What was I supposed to do, turn caveman and drag you home? The more I thought about it, the more I realized maybe you’d never wanted to be my wife.”

      “That’s not true,” she said, her voice a raspy whisper. She swallowed hard, fighting still more tears clinging to the corners of her eyes. “You know why I asked for a divorce. It was about kids, Jake. Your obsessive need for them. I told you I couldn’t have them, but you wouldn’t listen. You knew I could never be a mom. You knew it, yet you kept bringing up the subject—despite the fact that you also knew how much it hurt me to let you go.”

      “Let me go?” He laughed. “More like booted me out the door.”

      “Argh, this is just like you, you stubborn—Never mind. Evidently my reasons don’t matter any more now than they did ten years ago.”

      “What reasons? That’s just it. You never gave me any. I could live without having kids, what I couldn’t live without was love, Candy. And let’s face it, when that last year went by with us living like strangers, what was I supposed to think? And when you filed for divorce…Well, I know I can be thick-headed, but it wouldn’t have taken a jackhammer to pound the fact into me that at that point you pretty much didn’t give a damn about me or our marriage.”

      “That’s where you’re wrong.” She aimed her index finger in the direction of his chest, ignoring the release of ten years’ worth of hot tears. “I—I would have done anything for you. That’s how much I used to love you, Jake. I loved you so much that I set you free. I couldn’t give you kids, so I set you free to have them with another woman. That’s how much I loved you—not Candy Kisses—you.”

      “Jeez.” He slashed his fingers through his hair and haltingly approached her before going for broke and crushing her in a hug. “Oh, man, Candy. What a mess we made of things, huh?”

      She nodded against his warm, oh-so-solid chest. Being back in his arms felt so good, so right, as if she’d finally come home. Too bad that home was just a dream. The fairy tale the two of them once shared could never be recreated.

      Those once-idyllic days had been back when they were lovesick teens. Married at eighteen, only a month after their high school graduation, their marriage lasted a whole five years. At first, it’d been idyllic. With both of them working long hours in their respective family businesses, they hadn’t given a thought to the future aside from what time they’d next make love. For nearly twelve months, that had been enough, but then Jake had wanted more.

      The total package—meaning kids.

      He knew what kind of mother she’d had. The whole town knew the sad cliché of poor little Candy Jacobs’s mother running off—never to be seen again—with a traveling carpet company rep she’d met at the interior design shop where she worked.

      Even before that, though, Valerie Jacobs could hardly have been nominated for mother of the year. She didn’t bake cookies, read bedtime stories or attend school plays. She never cooed over scribbled drawings or A-plus spelling tests, and she certainly never braided her daughter’s hair or shopped hand in hand for the perfect Easter dress. Not that any of that would have even mattered to Candy had she provided the one thing every child craved above all else—love.

      No, the worst thing about Valerie Jacobs was that she’d been devoid of feelings for anyone but herself—oh, and of course, for her lovers.

      Candy’s dad had tried making up for her mother’s shortcomings with occasional pats on the head and hugs, but he was always busy at work, trying to keep her mother in the finery that only occasionally made her smile.

      Years after the fact, Candy had learned that the man her mom had finally run off with hadn’t even been her first affair.

      When her father died of a heart attack three days after Valerie’s abandonment, no one had been surprised. They’d just amended the gossip to include the fact that “that Jacobs woman” had quite literally broken her husband’s heart.

      When Candy’s grandfather had taken her in, life had been a little sweeter. But the little girl who eventually grew up never forgot the kind of emptiness that lurked inside. After all, half of her blood was Valerie’s, which meant she was destined by DNA to be just as wretched a wife and mom. The only question was when the time bomb ticking inside her would finally go off.

      Jake had known all about Candy’s mother. What he hadn’t known—because she’d never told him—was that Candy had no intention of repeating her mother’s mistakes. When Jake began pressuring her to have kids, Candy realized she had already made one disastrous error in ever daring to dream she’d make a good wife. Hurting herself and Jake had been one thing. But her most sacred vow, no matter what, she wouldn’t break. And that was to never, ever become a mother herself. No child deserved the lonely life she’d once led.

      Jake softly stroked her hair, so softly that had Candy been a cat, she would have flopped onto her back and purred. Problem was, she wasn’t a cat. She was a flesh-and-blood woman who needed to get on with life.

      Life without Jake.

      Jake stiffened when Candy pulled away.

      After sniffling, she said, “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to go all emotional on you. What I meant to say is that if you’d like a pizza, since I’m tonight’s hostess, I’ll buy.”

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