A Valentine Kiss. Christy McKellen

       CHAPTER THREE

      THEY DROVE BACK to the house in silence.

      Jordan’s presence was already turning Mila’s life upside down. He reminded her of the things she’d failed at. Of the things she had wanted since she’d realised as a child that she didn’t have a family in the way her classmates did.

      Her entire class had once been invited to a party and she had begged her foster mother at the time—a perpetually exhausted woman who’d spent all her time catering to her husband instead of the children she’d been charged with caring for—to let her go.

      When she’d got there Mila had seen for the first time what a real family was. She’d seen her classmate’s parents look at their child with love, with pride. Had watched them take photos together while the rest of her class played on the grass. Had seen the easy affection.

      She had spent that entire afternoon watching them, wondering why no one else was when this family was clearly doing something out of the norm. But when Mila had been the last to be picked up, she’d seen the way the other parents had treated their children. She’d realised that that was normal, and that she was the one with the special circumstances.

      Her longing for family had started on that day, spreading through her heart, reminding her of it with every beat. Since she had lost her child, those beats had become heavy with pain, with emptiness. And it would only be worse now that Jordan was back.

      Since he was back for good, she would have to leave the house she’d been staying in for almost a year. Though she’d known she couldn’t stay there for ever, she had hoped for more time than she’d got. Not only because she didn’t know where she would go—again, the thought of returning to the house where she’d lost their baby made her feel nauseous—but because it had come to feel like the home she’d never had. But then, Mila had also hoped for more time with Greg—especially since she’d finally managed to pierce that closed-off exterior of his...

      But that was the least of her concerns now that she’d found out she and Jordan were still married.

      It was the hope that worried her the most. Hope had been her first emotion when she’d heard the news, and it had lingered until Jordan had brought up filing for divorce again. It reminded her of how receiving those papers for the first time had destroyed her hope for reconciliation. And rightly so. She shouldn’t be—wasn’t—interested in reconciliation, however easy it might be to get lured back into the promise of a life with Jordan.

      But that wasn’t what he wanted, or he wouldn’t have left so easily. And that, she told herself, was exactly why she needed to protect herself from him. That was why she had accepted Jordan’s suggestion that she be the one to file the divorce papers this time. She needed to remind herself that their life together—at least in a romantic sense—was over.

      She didn’t want him to know how difficult things had been for her since he’d left, even though she had almost told him about it in Mark’s office. About how selling their possessions had nothing to do with moving away and everything to do with moving on. But because she couldn’t bear to expose herself to him she’d lied instead. Though now that she thought about it perhaps moving away was the first step to moving on...

      Either way, she needed his help. She couldn’t go back to their house—she would never think of it as hers, even if it was in her name—alone. She couldn’t face it by herself. And she had to face it. She had spent long enough grieving for the family she was sure she would never have now. She knew the loss of her son would stay with her for ever, but she was determined to make something out of her life. To prove that she would have been a worthy mother...

      ‘Do you want to talk about how everything will work?’ Jordan asked, almost as though he knew that she’d been thinking too much and wanted to distract her.

      ‘You mean how we’ll plan the event?’ she asked, and looked out of the window to the vineyards they were passing.

      Stellenbosch had always felt like home to her, even when she hadn’t had a home. The minute she had driven down the winding road that offered the most beautiful sights she had ever seen—the peaks that stood above fields and fields of produce, the kaleidoscope of colours that changed with every season—a piece had settled inside her. That had been the first time she had visited the Thomas Vineyard.

      ‘That’s part of it, of course. But I was speaking about all the details. Like where you’re going to stay, for example.’

      She sighed. She had told him that she would leave Greg’s house that morning, and when she’d said it she’d thought it was the best way to force herself to face going back to their house. But her deal with Jordan meant that she could delay that a little longer, and immediately the ball in her chest unravelled.

      Though that didn’t mean she could stay at the farmhouse.

      ‘I can still leave today.’

      She could stay at a bed and breakfast, she thought, forcing herself to ignore the pain in her chest. She didn’t need to be thinking about how leaving would sacrifice her only connection to Greg—to the memories of family and the love she’d never thought she deserved. She also didn’t need to remember that she’d spent little time working since the accident, which meant her bank account was in a sorry state.

      ‘You don’t have to,’ he said stiffly, and she turned to him.

      ‘What do you mean?’

      ‘It might make more sense for us to stay together.’ Jordan’s eyes were fixed on the road. ‘We have six weeks to sort this event out. Being in the same space will make it a lot easier.’

      There was Mr Logical again, she thought, and unexplained disappointment made her say, ‘I can’t stay in the house with you there, Jordan.’

      She saw him frown. ‘Why not?’

      Because there’s too big a part of me that wants to play house with you again, she realised.

      ‘It’s too complicated. This whole thing with us still being married...’ Her head pounded at the knowledge and what it meant. ‘It’s a lot to deal with. It would probably be best if you and I lived separately.’

      He didn’t respond as he turned onto the gravel road that led to the house that would soon be theirs. She used the time to remind herself that she had been at a standstill for a year. She couldn’t keep letting the tragedies in her life or her dreams for a family hold her back. It was time to move on, and living with Jordan—even if it was practical, considering her current financial situation—didn’t seem to be the way she would do it.

      But then she thought about the deal she had made with Jordan—about how he was going to help her sell all the things from their marriage if she helped him—and she began to wonder if living together and planning the event was the way she was going to move on.

      As though he knew her thoughts, Jordan repeated, ‘I think you should stay. We’re planning an event that will happen in the next six weeks. We need to get your house and your car sold—things that might take a lot longer than six weeks—but we can start now. And we can definitely get everything in the house sold before then.’

      Which should help her financial problems, she thought.

      ‘Handling all of it will be a lot easier if we could do it from the same place,’ he said again.

      It made sense, she thought, but cautioned herself not to make a hasty decision.

      ‘I’ll think about it,’ she said, even though the rational part of her told her she should say no. ‘But I’ll stay here until I’ve made a decision.’

      ‘Okay,’ he responded politely, and though she didn’t look at him, she frowned at his acquiescence.

      The Jordan she knew would have pushed or, worse, would have made the decision for her. Was he giving her