Read B01EU62FUC (R) for Free Online

asked.
    He shrugged. “I probably won’t watch anything but you.” He knew he should hold his tongue to avoid overwhelming her, but sometimes, he couldn’t resist stating the truth.
    She blushed, shaking her head. “Why do you say things like that?”
    “Because they’re true.” His hand stroked her hair out of her face. “I’m glad we’re married, you know.”
    “You are?” She searched his face carefully. She’d never known him to lie, but he was a good actor.
    He nodded. “Of course I am. You’re a beautiful, incredible woman. Why wouldn’t I be thrilled?”
    She took a deep breath. “I guess I’m not used to people acting like I’m worth something.”
    He frowned at her words. “Curtis was a slime bag.”
    She sighed. “I know he was. I never should have stayed with him so long, but I didn’t know how to get away.”
    “How’d you end up with him anyway?” He knew they’d been together since high school, but he’d never understood why.
    “You know we went to school together. He was my next-door-neighbor, and our moms were friends. We were in the same class of forty-two kids. When I didn’t have a date for the junior prom, he asked me. I wasn’t dating anyone, and we’d known each other forever, so I said yes. We didn’t really date through our senior years, but he was always there. We went to senior prom together, and then when we went away to college, we both ended up at the same school.” She stared off into space as she answered him, not wanting to relive everything but knowing he needed to know—to understand. “We were in the same co-ed dorm, and he watched out for me.”
    “Watched out for you or scared away anyone who wanted to be your friend?” Jesse asked, reading her facial expressions.
    “They seemed to go hand-in-hand with Curtis.” She stared down at her hands for a moment, before looking back at him, determined to get through the whole story. “We’d go to lunch together. We’d eat dinner together. I didn’t know a lot of people at school, because he was always there. People started to assume we were a couple.”
    “You weren’t?”
    She shook her head. “Not really. I mean, I’d go to meals with him as a friend, but he never asked me to be his girlfriend or anything.”
    “Okay.” He watched her intently, wanting to understand what had happened. Why had this beautiful, intelligent woman ended up with such a slimeball?
    “When we went home for Christmas break after our first semester at college, he told his mom we were dating. Then his mom told my mom. There was much rejoicing, and I didn’t feel like I should argue with him.” She shrugged. “I didn’t really want to date him, but I wasn’t sure how to get out of it. Everyone at school thought we were dating anyway. So when we got back to school, he started coming over to study every evening. That’s when I got involved with theater. I found that if I had rehearsals, I could be with people other than him, and he would leave me alone for a little while.”
    “Did he hurt you then?”
    She shook her head. “Not physically. He’d threaten me sometimes. He was always there during rehearsals, putting a wall between me and the other actors. He would sit in the audience and do his homework while we rehearsed. You know how big he is. All the guys were afraid of him.”
    “I’m not.” His words were soft, but she could hear the emotion beneath them. He would always have her back.
    Valerie smiled at that. “I’m glad. I don’t think we’ve seen the last of him.”
    “Are you worried he’s going to hurt you?”
    She thought about that for a moment, unsure how to respond. “As long as you’re with me, I’m not afraid. I don’t want to be alone.”
    “So when we get back to Texas, I’ll make sure you’re never alone. No hardship there.” He waggled his eyebrows at her, making her laugh.
    “I think that’s what I like best about you. You can make me laugh.”
    He smiled, stroking her arm and