I struggle not to drop my gaze. I step back from him and continue tidying my clothing.

He grabs my arms again. “What are you saying, Chrissie? Answer me.”

I twist out of his hold. I quickly step back. If I stay too close to him, I will crumble. I have to get out of this room and away from Alan. Soon…or I will crumble…

Alan scrambles from the bed. “You are not leaving, Chrissie. I have not said everything I need to say to you. Baby, don’t go.”

I move to the door. My fingers tighten around the doorknob. “You’re too late, Alan. I’m married.”

The look on his face—what am I seeing in his eyes?—is not the reaction I expect to see and the way those black eyes stare at me catapults my world into a shaky, shadowy mess.

Quickly, before Alan can say anything else, I slip through the door.

There is no one on the patio and, while I’d rather run into the house and hide there, I hurry back to the party, desperate to get Neil away from here.

I spot Neil still sitting on the white couches where I left him. I cross the yard to him, unable to look up even though people occasionally speak to me as I pass.

I don’t wait for a break in conversation. “I want to go, Neil. I’d really appreciate it if we could leave now.”

He sets his drink down, and when he looks at me his eyes fill with alarm. “What’s wrong? Are you OK, Chrissie? What’s happened?”

The worry in his voice makes shame flood my veins and I can feel that I’m starting to shake. Damn, I just want to hold it together until I’m out of here. Then figure out somehow how to explain to Neil what I’ve done. Beg him for forgiveness. I don’t know. My thoughts are spinning out of control, and all I can think of is to get away from here.

My shaking intensifies and I can feel heavy stares on me and I know I must look more of a mess than I thought.

“Stay right here,” Neil says in an urgent and anxious way. “I’m going to tell Jack we’re leaving. Don’t move, Chrissie. Wait here.”

I stand there numb for a few minutes, but it feels like an eternity. Finally I see Neil cutting through the party guests back toward me.

He places a hand on the small of my back and starts guiding me across the lawn.

“What happened?” he asks. “Can you tell me that?”

I’m so ashamed.

“Not now, Neil. I promise I’ll tell you everything. Just not here. Not now.”

He shakes his head in aggravation. “Fuck, Chrissie, what is going on? You’re scaring me.”

I ignore him. I can’t talk. Not now. I’m going to break down if I do and I don’t want to do it surrounded by people. That would be even crueler than what I just did to Neil and our marriage.

We’re almost to the patio when Alan exits the pool house. The two men lock eyes, and Neil’s body goes rigid beside me.

I look up at him and I know with sinking dread that Neil has put the pieces together. He knows I was alone in the pool house with Alan and what happened is why I’m dragging him from the party now.

Panic overwhelms my senses and I feel him start to move away from me. Frantically, I lock my hands onto his arm to try to hold him back.

“What the fuck did you say to her?” Neil shouts, enraged.

Alan calmly arches a brow and locks simmering black eyes on green. “We didn’t get a chance to talk, if that’s what you’re worried about, Neil,” he snaps in a pointed and dismissive way.

The earth falls from beneath my feet. There is absolutely no way to misinterpret that statement. Not from Alan. Not with how he says it.

I try to keep hold of Neil, but my fingers lose their clutch on him. Before my anxious eyes, I see him shoot across the yard toward Alan.

“You asshole,” Neil hisses. “Do you have to fuck up every life around you? You stay away from her.”

My heart stills in my chest. I have never seen Neil look like this. Not in his most angry moments. Oh no, not like this. If there was a speck of doubt in me before today that Neil fucked up Andy as severely as the rumors claim, it died with what I see on his face. If he lets loose a punch it won’t end with one punch. He’s going to screw up his life again, only this time it will be my fault.

Oh fuck. Oh fuck. Oh fuck.

I move quickly, trying to get to them before Neil hits Alan, and then, out of nowhere, Len Rowan appears between them, his hands planted on Neil’s chest. Even through my panic-dulled senses, I can tell by the motion around me and the stir in the air that everyone at the party is fully aware of this hideous confrontation.

“Settle down,” Len says, struggling for air as he quickly maneuvers to hold Neil back. “You don’t want to do this. Not here. Not now. You’ll fuck up your life. One punch. Everything you’ve worked for gone, over. Get it?”

Neil shoves him back, but it looks like some measure of control has returned to him. He is shaking with rage, raking a hand through his hair over and over again, but he’s not charging at Alan anymore.

“Would you please go?” I whisper anxiously, my eyes imploring Alan.

He looks at me and something in his gaze turns me ice cold. He starts walking away.

“I’m sorry, Chrissie,” he whispers as he passes me.

Neil erupts again, moving his body between me and Alan. “You don’t fucking speak to her. Not now. Not ever.”

Alan stops walking. Oh shit. Neil, why didn’t you let him go? I try to move between them again, but Neil won’t let me.

“How could you marry her?” Alan exclaims, his timbre carrying to the four corners of the yard without effort. “How the fuck do you live with yourself?”

Numb with disbelief, I frantically try to make sense of what I’m seeing in Alan’s eyes and hearing in his words, but before I can do either he turns to leave.

Then everything happens all at once, so quickly my mind can’t keep up: Neil grabbing Alan by the shoulder; whirling him around; the sound of his fist landing in Alan’s jaw; the explosion of flashes as the press runs toward us, cameras snapping pictures with each step; the shouted questions from every direction.

“You fucking stay away from her,” Neil growls, standing above Alan. “You don’t talk to her. You don’t try to see her. You stay the fuck away from my wife and from me.”

Stunned, I can’t find my words.

For some reason my gaze desperately moves to Alan and not Neil. Our eyes lock. Alan says nothing. He stares at me and my heart jumps into my throat. Why are those great black eyes so full of pity and anguish as they look at me?

Before I can make reason of it, Neil is dragging me to the house, shouting no comment with every step. Inside he pulls me with him to a bedroom, slams the door and locks it. I stare at him, afraid and unsure how to manage this.

His fingers drop away from my wrist and he moves to the bathroom. Oh crap, he’s bleeding. What have I done?

“We should go to the hospital, Neil. You might have broken something.”

His jaw clenches and unclenches as he holds his hand under running water. After a few minutes he shuts the tap off and wraps his hand in a towel.

In the bathroom doorway, he stops, staring at me with eyes wild with pain and something else I’ve never before seen. The knot in my throat becomes strangling.

“I don’t ever want to talk about this,” he says with a quiet voice that makes me jump. “I don’t want to know what you did in there with him. Not ever.”

I nod, even though I’m not sure where he’s going with this.

Those green eyes lock on mine. “Do you want our marriage, Chrissie? Or do you want him?”

Neil waits for my answer, and the expression on his face turns my mind blank. I speak without even attempting thought. “I want you, Neil. I want you.”

CHAPTER NINETEEN

I sit on a chaise lounge in the hot July sun, watching Neil and Jack side by side deep in conversation as my dad flips burgers on the grill.