Free Heartbreaker Breaks (A Bittersweet Lottery Love Story) (Tangled Hearts & Broken Vows: Tales of Infidelity Book 1) by Paloma Meir

the stairs was bringing her one step closer to Nick. She had an urge to run.
      “Where are my girls going?” Adam yelled out from the second floor landing.
      “Bike ride, Dad.” Anja turned and smiled up to her father.
      “Good, give me a minute to get dressed.” His accent was heaviest in the morning. Faye had always loved that about him, but it had been leaving her cold for the previous few weeks.
      “Sorry, girl’s day out,” She called back to him as she took Anja’s arm and led her quickly to the kitchen.
      Faye had done her best to present a united front of marital happiness while the girls were home for their short spring break. The false smiles and Adam’s arm around her waist felt like a vise, shrinking her. It was as if he weren’t aware of the hairline fracture running through their marriage that was breaking apart.
      She tried to question it in her mind, find a way to approach Adam, come to a resolution. Her ponderings would cloud over with thoughts of Nick and their days together. She preferred those thoughts.
      “Okay girls, let’s go,” She smiled brightly and proud, as she entered the kitchen to find Ines running back and forth, double checking the lunches she had packed, organizing the basket for maximum space.
    …
      “Let’s race,” Ines called out into the bright and windy day as they rode onto the bike path at Washington and Ocean Front Walk.
      Faye didn’t respond but pushed harder on her pedals. They weren’t more than a quarter mile from Nick’s apartment and she was feeling nervous butterflies of unease within her chest. She felt as if she were stalking him, which was ridiculous. She had ridden this part of the bike path thousands of times over the years, she reminded herself.
      Still, Faye was quite aware that she had never taken such care with her appearance before going on a bike ride before. The mindfulness of the way she presented herself had grown over her weeks spent with him. She had never been a sloppy woman, never let herself go as some women did at her age but her look had been jeans and simple t-shirts, usually from Anthropologie.
      She thought it best to present herself as a blank canvas, to emphasize the quality of her handbags. It occurred to her as she pedaled away onto the sand covered bike path that her choice of being a walking advertisement for her bags was only partly true.
      The honest truth was she had ceased somewhere along the line to consider herself a woman. A mother, yes, her children were the center of her life. A business woman, yes, her minor success at starting a career later in life, was a source of pride within herself. A wife, she would even admit begrudgingly that her marriage, in spite of Adam’s financial impulsiveness and women over the years, was a successful one. They loved each other very much, and their fiery attraction had never dulled over the years as it had with so many of their long married friends.
      But the softness of femininity had faded year after year since the birth of her children. The little things, drying her hair into an alluring swoop, the glosses she had applied to her lips, all the impractical acts she had loved as a young woman hadn’t been a part of her utilitarian life in decades. She missed the fanciful touches.
      Faye grew aware as she approached Nick’s apartment that she had been unconsciously adding these elements back into her life. It wasn’t just the rose-colored slip of a dress she wore that highlighted her defined collarbones and ample, warm cleavage. Her skin had a sun-kissed hue from her time spent roaming the beach and town with Nick. Her pouty lips were covered in a high gloss, and her hair tousled and sexy from the wind blowing through it. She felt sensual, alive in a way she hadn’t felt in years.
      The warm feeling running through her body, the glow emanating outward came to a sudden stop as she slyly glanced up at Nick’s balcony. A woman, more a girl stood