Free Almost Mine by Eden Winters Page B

he’d hoped, and took a more direct approach. “Please, Dad. I’m worried. Just go see him, okay?”
    Should I go? I weighed the pros and cons, the twisting in my chest worsening. What if my husband’s not working turned out to be something more than lack of opportunities? The hurt he’d caused whispered in my ear, See, he can’t make it without you—serves him right. Another part of me, the part that remembered the poor man pushing himself to the breaking point to nurse me and Bob through a horrible stomach bug said, Would seeing him be so bad?
    Actually, yes, it would. The man who was almost mine. But not quite.
    If I visited, maybe he’d tell me why he hadn’t filed for divorce, since my busy schedule didn’t allow much time to drop by one of the junior attorneys’ office for the ten long minutes it’d take to get the ball rolling.
    My curiosity alone made a visit worthwhile. Maybe seeing him, witnessing fizzling sparks where once an inferno raged between us, would get it through my thick head that what we had was over for good. And then what?
    Maybe it was time to admit defeat, to finally close the door on a failed romance once and for all. “I’ll go see him,” I said. For my son and my own peace of mind.
    ***
    This can’t be the right place. Another glance out of the car window didn’t improve the view. When had Travis moved to such a rundown neighborhood? What happened to that great little condo he’d leased uptown?
    “You have arrived at 550 Kennedy Street,” the navigation system confirmed. I found a parking space a few blocks away, in a slightly more secure area. With any luck, the owners of Travis’s dilapidated apartment complex were hard at work on renovations, starting with the inside—and my car would still be here, tires intact, when I returned.
    After stepping through the front door into the foyer of the building Bob insisted his father lived in, I amended my observation to: maybe the owners are renovating inside the apartments.
    The place fell somewhere between “dump” and “pigsty”. My meticulous husband couldn’t possibly live here. Some effort kept a disdainful curl from my lips. I’d promised a meeting—but nothing more. How he chose to live his life wasn’t my business—anymore. The scent of boiled cabbage and cheap cleaner followed me down the hallway.
    I’m doing this for my child, not for myself, and definitely not for Travis. I tapped on the door to room 113. Unlucky number, unlucky day. Cue the gloom and doom music.
    A thin figure opened the door, face partially hidden by a shock of lank hair. “I’m sorry,” I said, “I must have the wrong apartment. I’m here to see…”
    “It’s me, babe.” The man slowly raised his head. Clear green eyes seemed out of place against pallid skin. Travis’s eyes, but in someone else’s face. The high cheekbones models would once have paid any price for now stood out in pointed contrast to hollow cheeks.
    Oh. My. God. “Travis?” All the way across town I’d held tight to the image of the man he’d been twenty years ago. I’d last seen him (at a distance) in his role as Professor Higgins. Either he’d been heavily made up then or he’d gone downhill fast. My chest tightened.
    “In the flesh.” He stepped aside and invited me in with a flourish of his hand. His jeans sported more holes than might be fashionable; his thin T-shirt hung from his frame. His feet were bare.
    A shudder crept up my spine. Like hell would my bare feet and the dirty brown carpet meet in this life time. My first instinct was to grab the man and get him out of this dump. No matter what hard feelings currently stood between us, my son’s other father shouldn’t have to live here.
    “Bob said you wanted to see me?” Best be about business and get on my way home. If Travis needed money, I’d write a check. Hell, I’d buy him a condo. This man had shared twenty years of my life and helped me raised a son. He deserved better. Whatever he