Free Love Me Forever by Ari Thatcher Page A

stopped by on her way to the common dining room for meals, to be sure Mrs. Miller would remember.
    Soon, though, the family would need to hire a fulltime aide, or think about a more structured facility. The saddest part of Jen’s job, in the six weeks she’d worked at the retirement community, was seeing the residents fade to the point of needing to move to a nursing home.
    Mrs. Miller found her purse on the counter in her kitchenette and took out her keys. “Here they are.”
    “Oh, good. Now, slip that little stretchy band on your wrist so you have them with you the next time you step out.” Jen said goodbye and slipped out into the hallway, nodding to a passing couple.
    Seeing them walk arm-in-arm made her sigh. She’d heard they’d been married for more than fifty years. Even as their bodies wore down and their steps became shuffles, they moved in practiced synchronization.
    Without warning, tears welled and the lump returned in her throat. She took the stairs down to the main level and followed the hallways to the back entrance of her office. The last thing she needed was for someone to see her crying over something as stupid as seeing an old couple walk together.
    Divorce made her moods swing like crazy. Giddy one minute, tearful the next. Knowing she wouldn’t have fifty years beside her husband still made her ache.
    It was Ted she pictured herself walking the hallway with, wasn’t it? It must be. She’d given up dreams of happily-ever-after with Matt years ago. In twenty-five years when she was ready to retire, she could look him up, see if he was still single. Then she’d be ready to sell her house, move to wherever he was, and spend their dotage together walking the beach, watching sunsets in the tropical warmth of an evening.
    In the meantime, she had to get the accounts payable processed.
    She shut out the image of Matt’s face that slipped into her mental photo album on a regular basis each day. Often, she would turn up the radio to drown out the memory of his voice on the answering machine, her mind replaying his one-sided conversations when she least expected it.
    One day soon she’d have recovered from the pain of leaving him, and she could call and give him the apology she owed him. Tears threatened again, knowing how she’d treated him.
    You don’t deserve a man that perfect. You deserve to spend your dotage alone, and all the years between now and then. How could you sneak out when his back was turned, without even saying goodbye?
    She gulped down the last of her watered-down lukewarm iced tea, the ice having melted long ago. Blowing her nose, she sat up straight and opened the folder with the bills she needed to enter into the computer.
    She’d only processed the first three bills when the interoffice line on her phone lit up. She picked up the handset. “Hi, Kelly.”
    “Jen, you have a visitor at the front desk.”
    “A visitor?” That was odd. The weekend before, she’d filled in for the sales person on her Saturday off, and on occasion, a client would insist on seeing her once a decision had been made to move in. But she couldn’t recall anyone who’d seemed close to making that step.
    “Yes, a man is here to see you.” Kelly’s voice dropped to just above a whisper. “He’s tall and hot. And he has flowers.”
    Dear God, was her ex here again to beg for a renegotiation of their divorce settlement? “Look, if it’s Ted tell him I’m at lunch. Tell him to call my lawyer if he needs to talk to me.”
    “Jen, you need to come out here. This guy spends too much time in the sun to be your ex, and if you were married to a man who looked like this, you were a fool to divorce him. Now, get out here!”
    Too much time in the sun? It must be Matt. But what was he doing here? How’d he found out where she worked? Well, she had told him the name of the place and it didn’t take half a brain to get the address.
    Matt was here. With flowers. To see her.
    When her mind stopped