Free Leaving at Noon by Jess Dee Page B

anything because the only time we’ve spoken in months was the
night before I left, and that would hardly have been
appropriate.”
    “ Any day between now and a
month ago would have been better than today. All you needed to do
was open your mouth.”
    “ And say what? Something
big’s happening at work? You stopped listening to my work stories
months ago.”
    He stared at her. “Pardon?”
    “ You lost interest in my
job a long time ago. And I lost the urge to come home and tell you
about my day around the same time. Hard to share my stories when
your attention’s a mile away.”
    Oh hell no. She had the wrong end of the
stick. “I stopped listening because there was nothing to listen to.
The silence was oppressive.”
    Zoey’s mouth opened, but she must have
decided against responding because she closed it again, tapping a
clenched fist to her lips. Then she tried again. “You’re saying I stopped talking to you?”
    “ Pretty much.”
    “ And you noticed?” Sarcasm
edged her words.
    He gave her a derisive look.
    Her lips thinned. “In one breath, you tell
me our problems crept up so slow you didn’t notice them until it
was too late, and in the next you tell me you noticed I stopped
talking to you.”
    What was her point?
    “ Make up your mind, Theo.
Either you were aware things were changing, or you
weren’t.”
    “ I assumed you were
preoccupied. I waited, figuring you’d talk when you were ready.” He
let her process that before adding, “You didn’t.”
    She chewed on her lower lip. “Maybe by the
time I was ready to talk, you’d stopped listening?”
    “ Maybe.” But she hadn’t
tried to talk, so he couldn’t say for sure.
    “ I wanted you to ask about
my work. You never did.”
    He held his palms open. “Since when do I
have to ask? There was a time you’d tell me stuff
spontaneously.”
    “ I assumed you didn’t
care.”
    He gaped at her, incredulous. “We’ve been
married for five years. You’re my wife.” The most important person
in his life. “How could you think that?”
    “ You weren’t talking! You
weren’t saying anything about what you were thinking or how you
were feeling.”
    Theo frowned at her. What had she expected?
He’d never been one to wax lyrical about his thoughts or
emotions.
    She must have read his expression. “You
withdrew so completely, I had to guess. My mind started wondering,
filling in the blanks, making up for your silence. I drew my own
conclusions but had no way of knowing if they were right or
wrong.”
    “ And one of those
conclusions was that I didn’t care?” Man. How had she distorted
things so badly?
    It took a while before she responded. “Do
you?”
    That she even needed to ask… “I care, babe.”
His voice came out rough. “I’ve cared since the minute I first laid
eyes on you.” She’d been dancing in Levi’s arms. “Still care,” he
added, in case she wasn’t getting the message.
    Her shoulders trembled. “I didn’t notice you
waiting for me to talk.”
    “ You weren’t looking at
me.”
    Her face fell. “Did I break us?”
    “ You want me to lay the
blame for our troubles at your feet?”
    “ I want to find a solution
to our troubles,” she said. “I want to do whatever’s necessary to
put all of this behind us.”
    Something in her voice made Theo’s stomach
tense. “Put all of what behind us?”
    “ Our problems.” Zoey
dropped her gaze to the sand. “Or our marriage.”
    Her words hit him like a blow to the solar
plexus, making breathing and speech difficult.
    Theo couldn’t begin to wrap his head around
the idea of putting their marriage behind them. He’d come to Noosa
to work things out, not bail on their relationship.
    One thing he knew for sure, he wasn’t
leaving the problem-solving to his wife. Not if ending their
marriage was even a remote possibility in her eyes. “So, your
fault, therefore your solution? You’re taking the blame and the responsibility now?”
    She gaped at him.
    “