One Week Three Hearts:

Copyright

Spring

Summer

Fall - Monday

Tuesday

Wednesday

Thursday

One Week Three Hearts

Adele Allaire

Published by Adele Allaire at Amazon.com

Copyright 2014 Adele Allaire

Discover other titles by Adele Allaire at
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This book is a fictional work. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author's imagination, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or deceased, brands, events, media, or locations are entirely coincidental, or used purely in a fictional manner.

Amazon Preview Edition, License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Amazon.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

This isn't a standalone story; reading the first book in the Three Hearts Trilogy,
One Night Three Hearts
, is required to understand what's happened so far.
 

A note from Adele Allaire: I received many requests to publish the second book in the trilogy, however, the second half is now going through its third round of complete rewrites. I asked quite a few if they would be okay with reading the first half as a preview version, and an overwhelming majority asked me to publish this as is. So please understand this is the first half of the novel only, and you won't be required to purchase the second half separately (you can update this Kindle file with the latest version when it's released).

Sign up to get notified when the full novel is available & alerts on other Adele Allaire books.

My intent wasn't to turn this into a series, but to keep to its original trilogy format. I know it sounds strange for an author to say 'don't buy my book,' but if you wish to read the entire novel at once, then please wait until the price changes to $2.99 USD and "Part One" isn't in the book's title. Thank you for your patience and understanding.

Dedicated to the wonderful beta readers who keep me grounded and constantly writing.

SPRING

Rose pointed to the one inch thick stack of paper bulging out of a legal file folder next to a half-opened Amazon box on the kitchen table. "We need to talk about that," she said.

Two weeks passed since the events of her thirty-fifth birthday, and she struggled to make sense of the constant internal dialogue roller coaster. She didn't want to back down no matter how hard Jason tried to brush it aside. Rose kept mentally kicking herself for naively thinking this strange set up between the three of them would somehow magically work out. Invigorated determination woke her this morning. They would talk about what happened come hell or high water.

An ocean and several time zones away in China, Rose suspected Matt wanted to resume their conversations about one subject only, and she concluded their previous behavior as juvenile. She didn't want to add such a complication into their daily lives again.

How awkward would that be? 'Oh, sorry Jason… I can't help you bring in groceries right now. I'm on the phone with your best friend, but I'll get to it in about fifteen minutes. And after we bring everything in, you can go shoot zombies online with him like nothing happened.'
 

Not that Matt even tried to talk to her directly since that night; his limited contact was in the form of the contract and that box Rose barely opened last night after Jason brought it in. No phone calls, emails, or text messages. Jason didn't mention speaking with him. Matt's silence was an unspoken topic neither of them could bring themselves to address.

"Now? It's seven in the morning," Jason said as he propped his foot on one of the dining chairs to tie his scuffed shoe. "Honey, really… I need to get to work. Those papers are a stack of good intentions anyway."

Good intentions? I read it through at least ten times. Matt wants no part of this. He waived his paternity rights, and wants nothing above or beyond a typical anonymous donor. Well, except that bizarre clause about how he gets sole custody if we divorce or separate for longer than six months. And the lab said there was essentially no difference between Jason and Matt in that department, so what is the point to all of this? It's not like we're adding something new to the equation.

Rose probably gave her husband a
look
because he sighed, visually checked himself, and called in a car trouble excuse to his boss' voicemail.

"All right, let's talk about this," Jason said with little enthusiasm as he leaned back into the chair. "What's preventing you from signing those papers so we can deposit that check and get going with the process?"

Rose sighed as she turned to rinse out her coffee cup in the scratched stainless kitchen sink original to the condo built in the late 1980s. The down payment emptied their meager bank accounts, barely leaving them enough to replace the carpet and paint, let alone the sink and its outdated faucet. Countless times over the years, Rose quietly observed her husband do his best to strip out the silicone, then navigate the caulking gun around the sink's metal edge to create a seal to the white tile countertop with its dark discolored grout.

The simple patch job did nothing for her unaffordable desire to rip out the whole thing and install a sleek quartz slab like she envied on those remodeling television shows. Her sensible accountant nature deemed such thoughts frivolous, though it was difficult to bury those feelings. Instead, she budgeted their paychecks for necessities like replacing the fire hazard cooktop with all its disgusting grime built up around the burners, or repairing the leaky seal in the dishwasher. Now with only one income supporting them, there wasn't any room to upgrade or modernize whatever the condo's prior owner postponed or neglected.

Back stiff and shoulders squared, not facing Jason created a necessary and confident shield to get through this conversation. "There isn't anything stopping me from signing them. I'm still trying to understand what happened that night, and why you never confronted me about Matt."

Really, I had to bring that one up first? Asking why he wasn't jealous like that was my motive for speaking with Matt all those years ago?

"He was flirting with you. I was jealous at first, but then you ended it with him," Jason said with a nonchalant tone. He spoke as if this was a talk they had every morning, the same mutual conclusion drawn over and over again. "You always came back to me. I knew all of that meant nothing. You love me and you ended it before he could finish you off. I forgave you a long time ago. Come on, we were barely married six months when all that happened."

The wooden chair scraped against the tile. Jason's knees popped audibly as Rose mindlessly scrubbed the sponge against the bottom of the coffee cup. After the honeymoon phase, the first few months of their marriage culminated in a period where they disagreed about anything and everything. The shiny outer layer of excitement and newness worn off, each staked carefully negotiated claims to responsibilities and areas around the condo. Found littered everywhere except the laundry hamper, a discarded pair of gold-toed black socks rolled into a ball sent Rose into a nuclear meltdown while Jason stared in fascination. She smiled to herself as she wistfully thought about that time when socks mattered as much as the larger issues they faced today.

"I loved you, but I didn't know how to be married to you then." Truth slipped out before Rose could catch herself. Jason slipped his arms around her waist. His fingers traced the robe's frayed satin lining, rubbing the fibers between his fingertips.

"I guess later on, I realized he fulfills one piece of you — the one I can't. Won't," he admitted. "I can't do to you what he did that night. I couldn't give you what you wanted. I tried once; I got all prepared to do one of those things you both talked about, and I just couldn't do it."

I couldn't ask you to, or even tell you about it.

Hot breath nuzzled the place where Rose's neck met her shoulders. Her husband's hands leisurely roamed over her stomach, disregarding the way it bulged over the taut band of her panties. The coffee cup and sponge froze under the running water, mimicking the small hope she desperately tried to squash in order to get through the day: the possibility she might be pregnant.

Insatiable since that night they shared with Matt, Jason initiated a physical scenario reminiscent of those first few honeymoon weeks all those years ago. Each evening and almost every other morning, Jason's gentle touches transformed into urgent affirmations. Clothes were pushed away or shrugged off in haste to make room for a hungry mouth. A worn bra haphazardly draped from the kitchen chair Jason pushed aside. The lingering throb from the toe Rose stubbed on the bedroom door served as evidence of last night's impatient act that followed a series of his breathless whispers.
Hurry. Open that later. I need you now.

"Watching Matt with you made me see you— really see you— for the first time in years," Jason said. "You are a beautiful, sensual creature, Rose. I could watch you with him for hours. I can't stop thinking about that night, and I want more every time I do. Look what he brought to the surface for us before, and now again. We needed this."

Jason paused his caresses at the top of the loose bow that held her bathrobe closed, and slowly pulled the bathrobe's terrycloth belt away from her body. Densely collected tree leaves blocked the kitchen window's street view as the kisses on Rose's neck intensified. His hands found the bare skin of her torso. The simple motion of wrapping her arms around Jason's neck acted as a silent agreement for him to continue.

***

Leftover steam from Jason's second morning shower escaped through the ajar bathroom door. Rose glanced at her husband's cutoff silhouette before grabbing her phone from the nightstand; she forgot to change her ovulation date from her birthday back to her usual one.

Well, that little trick did what it was supposed to do — and then some.

Something about her husband's behavior that night still gnawed at Rose now that she had practically a daily comparison. Except for the increased spontaneity, and how just opening the box last night caused him to drag her to the bedroom, Jason reverted back to his standard bedroom routine. Each time Jason initiated something, it was enjoyable, but she found herself craving that edge Matt added to the mix. She tried everything non-verbal she could think of to get him to be a little rougher, and Jason would be all sweet and playful instead.

The way Jason cut her off from asking about his history with Matt set her mind speculating. Since the blunt approach worked earlier, Rose decided it was necessary for Jason to display all his cards before dealing with everything still left on the kitchen table.

"Jason, what was it like living with Matt when you two were roommates?" she asked him through the door. Activity might conceal her prying. Rose busied herself by picking up her robe from the floor and replacing her phone to its spot on the nightstand. She didn't want to put Jason on the defensive, but the two men were very comfortable— almost too comfortable— with each other that night.

Her husband emerged from the bathroom and grabbed his shirt off the armchair that seemed to be the constant repository for his clothing. "He was on the swim team. Matt had girls crawling all over him day and night," Jason said. "It was hard for me to sleep or get any studying done."

Not satisfied with his initial level of elaboration, Rose pushed a little further and asked Jason what he meant by that.

"A constant rotation of girls all the time with very few repeats," Jason said without pausing in buttoning his shirt. "You have to understand I watched the guy read Plato's
Republic
while he fingered a girl on his lap. That's Matt. He is a psychological adrenaline junkie. Women are like an exposed vulnerable nerve to him, and he just wants to poke at them with everything they think they want. Then he is off like a shot to the next one."

Matt said he loved me.

Rose's protest remained silent even though the temptation to defend her feelings was difficult to resist. In their new reality, how appropriate was it to discuss with her husband the bond she shared with another man? Hearing all of this from Jason puzzled her. Adding Matt's feelings for her to the pile of things to mull over, she fiddled with a loose fiber dangling from her bathrobe sleeve as Jason continued detailing the reasons why Matt would never commit to one woman.

"I watched him do it for four years as his roommate, then he went off to grad school and I met you," Jason said. "He's my best friend, and there is no one else on this earth besides you I'd give a kidney to except him. Although, I wouldn't give him the kidney because what if you needed it?"