Read Online Meant to Be by E. L. Todd - Free Book Online Page B

the two of you get sucked any deeper.”
    “Any deeper?” he asked incredulously. “I’m at the bottom, Sean. I can’t go any further.” He gripped his skull. “I love her, like, really love her. I don’t want anyone else. She’s perfect for me, you know?”
    “I know,” I said gently.
    “I just can’t imagine my life without her.”
    “Can you imagine your life with her, while everyone moves on and has their wedding and their children?”
    Mike wouldn’t look at me. “What would you do if this was Scarlet?”
    That was a tough question. “I can’t answer that objectively since I’m already married to her.”
    “Just do it,” he barked.
    “I didn’t care about marriage until I fell in love with her. I proposed to Penelope because I knew that’s what she wanted, but I didn’t realize how much I really wanted a wife and kids until Scarlet became mine.” I shrugged. “So, if she didn’t want to get married, I’d accept that. As long as I had her, I could deal with that. But now that I know how awesome it is to be married to her, how hot it sounds when people call her by my last name, how sexy she looks when she’s pregnant with my kid…I couldn’t live without that.”
    “You didn’t answer my question at all.”
    “Because there isn’t a right answer. It all depends on you, Mike. If that’s the future you really want and it’s not going to happen with Cassandra, you need to end it. But if you can really accept the small amount she’s willing to offer, then stay with her. But if you want my opinion about this whole thing, it’s this; if she really loved you and trusted you, she would marry you.”
    He finally looked at me. “You don’t like her.”
    “No. I like Cassandra a lot. She’s a good girl and she’s perfect for you. But I don’t think it’s right for her to punish you for something that has nothing to do with you. She may have had a bad marriage before, but you’ve proven you’re nothing like that. She needs to get over it. Plain and simple.”
    “Did Scarlet just get over it?” he countered.
    “Actually, yes. The moment she took me back, she said everything was forgiven. But it’s different with you guys.”
    Mike looked more depressed than I’ve ever seen him.
    “I’ll support whatever you decide. But I want the best for you. When you started dating women in a serious way, you said you were looking to settle down with someone. I know you can make the argument that you pretty much are married because you live together and love each other. A signed piece of paper doesn’t make a difference. Only it does. It makes a huge different. My wedding day was the happiest day of my life, and every day after that has come in a close second. I lived with Scarlet before we got married, and I can tell you right now, it was totally different when we got married. And I’d be devastated if she didn’t want to have kids. And you can’t make Cassandra change her mind. That would be wrong. Asking someone to be a parent who doesn’t want to be one automatically makes them a bad parent.”
    “I get it,” he said defensively. “You made your point.”
    “What are you going to do…?”
    “I’ll talk to her again.”
    “And if she says no?”
    “I—I don’t want to think about it.”
     
    When I came home from work, Scarlet wasn’t in the house. I searched for her everywhere but couldn’t find her. Her car was in the garage and my dad was in his room. Where the hell did she go?
    I called her.
    “Hello?” she said.
    “Where are you?” I snapped.
    “On the beach,” she said quickly. “Everything alright?”
    I breathed a sigh of relief. “I couldn’t find you in the house.”
    “So you immediately panic?” she asked incredulously. “You’re going to have a heart attack before you’re thirty.”
    I walked out the back door then moved across the sand. I saw her sitting on a towel near the waves. “Because you’re going to rock my world a little too