Pursuing My Rejected Luna by Cara Anderson novel Chapter 175

Chapter 175

We know you’… Your bonus doesn’t care about your excuses, You know yo

I can’t avoid it any longer, no matter how much I wish I could. So I go in search of my husband and find him in his office. Nicolai looks up when I come in. Reads my face in the way he reads everything important before i speak, completely and I know I have his full attention.

“I need you to stop treating me like I’m going to break,” I blurt out before I lose my nerve.

He’s quiet, knowing I have more to say and patiently waiting for me to get it all out.

“I’m not going to break,” I continue. “I’m also not going anywhere. But if you keep being carefully polite with ine –if you keep choosing responses instead of just responding-I’m going to lose my mind.” I look at him. “I need you to be real with me. Even when real is complicated, or even painful. You told me that once. It goes both ways.

He looks at me for a long moment. Something shifts in his expression.

“That’s fair,” he says.

“I know the kitchen this morning was-”

“Difficult,” he admits. “Yes.” He meets my eyes. “I’m working on not making it your problem when it’s difficult.”

“It’s okay if it’s my problem,” I tell him. “I just need to know that’s what’s happening. I can’t help with something I can’t see.”

He nods. Then he reaches out and takes my face in both hands-not carefully, not with the cautious gentleness of the last several days. Just him, real and present, with whatever he’s feeling behind his eyes open for me to see.

“Better?” I ask.

“Working on it,” he says.

He kisses me. Also not carefully. And I feel something in my shoulders that has been tight for days finally release.

Next I find Jaxon in the sitting room before dinner. He’s on the floor with Benji, who has declared today a no- sitting-supported day and is practicing his anti-gravity ambitions with Jaxon as the crash pad.

I sit on the couch near them, watching them play for a moment. But I know I can’t delay what I came to say forever.

“You can hand me my son without looking like you’re defusing a bomb,” I say.

Jaxon looks up sharply. Something moves through his face-surprise, and then relief, and then the specific expression of someone who has just been given permission they didn’t know they needed.

“Am I doing that?” He looks bemused.

“You’re doing that. And asking permission for things that don’t require permission. And generally treating every interaction like it might be the one that breaks the whole arrangement.”

“I just don’t want to-”

“I know,” I interrupt. “I know why you’re doing it. But it’s making me feel like you’re afraid of me.” I look at him. “Be normal. You know how to be normal with me now. Just do that.”

He considers this. Then Benji tips sideways and Jaxon catches him without looking-reflex, easy, the practiced

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competence of months of daily fatherhood.

ike that,” I point at our son. “Like you just did that. That was normal.”

He almost smiles, clearly finding my instruction amusing. “Okay,” he agrees. “I can do that.”

“Good,” I say. “Thank you.”

We sit on the floor with Benji for a while, just the three of us, and it’s almost normal. Not completely. But almost.

Later, I’m talking to Nicolai, quietly, in that space before sleep when real things get said.

“I still don’t know what Jaxon actually wants,” I lament. “From me. From our bond.” I look at the ceiling. “He said he wants to find out what’s there. But that’s not the same as knowing what he wants.”

Nicolai is quiet for a moment, actually considering his response even though the conversation must pain him a little.

“Neither does he,” he says.

“What?”

“Know what he wants.” He turns his head to look at me, true compassion in his eyes. “Or he knows part of it. He doesn’t know how much is the bond and how much is him. I think that’s the honest answer. He’s not holding back because he’s not interested. He’s holding back because he’s trying not to make assumptions.”

“You talked about this with him?” I ask. 1

“Among other things.”

“Ánd?” I feel like a schoolgirl begging for the latest gossip on the boy I like.

“And I think he’s doing something that doesn’t come naturally to him-waiting until he’s sure before he says something.” Nicolai looks away and I feel the loss but know this is hard for him. “Which is the right instinct. Given the history.”

“Okay,” I don’t like it but I can see the sense in what he says.

Silence falls between us in a way that’s rare for us and it makes my chest throb. I don’t ask the follow-up question -what do I do while he’s figuring it out-because I don’t have the will to push him any further, to hurt him any more than I already have.

I’m walking back from the nursery-a late night check on Benji-when I pass the west wing. Jaxon’s door is closed but not all the way. I’m not eavesdropping, I swear I’m not. I’m just walking past, but his voice carries in the way voices carry in quiet houses at night, and I catch enough:

“I know what I want. I’ve known for a while. I’m just not sure I get to have it.”

Noah’s name earlier in the sentence. The low, certain quality of Jaxon’s voice when he’s speaking freely. I know what I want.

I keep walking. Don’t let myself stop. Don’t let myself turn around. I get back to our room, slip in without waking Nicolai, and lie in the dark.

I know what I want. I’ve known for a while. I carry those words for the rest of the night like something I found that belongs to someone else-something private, unintended for me…

That I can’t make myself stop reading.

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