Chapter One

No One Was Perfect

Eighteen Years Later

“How long do we have to talk?” Katelyn asked Dr. Regan Philes. Her patient looked nervous and was twisting her hands together in her lap.

“You scheduled a thirty-minute session with me,” Regan reminded Katelyn. “At your last session with Zachery, you both agreed it’d be a good idea for you to talk to me alone. Do you not want to do that?”

She’d been seeing Katelyn and Zachery for a month now. Four sessions and Zachery did the bulk of the talking and Katelyn only nodded her head.

Regan had been the one to offer a one-on-one session to see if she could figure out what Katelyn wanted without feeling the pressure from her husband.

“I do,” Katelyn said. “But it feels like whatever I say doesn’t matter.”

“It matters to me,” she said. “This is your time. You’re free to say what you want.”

“You won’t tell Zachery?” Katelyn asked.

“Not if you don’t want me to. You’ve been coming to therapy for a month. I know Zachery wants to work it out. But I’m not sure what you want.”

People could try all they wanted, but if a couple wasn’t on the same page, they weren’t going to get the end results anyone was looking for.

To this day, she still has no idea why her parents never once tried to work out whatever differences they had.

Heck, she didn’t think there were any differences.

They didn’t talk about what was bothering them. They just made a decision, agreed it was for the best, and threw away over twenty years together—and messed up their son in the process.

Kellen was better now, but boy, her brother struggled for years, getting into trouble with drugs and alcohol. Wanting attention and hoping it’d bring their parents back together.

It didn’t and they were both remarried now and she had to listen again to how perfectly happy her parents both seemed to be.

She wouldn’t fall for that crap again.

Never.

No one was perfect.

No one was ever happy all the time.

And everyone got mad at their significant other at some point.

Life just wasn’t that tidy and it was her mission to help people open their mouths and let their voices be heard. If for no other reason than to feel better and let all that toxic crap go that was bottled up.

“I don’t think I can do this anymore,” Katelyn said.

“Do what?” she asked.

She wanted to be clear. Her computer was recording like it always was and she’d type her notes up later. She kept those recordings in a cloud and would go back and listen to them again at some point if she had to, but she liked to review them before her notes were compiled and this allowed her to talk freely without the distractions of paper or typing.

“My marriage,” Katelyn said. “I don’t feel as if I have any say in anything. It’s so hard.”

“Have you told Zachery that?” she asked.

“That I don’t want to be married anymore?” Katelyn asked.

“Yes. And that you don’t feel as if you are being heard.”

“Both,” Katelyn said. “But he talks around me and the next thing I know, I’m agreeing.”

“Because it’s easier to agree than to speak up?” she asked.

“Yes,” Katelyn said. “I guess in the end I always lose, so why bother?”

“You agreed to come to counseling and it’s my job to get him to see your side of things at the same time for you to understand why he’s the way he is.”

“I know why Zachery is the way he is,” Katelyn said.

She listened to Katelyn repeat Zachery’s history of moving around so much in his life and never feeling as if he had any control. When he was old enough to make his own decisions in life, he pretty much did it all.

It wasn’t right or wrong and not for Regan to judge.

Some women liked to be taken care of like that.

Katelyn didn’t appear to be one of those women. It was her job to urge her client to say that.

“Let me ask you this,” she said. “If after the next three sessions, your opinion hasn’t changed, do you still want to have a trial separation from Zachery?”

“I want a divorce,” Katelyn said. “I’m afraid if I do a trial separation then he will talk me into staying and I can’t lose any more of myself. I don’t like who I am anymore. I never used to be this way. I don’t have friends that Zachery doesn’t know and has to meet.”

She hadn’t known that. “Does Zachery not let you go out with friends?”

“He does,” Katelyn said. “At times. But he wants to know who they are and what we are doing. I’ve never given him any reason not to trust me.”

“Have you had that conversation with him?” she asked.

“I’ve tried. But he won’t listen to me,” Katelyn said.

“We can talk about it today if you like,” she said.

“Sure,” Katelyn said.

Which was her client giving in. “But you’d rather not?” she asked. Katelyn shrugged. “Do you want to have a divorce and not continue with these sessions? It’s okay to say that. You’re here to talk these things out. People come to couples therapy for a number of reasons. Most times to save a relationship, but other times it’s to ease into a separation and the best way to maneuver it.”

“Really?” Katelyn asked.

“Yes. I urged this one-on-one session because I need to know what you want. This is the first you are speaking up. I can help you get that point across, but I need you to say it. I’ll be facilitating it, but it has to come from you.”

Katelyn took a deep breath. “Okay. I can’t do this anymore. I’m dreading these sessions with him. I just need to be away. I need to move on. I’m ill all the time waiting for him to come home and smother me. I just don’t love him anymore.”

She let Katelyn cry a little in her office, then they talked about the best way to approach it when Zachery showed up for their couple’s session.

But thirty minutes later, Katelyn wasn’t saying a word and Zachery was doing all the talking like always.

“I made reservations at Katelyn’s favorite restaurant for tomorrow night. I know she’s been working hard and deserves a break,” Zachery said.

She looked at Katelyn. “How do you feel hearing that?” she asked.

Katelyn forced a smile. “It sounds great.”

It went like this for another fifteen minutes without her client standing up for herself. It wasn’t her job to tell Zachery what Katelyn had said to her in confidence and she’d explained that prior to Zachery showing up.

When the session was done, Katelyn left with Zachery, him grabbing her hand and threading their fingers together. “Thanks so much, Dr. Regan,” Zachery said. “I think we are making so much progress.”

She forced a smile and nodded. Katelyn mouthed “sorry” to her and they left.

There was no reason Regan needed the apology other than her client would come here next week and either say the same things in private but then keep quiet with her husband, or change her tune.

Her job was to listen and point out what she saw.

“I’ll be back, Miles,” she said to her assistant.

“You didn’t get anywhere, did you?” Miles asked. He was flamboyantly chipper as he laughed and waved his hands around.

Miles and his ex-boyfriend had been a client of hers last year, and though the relationship hadn’t lasted, Miles had been so mature about the breakup. A joy to work with and someone she truly enjoyed spending time with.

When he lost his job, and her business was growing to the point she needed help, then a better location, she’d asked if he’d be interested in running her office and doing her billing.

They’d been a great team ever since.

“I thought I was,” she said. “And now where I’m going is to the vending machine for a soda. I should talk to the Fierces. I wonder what the chances are of getting a wine vending machine in the building. Beer? I’d settle for that in a pinch after that session.”

“I’ve got a bottle of whiskey in my drawer,” Miles said. “Never been opened, but you know I said I’d keep it here.”

She smiled. “I might take you up on it one day but not today.”

She looked at the slim gold watch on her wrist. She had twenty minutes before her next client and walked out into the hallway, saw her clients off to the side bickering and told herself not to intervene. No one seemed in danger and Zachery’s smile was gone.

Katelyn pulled her arm away and walked into Davenport Law.

She stood there a minute debating if she should find out what was going on and then decided it might be better not to when Zachery turned to go toward the elevator.

They were on the second floor and she was going to take the stairs and turned in that direction and heard a throat clear.

There was Zander Conway watching her.

He had an office right next to hers. Private investigator.

They’d talked a few times in the two months she’d been here. She’d even referred a client to him who needed their spouse looked into for an affair.

She didn’t only do couples therapy, but that was the basis of her business recently.

“Good afternoon,” she said to Zander.

“Your clients came out of there hand in hand smiling and then next thing I know the woman is talking about a divorce.”

She held her grin in. At least Katelyn spoke up.

“Looks can be deceiving,” she said.

“I got nervous for a second that the guy was going to blow up. His face got red and he nudged her to the side. I politely offered that there was a law office right there that could handle any divorce.”

She started to laugh. Maybe she needed that right now.

“Did that make it better or worse?”

“Calmed the guy down fast, but the woman’s eyes lit right up and you saw what I did. She marched right in there. Hope I didn’t ruin any of the work you’ve been doing.”

Regan looked him over. He was over six feet of a yummy specimen.

She wasn’t sure the last time she looked at a man and thought that, but whenever she saw Zander Conway, her mind went to all sorts of things it never had in the past.

His hair was dark and a little messy right now. He had on jeans and sneakers, a black T-shirt and his phone was vibrating in his pocket. Loud enough for her to hear and her eyes to drop down to the front of his jeans by his crotch.

Once she realized what she was doing, she yanked them up fast and heard him laugh.

Caught.

“You didn’t ruin anything,” she said. “I guide and they choose their own paths.”

“I guided them right to an attorney. It was better than me breaking his fingers if he landed a hand on her.”

She let out a little laugh. This was making her day better than a drink could.

“I’m sure they both appreciate that,” she said.

“Good to see you, Doc,” he said, then took his call and went into his office, so she turned back into hers.

“Oh boy,” Miles said. “Sexy PI and you were having a conversation. I saw it and heard some of it.”

“How did you hear it?” she asked.

“That deep voice of his just sends all sorts of tingles in my body. I might have jumped up and sat in that chair with my ear against the wall.”

“You’re horrible,” she said.

“No,” Miles said. “Just honest. If only he was interested in my type, but he’s not. He has eyes for you though.”

“Please,” she said. “I’m not his type any more than you are.”

“She’s sassy,” Miles said, snapping his fingers in front of his face. “You want him to be interested in you.”

“I didn’t say that,” she rushed out.

“But you meant it. Regan has a crush,” Miles said doing his best runway strut back to his desk.

“Hardly a crush,” she snorted. “I’m not a teen.”

“Did you get your drink?” Miles asked.

“What?”

“You were going to get a drink but didn’t make it downstairs. Maybe because tall dark and sexy distracted you.”

She felt her face fill with heat. “I’ve got water here,” she said, rushing to her office as Miles laughed at her.

Maybe she did have a crush. Just a tiny one.

To Be Continued...for Zander Conway