Kelly settled in the low folding chair and pulled the pretty blue mason jar from the little built-in table.

Inside, a sensual rainbow of delight. Chocolate bars of every type, wrapped in a variety of colors and textures. Pale lavender with silver writing, midnight blue with gold stars, the saffron yellow with bold green. All her favorites.

Kelly looked to the tick marks on the inside of the lid and allowed herself to select the lavender. Salted caramel with almond. She made a quick note and closed the lid. Settling in with a sigh as she kicked off her sandals.

She slid a fingertip down the seam, baring the glossy dark chocolate inside. Six squares.

Snapping off two, she broke that in half again and that’s when Vaughan’s head popped in through the open hatch.

He started, clearly surprised to see her there. “Oh! Sorry.” He started to go. And she should have let him but instead, she called him back.

“Is everything all right?”

He popped in again. “Yes. I just...”

“Needed some quiet?” Kelly asked.

Relief flooded his face. “Yes.”

She held the candy bar his way. “Come on, then. I have chocolate.”

He gave her a look and settled in, criss-cross-applesauce style. He probably did yoga to move with such ease.

She handed over a square of chocolate and popped the other into her mouth, not letting his presence ruin the luxury of that first taste. Yum.

“Thanks for inviting my family over here. I know my mom can be...”

Kelly held a hand up to stop him. “Nope. Not going there with you. We’re not married anymore and your children are nowhere in sight. I don’t have to be nice so whatever. I don’t want to talk about her. You were all worried about Maddie. You all got hungry. My house is here. Kensey is delighted to have her uncles and grandparents here. That’s all I need to care about.”

“You’ve changed your tune.”

Seriously, her chocolate Zen was really getting messed up by this. “Not really, Vaughan. This thing with your mom isn’t about me at all. It’s about you and I’m not paying for your sins. Not anymore.” She broke off two more squares, handing him one.

“I guess that’s fair.”

“You guess.” She snorted.

He gave her a lopsided grin. “Did you take medication and sneak some wine?”

“I wish. I’m drunk on indignation, I think. It’s the only kind of libation I can have until the only Hurleys in this house are me and Kensey.”

“Why? No one is going to care.”

“I can’t get sloppy when your mother is around. I never know when she might attack.” She hadn’t meant to say it, but once the words came out, she was glad she had.

“I’m sorry. For...a lot.”

For a lot. Kelly sighed, exhausted and utterly fed up. The trickle of anger she’d been dealing with all day began to flow a lot more freely. Eight years and he still couldn’t just say it out loud.

“You’re not saying anything,” Vaughan said.

Kelly stared at him, blinking. She couldn’t have imagined anything worse for him to say at that moment. “You’re going to take that tone with me? Where the fuck have you been, Vaughan? Huh? Are you kidding me with this?”

He jerked back a little. In the past, this would have been the place she’d have apologized, even though she wasn’t at fault for anything. An ingrained response to keep her mother calm that she’d taken with her from childhood like a tic.

But she closed her mouth and refused to say she was sorry when she was most definitely not. Anger had sharpened parts of the pain of their breakup she thought she’d left in the past.

And instead of running from it, she let it slice through her. She needed to never forget what loving this man had cost her. Though she’d never trade the pleasure they’d shared to erase the pain, she couldn’t allow herself to pretend it was safe to trust him without cost.

She wasn’t willing to pay it. Not again. Not even with a lot more years and experience under her belt. She was completely beyond her ability and she couldn’t once again be in a relationship where she was far more deeply committed and invested than her partner was.

“So, okay, then. You don’t accept my apology. And I understand.”

For real? The man avoided all of this stuff for years and years and suddenly he decided to talk about it? And she was supposed to simply accept it and jump in where he was without protest?

Without even her input on whether or not she even wanted to do this right then? Ugh, his ego was insufferable. And hot, but right then insufferable. “Oh, you do?”

His eyes widened. “You’re mad.” He said it with surprise. As if he hadn’t even considered that as one of her reactions. Kelly really wished she’d have tucked a bottle of gin out here. Chocolate wasn’t enough for this.

“Yes, I’m mad!”

“That I finally apologized?”

Years later and this was how he decided to say he was sorry? No, worse, this was what he thought saying he was sorry looked like. Maybe it was that she had terrible taste in men. She needed to use one of those matchmakers. They’d do the choosing and she could avoid everyone who made her want to punch them in the junk.

But at the moment, the audacity fueled her and she gave it free rein. “I should have known that when you finally got around to it—eight years later—you’d be pissed off that someone told you to own your shit.”