The Wrong Heart

  Jennifer Hartmann

  The Wrong Heart

  Copyright © 2021 by Jennifer Hartmann

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

  Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Names, characters, and places are products of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

  Cover model: Rhylan Streloff

  Photographer: Justin Dube

  Book designer: Hartmann Studios

  First printing edition 2021.

  www.jenniferhartmannauthor.com

  To the fractured and broken:

  You are worth fixing.

  —PROLOGUE—

  from:

  Magnolia

  to:

  Zephyr79@gmail.com

  date:

  Jul 7, 2020, 12:09 AM

  subject:

  Widowed & Wilting

  You don’t know me, but you have my husband’s heart.

  I shouldn’t be doing this. I shouldn’t be contacting you. It’s wrong and foolish, and probably illegal, considering I received your e-mail address through confidential medical records.

  You have every right to turn me in.

  Hell, maybe there’s a part of me that wants you to. I don’t know how to live in this world without him, anyway. Prison could be a welcome distraction to the knee-buckling pain I’m faced with day after day.

  But there’s also a part of me that hopes you won’t—a desperate, twisted part that is begging for you to find sympathy in that heart I’ve come to know so well.

  A part that will wait for you to write me back.

  No names. No personal details.

  Just a conversation.

  The only thing I have left of him is inside you.

  — Magnolia

  —ONE—

  I’ve always had a weak stomach.

  Skinned knees, roadkill, slasher films. Even a rare steak makes me woozy. So, when I slice my finger on the serrated knife and blood pools to the surface, I go ashen.

  Charlie leans across the table, snatching up my hand and examining the wound. “Nice one, Mel.” He shoots me a sympathetic smile, then wraps my finger in the dinner napkin from his lap. “You okay?”

  “I’m only panicking on the inside,” I croak, reining in my nausea.

  The handsome face shining back at me settles my swelling anxiety as I blow out a breath. Amber-infused eyes dance across my features, assessing fondly, bathing me in a warm familiarity. Like peach pie.

  I compared Charlie to peach pie on the night we met. I was deliriously drunk on Schnapps—peach-flavored, coincidentally—and thought he had the sweetest, warmest eyes I’d ever seen. Just like peach pie. Charlie was somehow swept off his feet by my intoxicated babbling, slurred words, and strange correlation to dessert, and even though I ended that night by puking on his Sketchers, he asked for my hand in marriage one year later.

  That was seven years ago, and today we’re celebrating our five-year wedding anniversary.

  With peach pie, of course.

  I heave in a rattled sigh, unwrapping my finger and zoning in on the tiny cut as I pucker my lips. “It’s fatal,” I decide.

  “Clearly. The infection is spreading already.”

  “Only a kiss can save me from a slow, painful death.”

  Charlie tsks me with his tongue. “You’ve been watching too many Disney movies,” he chides. “You can only be saved by a highly skilled sex machine, willing to ravish you with his ultra-healing weapon.”

  My husband’s ensuing eyebrow waggle has me holding back an unladylike snort. I gasp at his audacity. “Where on Earth will I find such a noble savior in a place like this?” Glancing around the restaurant for effect, I eyeball our waiter. “Geoffrey. He was very efficient in providing us with sustenance. He must be skilled in other areas.”

  “False. I caught Geoffrey flirting with the bus boy—he’s not the one,” Charlie assesses, then sighs with an overly dramatic breath. “However…”

  I straighten in my seat, intrigued. “Yes?”

  “There is someone willing to perform this harrowing task. He’s ridiculously good looking.”

  “Go on.”

  “He always remembers to put the toilet seat down.”

  I place both hands over my heart. “Impossible.”

  “He doesn’t snore. He never steals the covers. He cooks a mean goulash, enjoys doing the dishes, and has quite an impressive… weapon.”

  A wink follows, and I swoon. “I love goulash.”

  “We must act now. Time is running out.”

  “But…” My bottom lip juts out, pouty and adorable. “Peach pie.”

  We both glance down at the half-eaten confection adorning my plate, gooey and glazed, topped with a heaping dollop of whipped cream. As much as I love Charlie’s “ultra-healing weapon,” there’s no way I’m leaving until I finish this pie.

  “Fine,” Charlie relents, leaning against his seat until the chair tips back on two legs. I always scold him for it, but he does it anyway. One of these days he’ll fall, and I will laugh. “I suppose it’s hard to compete with that. At least you’ll die happy.”

  A smile breaks out across my face as I dig the tines of my fork into the warm dessert, my gaze still fixed on the man across the table. His bangs fall over his forehead in a swirl of chocolate and caramel, a boyish charm that adds to his youthful appearance. His dimpled grin is the icing on the cake.

  Or… the whipped cream on the pie.

  My tongue licks at the sweet cream coating my fork, and I watch my husband’s amber eyes heat with bronzed flames.

  I’m an evil tease.

  He captures his lip between his teeth. “On second thought…”

  Five minutes later, the bill has been paid, Geoffrey has been generously tipped, and all thoughts of pie scatter from my mind as we skip out of the bar and into the setting sun.

  The southern Wisconsin air feels fresh and musky, a prelude to springtime and new beginnings. The faint scent of impending rainfall fractures the heady Saturday night aroma of downtown pizza joints, mingling with engine fumes from the stream of traffic beside us.

  I swing our interlaced hands back and forth as we glide down the sidewalk, my smile bright and beaming like the string lights connecting one lamppost to the next. Passersby return the sentiment with their own cordial waves, head bobs, and smiles to rival mine.

  “I’ll never understand it,” Charlie murmurs, his feet trying to keep up with my swiftly moving legs as I pull him forward, reveling in the way the breeze dances across my skin.

  “Understand what?”

  “How you suck everybody in like that. You’re like a happy vacuum.”

  My giggles have me doubling over, so I squeeze his palm to keep me upright. “God, Charlie. You can’t be slinging those sexy nicknames at me in public.” His rumble of laughter floats up to me, and I shoot him a nose crinkle over my shoulder. “And I can’t take all the credit. It’s Saturday night. People are always happier on Saturday nights.”

  He gives me a tug until I’m falling back against his chest, two arms encircling my waist in a protective grip. “No, Mel. It’s all you.”

  People dodge us when we come to a complete stop in the middle of the sidewalk, but we’re uncaring, totally oblivious to the world around us. It’s just Cha
rlie and Melody standing beneath quiet rainclouds, a new chapter blooming like the magnolia trees budding in our backyard. My eyes close through a sigh of contentment.

  Charlie’s chin rests atop my shoulder, his warm breath kissing the curve of my neck. “Do you think it worked?”

  A grin curls my lips. I twist around in his embrace, catching the quick flash of nerves in his eyes. “You make it sound so technical.”

  “Well, it sort of is. It’s science.”

  “You’re really bringing your sexy A-game tonight. You do want to get laid, right?”

  Charlie presses his forehead to mine, tawny bangs tickling my hairline. And then his hand crawls up the back of my thigh, landing on my backside and cupping gently, our groins melding together. “What do you think?”

  The jitters in his gold-dusted irises flutter away, manifesting into a colony of butterflies in my belly. “I think—”

  A tipsy brunette bumps into us, laughing her apology as she stumbles by, and we’re reminded of our audience. We take our two-person rendezvous to the far-right corner of the sidewalk until Charlie’s back is level with the brick building. I dip two fingers into his front pocket, while my purse dangles beside me in my opposite hand. “Is this normal?”

  His warm gaze flits across my face. “Grinding on each other in front of Benny’s Diner?”

  “The fact that we still want to grind on each other in front of Benny’s Diner after seven years together. When does the light dim? When does the spark fade?”

  “Never.” Charlie traces his fingertips along my parted lips, that familiar knowing smile etched into his. “You’re the sun, Melody March. The sun only knows how to shine.”

  Lord help me. Only this man could be equally proficient in computer analytics and spouting off glorious words like poetry. “I’m the sun, and you’re the sky.”

  I try to hide my adoring smile in the buttons of his dress shirt, but he tips my chin up with two long fingers. “Do you think it worked?” he repeats, soft and subdued, eyes twinkling when they meet with mine.

  “Yes.” It’s a cautious, hopeful whisper. I lean up on my tiptoes, my five-foot-two frame hardly able to reach his lips. He bends down, and I seal my declaration with a kiss. “Do you?”

  Charlie grins as he sweeps his nose against mine. “I hope not. I really enjoy practicing.”

  “God, you are—”

  I intend to swat him with my purse, but I’m almost knocked off my feet when that purse is ripped from my hand in a sudden flash, and I stumble, momentarily stunned and confused, my next breath sticking to the back of my throat as I try to process what the hell just happened.

  But I don’t have time to process it because Charlie takes off, leaving me in a stupefied haze on the sidewalk, knees struggling to keep me upright.

  My purse was stolen.

  And my husband is chasing the thief through the crowded downtown, dress coat billowing behind him as he bumps into slack-jawed bystanders and hollers at the stranger to stop and get the fuck back here.

  The fog lifts, enabling me to follow. “Charlie!”

  My sky-high wedges are hardly effective running shoes, and my ankles keep twisting, my mini-skirt hindering my speed.

  Is this real life?

  I still can’t process the fact that I’ve been robbed, and Charlie is chasing him down, and I’m chasing Charlie, and not a single goddamn person is trying to help. They just stand there gawking, watching the scene unfold through their cell phone screens.

  “Charlie!” I call again, begging him to stop, to let it go. This is madness. The offender makes a sharp left into the middle of the street, Charlie right on his tail. “Charlie, please!”

  He keeps going, keeps gaining speed, lessening the gap between them.

  The moment he reaches for the man’s arm, tearing the purse from his grip, a scream erupts from the bowels of my very essence. A category five hurricane. It shreds my insides, liquifies me, whittles me down to dust and debris.

  “Charlie!”

  A pick-up truck blows the red light and slams into my husband.

  Tires screeching, glass shattering, metal breaking bone.

  Screams, sobs, gasps.

  Charlie is struck hard, bouncing off the windshield, tumbling over the hood, and rolling off the vehicle, landing in a heap on the pavement.

  The thief climbs to his feet and hops into the passenger’s seat of the pick-up, then the truck takes off.

  It just bolts.

  It leaves the scene of the crime in a flash of burnt orange, rusted hubcaps, and a plume of exhaust—a cloud of carnage.

  And then I’m running.

  I think I’m running, but it’s all in slow-motion, and I’m not sure what happened to my shoes, and people are gathering, shrieking, bellowing for help, but I must be dreaming, and it will all be over soon. We’ll wake up in our king-sized bed, rested and satiated, snuggled up in the brand-new bedspread I just purchased that smells like Charlie’s favorite fabric softener, birch water and botanicals. I’ll prepare breakfast, blueberry pancakes and turkey bacon, while Charlie does the dishes because he enjoys doing the dishes. He’s weird like that.

  I’ll turn on some music, probably a mix of CCR and Taylor Swift and Jimmy Eat World.

  Because I’m weird like that.

  Charlie will tease me for singing off-key, and then we’ll dance, stepping on each other’s toes, and I’ll giggle when he dips me too low, falling to the tile floor, collapsing into a pile of laughter and limbs. We’ll make love right there in the farmhouse kitchen, and it will be the perfect beginning to our fifth year of wedded bliss.

  Yes.

  I’m definitely dreaming.

  But the gravel digging into my heels as I race to the love of my life feels painfully real, and the tears are warm and wet as they spill down my cheeks. My ears are ringing, echoing with a wretched, vile sound that appears to be lightyears away. Something chilling and bloodcurdling.

  It’s a scream.

  It’s my scream.

  A hollow, broken wail pulled from someplace dark and untapped.

  I don’t recognize it, but how could I? I’ve never made this sound before. I’ve never experienced this unique kind of heartache—the kind that steals away your senses.

  Vision blurred, body numb, taste thwarted by ashes and soot.

  I can hear, though.

  I hear that scream reverberating through me, that heartbreaking scream, and I’ll hear it over and over and over again for the rest of my life.

  It’s an overture to dissolution.

  My kneecaps find the pavement as I collapse beside him, my hands reaching for every piece of him I can grasp. He’s still warm, still alive, still mine to hold. “Charlie… oh, my God. Oh, my God. Baby, talk to me.”

  Charlie groans, his dark brown lashes fluttering as he tries to roll towards me. “Mel,” he croaks, voice scraped and splintered, matching the fresh wounds that mar his beautiful face. When he locates my eyes, amber locking on emerald, a smile stretches as he chokes out more words. “I got your purse.”

  Tears blind me as I glance over at his hand, his bloody, bruised knuckles, and note that the leather strap of my handbag is still twined between his fingers. Another sob leaves me shaking, hands trembling as they clutch the front of his shirt. “So stupid. So, so stupid,” I wheeze.

  “It was epic, though, right? You were totally impressed?”

  Charlie’s smile lingers, a tiny sunbeam poking through dark gray storm clouds. I sniffle as my head swings side to side. “It was just a purse.”

  “It was your purse.”

  His response is organic, quick and easy.

  Like there is no other response.

  Sirens howl in the distance, and people gather closer, whispers and noise, shredding our intimate moment. I cradle his face between my palms and lift his head, inserting my legs underneath him until he’s draped across my lap. “You’re going to be okay,” I murmur through tear-stained lips, brushing his bangs away from his fo
rehead. “You’re going to be fine.”

  Charlie grits his teeth together, trying to hide his pain from me. “Only a kiss can save me from a slow, painful death.”

  He’s trying to lighten the moment, bring teasing to the turmoil.

  So authentically Charlie.

  I lean down to kiss him, a new wave of anguish spilling from me as our mouths collide. “I love you. Stay with me, okay?” I kiss him again and again, repeating those words, carving them into his bones, so he can’t forget. “I love you so much.”

  “Don’t cry, Mel.” Charlie raises one unsteady hand to my cheek, thumb dusting over the tears, a gentle caress. “The sun doesn’t cry.”

  We say it at the same time: “The sun only knows how to shine.”

  But I’m the sun, and he’s the sky, and I don’t know how to exist without him.

  What happens to the sun when the sky falls?

  No, no, no.

  Stop it, Melody.

  He’s going to be fine.

  Charlie starts coughing then, sputtering in my lap, blood misting my face like a grisly rainfall. “Charlie, Charlie… oh, God, Charlie.” I shake his shoulders and squeeze him to me, holding tight to keep him warm… because that’s what I do.

  I’m the sun, after all—a beacon of warmth.

  His throat bobs as he swallows, one lone tear collecting at the corner of his eye and gliding down his temple. Blood tinges the droplet as it makes a slow descent and lands near his ear. It just sits there, like it’s trying to hang on for dear life.

  Charlie inhales a jagged breath. “You smell like peaches, Mrs. March.”

  He’s still smiling. He’s still smiling, despite his broken body and blood-stained skin. “Your eyes remind me of peach pie,” I rasp, trying to stay strong. Trying to stay so strong.

  Just like him.

  “It’s meant to be.”

  That singular tear finally falls, collapsing onto the cement, and then the ambulance and police cruisers pull up while people scatter like the clouds above us. As the medics approach, the sky explodes with thunderous lightning, a piercing crack that rattles my bones.