The Neighbor's Son (The Forbidden Love Series: Book 1) by Ella Ward

 
    CHAPTER
I
     
    "You have got to be kidding me," I
whined, groaning into my pillow while the alarm on my phone blared
away. "How can it be morning already? I just went to sleep." Well,
not really. I did go to bed at a reasonable hour the night before.
I just didn't fall asleep until dawn was breaking. It was one of
those nights when you can't get your mind to stop racing no matter
how hard you try to shut it off.
    Too sleepy to reach for the phone and
toss it out the window, I pulled the covers over my head and tried
to ignore the annoying beep. As the phone went silent, I thought
about spending the morning in bed to catch up on some much needed
sleep. After all, it was a Saturday and I didn't have to go to
work. But then I remembered that I had a yoga class that morning
and many errands to run that day. So I peeled my sleep-deprived
body off the bed and dragged it into the bathroom.
    After a long, cold shower, my body felt
a little stiff but I was fully awake. Realizing I didn't have much
time before I had to be at my class, I quickly slipped into my
favorite black and gold yoga outfit and rushed back into the
bathroom to do my hair. There, I stared at my make-up free face in
the mirror, and that’s when it hit me: I was no longer Mrs. Peter
MacDougal. Even though Peter and I had been separated for over a
year prior to finalizing our divorce, the magnitude of that
life-altering event hadn't really sunk in until that morning when I
caught my reflection in the mirror. It didn’t even register when I
signed the papers in his lawyer's office two days earlier. I guess
part of me was still in denial about the whole thing.
    I let out a heavy sigh while pulling my
long, auburn hair into a high ponytail. A mixture of dread and fear
washed over me. The word ‘divorcee’ is a term I never thought I'd
use to describe myself. But there I was: A thirty-two-year-old
childless divorcee, alone in a house too big for one person and
wondering where the last fourteen years of her life had
gone.
    I had been with Peter since I was
eighteen years old. When I met him, I was a freshman at Boston
College and worked part-time at a fancy restaurant in downtown
Boston. One night after my shift, my crappy car broke down in the
middle of the road and Peter stopped to help. After calling me a
tow truck, he gave me a ride back to my dorm. On the way to the
campus, I learned that Peter was single, worked in real estate, and
was fifteen years older than me.
    The age difference worried me, but
Peter was so charming and confident I decided to overlook it. When
he dropped me off at my dorm that night, he asked me for my number
and I gave it to him. He called a week later and took me on the
most romantic date I had ever been on. We became inseparable after
that.
    Peter and I had been dating for just a
few months when he got down on one knee and put a gigantic 18-karat
diamond ring on my finger. I said yes without hesitation. Many
people around me told me I was rushing into things, but I ignored
their warnings. What can I say? Back then, I was a naïve and
inexperienced eighteen-year-old. Prior to Peter, I had never had a
real boyfriend. Most guys I met back then were total jerks who were
only interested in getting in my pants, or at least that's what it
felt like.
    Then Peter came along. He said all the
right things, treated me like a princess and swore to always be
faithful to me. I believed his promises, married him, and moved
across the country with him. Looking back, I wish I hadn’t done any
of those things. Just a few months into our marriage, the true
Peter revealed himself. He became possessive and condescending and
was incapable of keeping it in his pants.
    Every time I confronted Peter about his
cheating, he either denied he was stepping out on me or promised
he’d never do it again. But he kept sticking it into anything that
walked. I wanted to leave him but the naïve girl within me always
told me not to. I honestly thought I could change