Unexpected Oasis by Cd Hussey Read Free Book Online Page A

his itchy spot and focuses on the dirty green ball in Trey's hand. With a grin, he chucks it out the door and Frank sprints from the barn after it.
    I rise from the floor, dusting the new layer of fine black hairs from my pants. Frank comes running back with the tennis ball and Trey greets him enthusiastically. There's something about watching a man lavish adoring attention on a dog that makes my heart weak. Especially this man and especially this dog. The way Trey coos at him as if he just won "Best in Show", ignoring every scar, every imperfection, completely melts my heart.
    I mean, if he can love an animal that much, that unconditionally, then a child…
    I swallow and force the thoughts away. I can't think like that. It isn't healthy. 
    Tears suddenly catch at the back of my throat and I feel them sting my eyes. Before Trey has a chance to catch me getting all emotional, I mumble a quick, "I gotta go," and make a hurried escape through the opposite end of the breezeway. I don't look at Trey. I don't look at Frank. I only focus on the red Mars landscape as I put one foot rapidly in front of the other.
    What the hell is wrong with me? Am I seriously lusting after Trey? Picturing what our kids would look like? It may be stupid, but it feels like a betrayal to Jim. A betrayal to the life we shared, the happiness we once had. It's only been seven months for Pete's sake. I've barely gotten past the denial state of grief—and that was only because Courtney's baby bump practically knocked me over when I ran into her at the grocery store. I'm only teetering on the edge of acceptance.
    The betrayal might have started long ago, but it still feels very raw to me. How can I even consider being attracted to another man when only a few scant months ago the perfect future I'd planned with my seemingly perfect husband was ripped away from me when the doctor very matter of factly told me I would never get pregnant?
    I was already mourning the loss of children I would never bear when I lost Jim. Just like that. Out of the blue. No warning. No indication something was wrong. It's why I came her e. Why I ran here. But that doesn't make me ready to just give my past a big fuck you and start flirting with the cute security guard. What kind of awful woman would that make me? How meaningless would that make the last seven years of my life?
    One thing is certain; I'm not giving into it. I'm not going to entertain ideas of having a wild, passionate affair with the gorgeous, hunky security guard. I'm not going to pretend that we have any sort of connection or that he finds me remotely attractive.
    Even if the latter part were true, it would only be because I'm the only breathing, under fifty, un-burqua'd woman for miles. I don't find myself attractive. There's no way he can. I obviously wasn't attractive enough for Jim, and his sex appeal couldn't hold a candle next to Trey's.
    I wander over to the fence behind my building. The security tower looms above me and I think I see Double D perched in it, large machine gun in hand.
    Married…with a couple kids. I shake my head in disgust. All the time hitting on me. Are all men pigs? I'm beginning to think so.
    I used to silently chastise women who bitterly complain about the lack of moral compass men seem to share, rationalizing how it wasn't fair to lump all men in with a couple of bad seeds. Now I'm becoming one of those bitter women. Correction, I am one of those bitter women.
    There's a gap in the adobe wall under the guard tower and I peer through it. Though the chain link I can see the Afghan security, guarding a perimeter they'll never be allowed inside. Beyond the guard closest to me, I can just make out a sign. The words are blurry, but as I squint they come into focus.
    "Warning. Mine Field." Below the words is a picture of a stick figure being blown up. One of his pencil arms flies left, one pencil leg flies right.
      Oh fuck. My heart suddenly racing, my stomach tight, I take a few rapid