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JAKE UNDERSTOOD
Penelope Ward
First Edition, March 2015
Copyright
©
2015 by
Penelope Ward
All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced nor used in any
manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for use of
brief quotations in a book review.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of
the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or
dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Cover by RBA Designs. Stock photo © Shutterstock.com
Table of Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
More From Penelope Ward
Acknowledgements
About the Author
CHAPTER 1
Present
The sound of the door slamming replayed over and over in my head.
My wife walked out on me.
Seven hours and thirty-five minutes had passed to be exact since she’d left, but it felt like an
eternity. She said she’d come back when she cleared her mind but didn’t say how long that would take.
Nina made two requests before she was gone: not to call her and not to text her.
Not wanting to make things worse, I decided to respect her wishes and spent most of the day
staring at the front door from my spot on the couch, hoping that any minute she would walk in and tell me
that everything was going to be okay with us.
The truth was I couldn’t blame her for leaving. Nina had every right to be pissed at me. We loved
each other fiercely and had gotten into our share of fights over the years since getting married, but never
had she physically left me. Last night was the straw that broke the camel’s back.
This day was a long time coming. In fact, I’d been bracing for it from the moment I first met her.
Maybe I was a fool for ever believing that she could handle the situation she’d gotten herself into when
she agreed to be with me. It was only a matter of time.
The one bit of good news was that our son, A.J., had been at my mother’s when everything went
down this morning, so he didn’t have to witness it. I had arranged to have him stay there this weekend for
a different reason, so it just happened to work out that he wasn’t here. I’d told Nina that my mother simply
missed her grandson and wanted some bonding time. Ma had picked him up Friday afternoon. Nina had no
idea that I’d actually planned a party for her tonight. So, this was suckass timing.
She’d recently finished nursing school after taking several years off to raise our son. I was so
damn proud of her and thought it would be nice to surprise her by inviting those closest to us to the
apartment for an intimate celebration. Our best friends, Skylar and Mitch, would be driving up to Boston
from New Jersey and staying with us for the long weekend. My sister, Allison, and her husband, Cedric,
were planning to bring food from Erika’s, a dueling piano bar and restaurant on Beacon Hill they’d
recently invested in. Tonight was supposed to be one of the most amazing Saturday nights of our lives. It
was also why I went to visit Ivy last night—on Friday—instead of my usual Saturday.
That was my first mistake.
A loud knock on the door interrupted my thoughts. My heart began to pound as I leapt up from the
couch.
Nina. Baby. You came back.
Nervous excitement transformed into overwhelming disappointment at the sight of Skylar and
Mitch standing in the doorway. Apparently, I was so excited to think it might have been Nina, I’d forgotten
she would have just used her key instead of knocking. I’d also apparently forgotten to tell them not to
bother coming to Boston tonight. There would be no party now. The look of despair on my face must have
been instantly obvious.
“Don’t look so thrilled to see us, Jake.” Skylar stomped the snow off her feet and brushed past me.
“We’ve been in the car for five hours. I have to drop the kids off at the pool stat.”
Mitch saw my confused face and clarified, “That means she has to take a piss.”
I couldn’t help but chuckle at the sight of little Skylar with a baby hanging from a carrier on her

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