I glance up. The windows are lined with silhouettes—figures watching, horrified, enthralled. My mother. Sophia. The entire bloody family. All of them witnessing the composed Edward Cavendish come apart at the seams.
I don’t stop.
“Fucking asshole!” Charlie shouts behind me.
I keep walking, long strides cutting across the grass, my breath coming hard and fast. My fists remain curled, my signet ring digging into the skin of my palm.
Because if I stop—if I so much as turn my head, if I even glance in his direction—I might finish what I started. And I can’t do that.
I’ve had too much time to think about Daisy. Too many nights alone in my cavernous townhouse, pacing through empty rooms with nothing but Millie’s ghost for company—trapped in the wreckage of my own making.
Too much time thinking about how I treated her.
How we all treated her.
And all I feel is shame.
That night at the ball blindsided me—gutted me, in fact.
The moment I saw her at the ball, the moment my brain caught up with what my eyes were seeing—Daisy, in a dress that stopped conversations dead, standing with another man’s hands on her waist, another man’slipson hers . . .
I was livid. Possessed by something primal, and I snapped.She’s mine.I knew it the second he pulled her in for a kiss.
I knew it when I saw Lizzie at the hospital and then checked the records to confirm my worst fear—Daisy hadn’t been off planning some grand trekking trip. She’d been admitted to the ER for dehydration and exhaustion.
And that word fits her perfectly.
Mine.
Mine to keep.
Mine to protect.
Mine to cherish.
And I fucked it up.
I treated our relationship like some kind of experiment in a petri dish to watch closely as it develops and discreetly terminate if it starts to take a toxic path.
I told myself I was protecting her, sparing her from a life with a man like me—older, serious, a chronic workaholic.
But the truth?
I was just afraid. Afraid that if I surrendered to her completely, she’d consume me. That I’d lose myself. That I’d make a fool of myself.
The joke’s on me, though.
Because for all my attempts to stay in control, to keep her at arm’s length, I’ve never been more out of control.
It’s been two agonizing weeks since Daisy collapsed on set. At least Liam has been decent enough to pass updates through Lizzie about how she’s doing.
She won’t take my calls. Won’t respond to my messages. She’s probably blocked me altogether. But she won’t be able to avoid me at the wedding.
And that worries me.
The last thing I wanted was a spectacle, yet that’s exactly what I’ve created. Now, everyone is talking about us, and she’s already under enough pressure as it is.
But come hell or high water, we’re going to face the truth of what we are.
