There’d been no way of knowing if Lucy would travel from San Francisco to Portland for her cousin’s wedding. He’d taken a chance coming here.
In the back of his mind, he’d hoped to see her, as he did anytime he went to an event where there’d be Barones. He’d mentally prepared himself for the possibility every time. What he hadn’t banked on was seeing her with someone else. Or how he would react. He prided himself on never losing control, but one glimpse of Lucy in the arms of another man and he’d forgotten himself. Now here he was, staring at her gorgeous silhouette in the shimmer of moonlight and water, and he thought maybe losing control every once in a while wasn’t so bad.
Taking a deep breath, he stepped forward.
“I wish you weren’t here,” she stated, not turning around to look at him.
“Ouch. I wasn’t expecting you to jump into my arms, but considering you’re still my wife, I was hoping for a little more enthusiasm.”
She whirled around and pointed her finger in his face. Her cheeks were flushed with anger, her wavy, chocolate-colored hair a halo. Her dark-brown eyes flared.
“This isn’t funny,” she seethed.“And don’t call me that!”
A smart man would have retreated. But Joel had never been smart when it came to Lucy, and like a moth to a flame, he stepped closer until her finger jabbed his chest. “Wife?” he asked innocently, provoking her. He knew it was unfair to stir her temper, but damn, he had one of his own, and it had been dormant for too long. Seeing her with Nico sparked it to life.
“Yes, that,” she insisted again. “I’m not.”
“You are.”
“No!” She flattened her hand against his chest and shoved. When he didn’t budge, she stalked off to the other side of the fountain. “If I were your wife, we wouldn’t have spent the last four years avoiding each other. We wouldn’t have moved on with our lives like the whole world hadn’t just crashed around us. Like we hadn’t just spent months playing house and spending every spare minute we had together. Like we hadn’t made a—” Her voice broke, and the choked sound gutted him.
He’d been there too. He remembered it all in vivid detail.
“Like we hadn’t made a baby together?” He finished for her, even though the words stuck thick in his throat. It had been the single most important thing that had ever been gifted to him, and he’d lost it. They’d lost it. There weren’t words to describe the pain. “Is that what you did, Lucy? Move on?”
She huffed out a breath and plopped down on a bench by some rose bushes, folding her arms across her chest. Her telltale sign that she was feeling vulnerable and didn’t want to show it.
Too bad. Four years of not talking about his deepest regret, likely hers too, and he was done hiding feelings. His or hers.He needed to know.
“Did you move on?”
She turned her face away.
“Did you?” He controlled his voice. There would be no losing his cool tonight. “That man in there.” He pointed back to the hotel. “Did you move on with him?”
The answer was none of his damn business, he knew that. But it had been four long years, and they were still legally married, so the time for answers had come.
If her answer was yes, he’d find a way to live with it, but he needed to know. He’d been living half a life, burying himself in work to avoid feeling the pain that coursed through him now. He’d denied himself every opportunity to be happy in atonement for the way he’d betrayed her. If she chose to move on, it would be her right.
“No,” she whispered toward the rose bushes.
He sighed. “I’m sorry I wasn’t?—”
She cut him off by jumping to her feet and taking several steps away from him. “Joel, don’t. Please, please don’t.” She pressed her fingers against her temples before raking them through her hair. “I didn’t move on with anyone else, but that doesn’t mean I want to move on with you.”
“I figured that one out by the way you’ve been avoiding me for four years,” he murmured.
“You told them we’re engaged,” she shouted incredulously. “What were you thinking?”
“I wasn’t,” he answered honestly. “I saw you dancing with that guy, and I didn’t like it.”
“Nico is my gross second cousin. It meant nothing.”
Joel shrugged. “I didn’t like it.”
Lucy sighed. “So you told Nico we were married? Then, when you could have let that go, laughed it off, you tell my aunt and cousins we’re engaged? What did you think was going to happen? That they’d just congratulate you, give youa big ole slap on the back, and never wonder what left field that came out of? What am I supposed to do now, go in there and tell them it was a joke? I’d never live that down:Lucy’s fake engagement, the closest she’ll ever get to escaping a life of spinsterhood.”
“Stop.” He held up his hand and watched her inhale a deep breath. “Of course that’s not what I want, Luciana.”
