She nibbled on her lip. “Mathew…”
“Just hear me out. Let me explain.”
Holding the tool bag in front of her like a shield, she watched him continue his approach. Her heart sped up, but it wasn’t the same painful tempo that she’d experienced when she saw him with Victoria. “Okay.”
He stopped suddenly, his eyes full of disbelief. “Really?”
“Sure. I can give you that much.”
Relief had the muscles in his shoulders relaxing. He didn’t make any attempt to move closer, nor did he speak. She wondered in part if he needed to collect his thoughts because he hadn’t expected her to accept his request so quickly.
River glanced around the parking lot, then nodded toward the café. “Maybe we should find a place to sit.”
“Right. Yeah.” He nodded. “That sounds good.”
She walked past him and into the building. Ignoring the guilty look Jason shot her from behind the counter, she chose a table and sat down, waiting for Mathew to speak.
He sat across from her and stared at his hands for a moment. “I got married young,” he said at last. “She came from the kind of family that expected her to marry a lawyer or a…”
“Or a doctor,” River said quietly.
His eyes lifted to hers. “Yeah.”
He looked back down. “At first, it worked. Or maybe we just thought it did. I was busy, but we both expected that. I didn’t think there was anything wrong with pouring everything into work.” His gaze flicked up again, and she knew he was talking about more than his marriage. “But after a while, it stopped working. We barely saw each other. We fought more than we talked. And by the end, I think we were both miserable.”
River stayed still, letting him keep going.
“We split on good terms. Nothing vindictive occurred. But I think it messed me up a little, which is one of the biggest reasons I didn’t tell you.” Mathew finally looked up at her and the remorse shone in his eyes.
“Is that the only reason you didn’t tell me?” she asked, working harder than ever to keep her shields up.
Mathew exhaled slowly. When he looked at her again, there was no defensiveness in his face, only regret.
“I felt like I’d failed,” he said plainly. “Not just at marriage. At… building the life I thought I was supposed to have. I had the title, the career, the wedding. But I couldn’t make the rest of it work. No family. No kids. No solid ground.” His jaw tightened. “And I didn’t want you looking at me and seeing someone who couldn’t hold it together.”
Her chest tightened hard at that.
“Most of all,” he said, quieter now, “I didn’t want you to hear about my past and decide I’d only disappoint you too.”
River’s eyes widened before she looked away. She’d never wanted to see him as a failure. And yet, hearing all of this, she could also feel her own hurt shifting, making room for something more complicated.
It was too much. Too fast. Too raw.
Without a word, she pushed back from the table and stood.
“River—”
She grabbed her tool bag and walked out before the tears gathering in her eyes could fully betray her.
She didn’t want to go home. She needed space to think. Space where his face wasn’t right in front of her and his voice wasn’t making everything harder.
The coffee shop down the street was the first place she saw, so she parked and went inside.
She didn’t even bother ordering. She just dropped into the first chair near the door and stared at the table, trying to get her breathing under control.
What Mathew had said made sense.
That was the problem.
