“I need more than this. More than mood swings andbreadcrumbs and sweet moments that vanish the second it’s inconvenient for you to care.”
His jaw tightens. “Idocare.”
“Then why didn’t you come back to the room last night?” I fire back. And I know I’m talking in circles, but there’s something he’s not saying, and I want the truth. “Why did you leave me alone after what I told you?”
He hesitates. Just long enough to say everything without saying a word.
“I needed you.” The wind off the water whips my hair into my face, and I shove it back with shaking fingers. “For more than your money or security, I actually neededyou—the man who looked at me like I was more than something he could just…win.”
His expression shifts and the color drains from his cheeks. He doesn’t flinch, doesn’t look away, but something in him staggers. Like a blow landed. Like he didn’t expect it to hurt.
“I’m sorry,” he says softly.
No excuse. No sidestep. A real, honest apology.
It knocks the breath out of me.
I blink, stunned, because this isn’t the man who once turned a fundraiser into a PR stunt and called it romance. This isn’t the man who missed birthdays and canceled dates and always made me feel like I was the one asking for too much.
“Oh,” I breathe. It’s all I can manage. Just that one tiny word, because my chest is too full, and my throat is too tight, and I don’t trust myself not to cry.
“I should never have left you,” he says. His voice is still low, but steadier now. “I should have stayed. I shouldhave listened.”
He takes a step toward me, slow and careful, like he knows just how close he came to breaking whatever’s left between us.
“I’m still the same man I was gathering eggs with you yesterday morning,” he adds, eyes locked on mine. “Let me prove it.”
I look down at the basket in his hand, at the blanket tucked under his arm, then up at him again, wary. “This your idea of proving it?”
He lets out a quiet breath. “It’s a start. Just…come with me. Please.”
“I don’t need a romantic field trip,” I say, but the bite in my voice is already fading. My edges are duller now, the anger bleeding out of me, leaving behind nothing but tired muscles and too many feelings.
The corner of his mouth lifts in a half-smile. “Don’t think of it that way. Think of it as breakfast.”
I stare at him. At the wind-tousled hair. At the soft lines around his eyes, at the quiet way he’s standing there. Not forcing, not charming, not telling me I’m spiraling. Just waiting.
“Where?” I ask, arms still stubbornly crossed.
He gestures toward the sleek little sailboat bobbing gently next to the dock. “There. Other side of the island. Just a little while.”
“I’m not done yelling at you.”
That half-smile tugs at his lips again. “I’d be disappointed if you were.”
I stare at him for a long beat. My pulse thuds hard in my throat, tangled with too many feelings—anger, confusion, something terrifyingly close to hope. I don’twant to give in. I don’t want to make this easy. But I also don’t want to stay stuck in the version of us that’s alwaysalmostworked.
“Fine,” I say. “I’ll go. But you’re onextremelythin ice.”
“Wouldn’t expect anything less.”
I step past him, jaw set, my flats thudding softly against the dock as I head for the boat. My heart kicks with every step, still thrumming with leftover frustration and a feeling I don’t want to name.
He doesn’t reach for me. Doesn’t guide me with a hand on the small of my back like he always used to. He lets me move ahead. Lets me make the first move. He gives me space.
And maybe that, more than the apology, more than the picnic, is what begins to thaw the part of me that still has hope.
He follows behind, and for the first time, it feels like we’re not falling back into old patterns. It feels like we’re choosing something new.
