Page 73 of All For You

“Lizzy, I’ve made a complete mess of everything. I’m so sorry for what I said to you on that Sunday at the inn, and what I did to your sister. My behavior was judgmental and harsh and caused pain to your whole family. I’m truly ashamed of myself.”

Lizzy sucked in a breath and clutched around her waist protectively. She was listening, but my gut twisted hard at how much I wanted her to believe in my deep regret.

I rubbed the back of my neck. “I reflected on what you said about your sister’s shy demeanor. I recognized that I was unfairly equating her with the behavior of someone else inmy past. I’ve seen the good Jane has been doing in her work at school. Those things together made me realize I’d made a horrible mistake by interfering. When I put my wounded pride and prejudices aside, I could see that I had no reason for being concerned about your sister’s motivations.

“My brother ultimately made his own decision, but I am not going to pretend he wasn’t influenced by me. I’d only wanted to protect him, but instead, like you said—I ruined his chance at happiness. I’m also sorry I was not respectful of your mother. I don’t know her and I judged her, and I am appalled that I did that.”

I scrubbed a hand down my face. “I know I’ve caused harm and pain, and my actions were unforgivable. And yet I stand here before you and ask you to forgive me. I will do whatever I need to make it right.”

She went quiet, and I could see her process my apology.

Was it enough? A deep dread settled under my ribs.

She raised her face to me, but her arms were still crossed. “I appreciate your apology. You seem genuine and contrite. Youhavecaused my family a lot of pain. You must speak to your brother, and to my sister, and make this right between them.”

“I will.” My voice sounded resolute, and I was. “I’ll talk to my brother immediately after this. I’ll apologize to your sister. Then I’ll arrange for them to meet in a place that is conducive to them talking. I will fix this, I promise.”

“Good.” She thought for a while, but I could see her frustration build. “But why would you think my sister was being duplicitous? Who was this person in your past you equated her with?”

Something wasn’t being said between us. I needed to explain so she would understand why I’d behaved so abhorrently. I hadn’t wanted to talk about this part of my past with anyone, not even with Wills. I wanted that mess where it belonged—in thepast, dead, buried deep, and forgotten. I took shallow breaths and braced my body, the bruises awakening, aching. I hadn’t said their names in a year, but if I had any chance with Lizzy, I had to confess, tell her about them.

My face strained, I gestured to one of the two old arches, the one smothered with white roses. “I think I wanted to tell you everything, because I’ve brought you to the arch.”

Lizzy scanned my face, confused about the arch.

“The most perfect arch,” Lizzy said, examining the stonework warily because she clearly couldn’t see where I was going with this. “And these roses are perfectly covering it. It looks like something out of a storybook—they look almost like hothouse flowers. How did your gardener get them to grow so beautifully in rainy old England?” She put her face into one and inhaled. “If I were writing this, I would have a couple stand under this and kiss. The whole picture is perfect. It’s a wedding photographer’s dream.”

Perfect.Sophia, my former fiancée. I shifted uncomfortably at the thought of her sleekly straightened hair, full makeup, and different neutral outfits appropriate to whatever we were doing—walking in the forest, having tea with my mother in the drawing room, out in London at a modern new bar.

In contrast, the woman in front of me had a smudge of something on her nose, hair strewn with more leaves, a casual oversized white linen shirt over her ripped jeans. And quite a few scratches on her wrists and ankles.

“You always have foliage in your hair.” Without thinking, I plucked out two leaves.

“I’m always a mess.”

“I like it. I mean, you’re not a mess. God.” I swiped a hand through my hair with a desperate laugh. “What I meant to say is…never change.”

“Oh.” She blushed and ducked her head. “Thank you. I don’t think I could change even if I wanted.”

I turned to her with a new energy. “The archwasfor wedding photos.Mywedding.”

She gasped. “You’ve been married?”

I gave a mirthless laugh. “No, it didn’t happen. I’m left with this arch, which, as you say, is perfectly covered with white roses. My former fiancée, Sophia, had the gardener buy mature plants six months before our wedding to ensure they were crammed on the arch like that.” They’d flourished, which was a torturous reminder, but I didn’t have the heart to ask the gardener to tear them out.

“Oh Darcy, I’m so sorry. Do you mind my asking what happened?”

What should I reveal? It was all pretty ugly, and I didn’t want to tarnish this conversation with the details. But something in me wanted her to know me better, wanted her to know the pain of my past, messiness and all. I looked at her lovely, lightly freckled, upturned face, and what I saw there was only softness and the willingness to understand me more.

“Sophia and I met through friends in London. She was beautiful and shy and quiet, but a perfectionist. This arch was another thing she’d engineered for the wedding. She’d engineered a lot of perfection in our lives. At the time, I never minded, because I thought that meant she cared so much. I didn’t realize that she cared more about howsheseemed and howour relationshipseemed. I chose to believe instead it meant that she cared aboutme.”

Lizzy looked startled by my confession, then her face softened, her brown eyes reflecting my pain. “Oh God, I’m so sorry. I didn’t know. It wasn’t in any of the society columns in the newspaper.”

“Nothing about us was in the press, because I kept a low profile even back then. Sophia was always keen to have everything publicized. I was astounded at that because, as I said, she was shy and retiring. Like your sister.”

I felt very foolish for falling for Sophia. What did that say about my ego that I had been so deceived by her? A complete absence of judgment or awareness on my part. I now saw how it colored my thoughts about Jane. A reaction that had been purely emotional, not rational. How could a sister of Lizzy’s, a person whom she loved, be as duplicitous as I’d imagined Jane could be?

Realization dawned on her face. “Oh, that’s why…”