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She refocused on Aiden. “So what happened?” she prompted softly.
He rubbed a hand over his face. “I was young and stupid enough to believe loving someone meant losing them.”
“You thought you’d lose me like you lost your mom and dad?” she said gently, her heart squeezing in her chest.
His smile was sad, his eyes lost in the past. “Yes, in a screwed up, roundabout way, I really did.”
She slumped back in her seat. All those shattered pieces of her heart, never to be fully repaired thanks to his disillusioned beliefs. Losing his parents hadn’t just affected his life, it’d affected hers, too.
He’d betrayed and abandoned her, and she’d decided if the love of her life had done that to her along with her biological parents, she mustn’t be worthy of love. She gulped down some of her drink, needing fortification. “I wish I’d known.”
He slugged down some of his icy-cold beer. “How could you have? It’s only been the last few years I understood the truth myself.”
She laughed suddenly, the sound verging on hysteria. “Look at us, victims of something we had no control over.”
He put his beer back onto the table. “That isn’t exactly true, if I hadn’t pushed you away we might still be together today. Instead I allowed shock to take over and make me lose faith in everything and everyone.”
She nursed her drink then, long minutes ticking by as she sank deep into thought. How odd to realize things could have been vastly different if not for one tragic event. She and Aiden might not have just still been together, they might even have gotten married...had kids.
Done everything her parents had hoped she’d experience.
Instead she’d stayed a virgin and steered cleared of relationships, and forged a career that had seen her travel all over the world.
She was doing things that many married women with children would envy. Yet she wasn’t happy, far from it.
“One pepperoni pizza and cheesy garlic bread,” the waitress announced with a wide smile. That same smile faded at the palpable tension, and after she placed the food onto the table, she scurried off.
Aiden took another mouthful of his beer. “Though I’m glad we got to air some of our past...disagreements, I’d really love to move on now. What do you say?”
She gulped back a savage response. Did he truly think her feelings were that transient? That she’d soon be able to forget about the upheaval that had occurred thanks to his rejection? Though she understood more fully why he’d done what he had, it didn’t mean she forgave him.
No. That would be unlikely to ever happen. Instead, she’d be more focused at moving on from him so she could enjoy her future, and get him out of her system once and for all. Tonight was a big part of that. “I say good idea.”
He nodded once, his smile grim, almost savage. Then he swallowed the last few mouthfuls of his beer before picking up a slice of pepperoni pizza. Waiting for her to do the same, they knocked their pizza slices together, just like they had in the old days. “Done deal,” he said, his lips quirking.
“Done deal,” she repeated.
Still looking one another in the eyes, they bit into their pizza. Signed, sealed, delivered.
