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I take another drink of the latte, not only because it’s good but maybe to hide my face.
When I set down the cup, Gage links our fingers together. “You don’t sound that way. But you deserve compliments. And the truth.” He pauses, then continues, “Kylie was my last real relationship. We were together for a year and she was fun and outgoing, but Eliza’s right. Kylie was a little caught up in herself. She was in love with her career. She got a job in New York and she left. That was that.” With a thoughtful sigh, he scrubs a hand across his jaw. “But maybe I was caught up in myself too—at least caught up in my own obsessions about the future.”
The Gage picture is becoming even clearer. “That’s why you think things don’t work out. From baseball, to marriage, to romance.”
“Way to see inside my soul,” he says dryly.
“I just want to know you,” I say feeling desperate, feeling ravenous. I look at the clock on the wall. I need to go to work soon. Time is running out. This temporary marriage is like a rich, decadent chocolate bar that makes me feel all the things, and I’m not going to leave a single piece of it in the wrapper. “When we went to Vegas you were thinking about the first time you got married,” I begin, returning to something that’s stayed with me.
“I was,” he admits, studying me, waiting for me to say more.
“And you said you were sure of this.” I drop our hands, gesture from him to me. “What we were doing.” I pause before I ask the hard thing. “Were you not sure of things with Hailey?”
His sigh is heavy, full of the weight of sadness. He leaves his coffee on the counter. With a hand on my back, he guides me to the table, sits me down, gathers my hands in his. “We got married because of the pregnancy. Did I love her? Probably. But we weren’t a great fit. That became clearer as we went on…and when it ended,” he says, then stops.
I’m on the edge of my seat.
He lifts his chin, like he’s girding himself. “She’d asked for a divorce.”
My jaw falls open. I’m frozen. A statue. Finally, I whisper, “I had no idea.”
“I’ve never told this to anyone except my therapist. She was really struggling, Elodie. She was never diagnosed but I suspect she suffered from postpartum depression. She was giving me primary custody of Eliza. She said she needed some time alone to sort out her thoughts. And when she went away on a trip—just for herself, something she needed—that’s when she died all of a sudden. And I never told her parents what had been going on. The custody, the separation. I never told anyone.”
My throat tightens, like a hand is gripping it. My eyes sting with tears. “Oh, Gage. You’ve carried all that for a decade?”
“I had to. What choice did I have?” He leans back, eyes flickering with the shame of secrets. “But people treated me like I was this noble widower and that was awful in its own way too. Truth is, I didn’t want her family to know or to think differently of her. She had an aneurysm. It was unpredictable. It was unexpected. She was so young, and I felt confident that even after we divorced, she’d have realized that she still wanted to be a mom. That she’d have become involved again with Eliza. She just didn’t live long enough to make that choice,” he says, and his voice is rough, full of hurt for the mother his daughter will never know.
Tears trickle down my face. His protective streak is so much deeper than I could ever have imagined. “You were protecting Hailey after her death. You were preserving a memory for her family.”
“And for my daughter,” he says quietly, that guilt resurfacing. “So I lied.”
No. No. No!
I shake my head, firm, adamant. Holding his hands tighter. “It wasn’t a lie. It was a gift,” I say, fiercely. “Her family didn’t need to know she was trying to find herself. It’s okay that you kept her secret. It’s an act of love. An act of protection. It doesn’t mean she wasn’t a good person or a good mom. It just means she was in a really hard place,” I say, this close to breaking apart. But this isn’t my story to wallow in. It’s his hurt, his pain, and all I want is to help him see he doesn’t have to carry it. “And you helped her after death. And your little girl.”
He lifts a hand, swipes the tears from my cheek. “I hate to see you cry, baby…but I kind of love it too,” he says, almost sheepish as his eyes well with tears.
“Why do you love it?” I ask, laughing lightly.
He presses a palm to my chest, covering my heart. “Because I like your heart. You have the biggest heart I’ve ever known.”
And I let go of a fear I’ve been carrying. “I was worried for a long time that you wouldn’t like the real me,” I say, and it’s my turn to be relieved.
“What? Seriously?”
“The messy me,” I add with a shrug.
“I like all of you, messy and wild and even with morning breath,” he says.
“Do not ever speak of such horrid things.”
“But I will. I like you when you wake up, and when you fall asleep, and when you’re frustrated, and when you’re worried, and when you need a hug. I like you when you’re upbeat and flirty and outgoing. And I like you when you’re honest and open.”
My feet aren’t touching the floor. I’m sure I must be floating. He clears his throat, his gaze vulnerable, like it costs him something to say the next thing. “Have you been in love before?”
Right now I think I am.
“Not before,” I say carefully, then since he likes the real me, I don’t hide my romantic heart this time. I open up to him, flinging open the windows on a sunny day. “But I like romance. That’s why I liked your proposal so much by Cupid’s Span. That’s sort of what I always imagined someday. Someone who was wildly romantic and who wanted only me. And I was always drawn to men who seemed romantic. Who made big gestures of flowers and wine and weekends away.” I lock eyes with Gage, my heart beating like a hummingbird. “But never anything like marrying me to protect me.”
