Page 98 of The Truth of Us

HARPER

By the time I packed to return to Chicago, my room at Montgomery House no longer looked like the room I'd arrived in. Nothing had changed, and yet it felt like everything had. The furniture in this room was the same, but somehow the woman in it wasn't.

I stood in front of the mirror in the dressing room, staring at my reflection while holding a sweater I'd bought with Margot that still felt a little extra. Soft green cashmere that was slightly oversized, it was comfortable enough to curl into, but Margot said it was cut in a way that suggested I might occasionally leave the house.

The old version of me would have picked the neutral one. In a taupe or a nude or a black variation of something that matched everything. Instead, I folded the green sweater and placed it carefully into my suitcase. I glanced at my nails while I zipped the bag shut. The blue polish had chipped slightly on my thumb, the colour still feeling so familiar, but just out of reach for me to name. I should have hated that, should have already made an appointment to have the colour fixed or changed; instead, I smiled.

A soft knock sounded against the door.

"Come in."

My father stepped inside, already dressed for the city. A dark wool coat over a perfectly tailored suit. He leaned against the doorway and looked at the packed luggage. "So it's finally happening."

I nodded. "I suppose it is."

He crossed the room slowly. "Nervous?"

"No."

The answer came too quickly.

He smiled. "Ah."

"What?" I questioned, focusing on the task at hand and not my father's knowing eyes.

"That means yes."

I sighed. "I hate that you know that."

His expression softened. "No." He stepped closer. "You hate that I know when you're lying."

I sat down on the edge of the bed. "I don't know what I'm walking back into."

He sat beside me. "You don't have to."

I looked over. "What?"

"You don't have to know." The words settled somewhere deep in my chest.

"I think I should," I murmured.

"Why?" It was such a simple question, and my father asked it with such tenderness.

But how could I explain it?

Because Elliot was there. Because the city still felt like him. Because I still woke up some mornings convinced I would open my eyes and see him. Because every version of moving forward somehow involved admitting I wasn't as over him. I still hadn’t wrapped my head around how something that had only lasted a month had such an effect on me.

I looked down at my hands. "I don't know."

My father was quiet for a long moment, then he smiled and said, "That's all right."

I laughed softly. "You always make everything sound simpler than it is."

"No." He reached over and squeezed my hand. "I simply have more experience surviving impossible things."

My throat tightened. For a second, I saw him not as Alexander Montgomery. Not as the man whose name opened doors, or as the man who had spent years protecting me. Not my father. Just as a husband who had lost the love of his life and somehow kept waking up every morning afterward.

"Do you think I'm ready?" I asked quietly.