Abigail.
I can’t lose her.
That’s why I need to talk to Isabella. She loves Abby. She’ll know what to do.
Isabella’s face is etched in worry when she opens the door. “What’s going on?”
I don’t answer and instead pass by her into the apartment. It’s small, which makes a big guy like me feel even bigger. In fact, I practically feel hulking in here. I hope Anthony Valenta makes an honest woman of Isabella one day and gives her the life she deserves. No woman of Isabella’s beauty and poise should be living in such a small dump. Well, it’s not really a dump, but to men like me and Anthony—men of wealth—it’s really just a glorified shoebox. It pains me to see Isabella living like this when Abigail is now ensconced in my luxury high-rise apartment.
I take a seat at the table. The sandwiches that Isabella had prepared are already sitting on nice floral plates, waiting for us, along with glasses of sparkling water. A green Pellegrino bottle sits on the table. Nice, elegant. I appreciate touches like this.
Both Isabella and Abigail have that quality in common. They notice—and execute—the small details that make a life nice. A woman’s touch, but better.
I stare down at the sandwich. I haven’t eaten all day, but I’m not hungry. It’s obvious Isabella isn’t, either, as she waits for me to reveal what I have to tell her.
“I need to talk to you,” I say, “about something important.” Just saying those words twist my stomach. I haven’t told anyone my secret. Ever.
“It’s okay,” she says quietly. “You can trust me.”
It’s as if she knew just the right thing to say. As I look into her honest, genuine face, I know I truly can trust her with my secret. And I feel in my gut that she’ll steer me right. She’ll help me do right by Abigail.
I take a deep breath and then tell her what I’ve been holding in my heart for all this time.
She gasps when she learns what it is. Her face turns ashen, and then tears well up in her eyes.
I hadn’t expected this reaction. Maybe from Abby, but not Isabella. Isabella has always struck me as stoic, but clearly not.
“You have to tell her,” she says, staring at me with brimming, troubled eyes. “You can’t let it go on any longer.”
“I know,” I say. “I just don’t know how to break it to her.”
“You just have to find a way.”
“But she’s going to leave me. I can’t take it if she does.”
“You don’t know for sure that she’ll leave you.”
“It’s going to come as a blow. A terrible blow that she’s not going to know how to deal with.”
“That’s true.” Her face is the picture of sympathy. “I wouldn’t want to be in your position.”
“Do you think she’ll be able to forgive me?”
“I truly don’t know, Liam. It would be difficult for most women to deal with and accept something like this. I know I would have a hard time with it.”
“Would you stay with Anthony if he’d lied to you about something like this?”
She bites her lip and contemplates this. “Probably not.”
Her admission hits me like a two-by-four to the gut. “Really? You wouldn’t find it in your heart to forgive him?”
“It’s not that…it’s just that Anthony and I have a complicated relationship. We’ve had so many ups and downs. I don’t know if our relationship could take one more blow. Especially one like that. That’s a huge lie, Liam. One for the record books.”
I swallow hard. “I know. But Isabella…you’ve known Abby for a while. You don’t think she could overcome this?”
Isabella meets my eyes. “I don’t know,” she says simply. “I truly don’t. But you can’t let another day go by without telling her. It’s wrong that you’ve let this lie stand between you for so long. She’s moved in with you, Liam. She’s committed her life to you. This is not the way you should start a relationship. The more time goes on, the harder it will be for her to recover from it.”
I draw in a breath. “I know. I feel like shit.” I drop my head into my hands. “I’ve made such a mess of things.” My voice breaks. “I can’t bring myself to tell her if I know for sure she’ll leave me. I would rather keep the lie between us but keep her in my life. She would never have to know. Don’t you see my position?”
She’s quiet for a long moment, and then she says the words I most need to hear, the clarifying words that tell me what I need to do: “You will never have a true relationship if it’s based on lies, Liam. Doesn’t Abigail deserve a true relationship? Don’t you?”
“Yes,” I say, thinking of Abigail’s sweet face. She deserves it all: the sun, the moon, and the stars. And someone she can trust.
Isabella’s right. Completely, one-hundred percent right.
After a moment, I push back my chair and stand. “Thank you for showing me what I need to do.”
She gives me a relieved smile. “Good, I’m glad I helped.” She gestures to the sandwich. “Aren’t you hungry? Don’t you want to eat before you go?”
“No thanks. I’m not hungry.”
“Do you want to take it with you?”
“No thanks. I just want to go do what I need to do, before another minute passes.”
“Okay.” She walks me to the door. “I’m sure Abigail will be calling me when she finds out. She’ll need a friend. Do you want me to tell her that you came by?”
“No,” I say. “I don’t want to drag you into this. It’s bad enough I’ve kept this secret from her. I don’t want to cause any problems between you two.”
“Okay,” she says. “I understand.”
“Give me your word you won’t say anything?”
“Yes.” She pauses and gives me a long look. “But I’ll let Abby know that I think you’re a good guy.”
“I appreciate that,” I say, but I don’t feel like a good guy at all.
I feel like a terrible guy who is going to do an even worse thing.
I’m not going to do what Isabella thinks I am. I’m not going to tell Abigail my secret.
Instead, I’m going to spare her.
I’m going to break up with her.
I’m going to walk out of her life forever.
three
Abigail
It’s difficult when Liam travels out of town on business, especially when he has to leave abruptly without warning, as he did a few nights ago. I miss him and count the days to when I’ll be in his arms again.
One evening, after he’s already been gone a few days, I arrive home from work and am met by two large guys in workmen’s clothes who say they’re with a moving company. They tell me they’ve been hired by my boyfriend, Liam Black, to move all of my things into another apartment across town. They tell me that Liam has left instructions for them to start moving my things out immediately.
The breath is sucked out of me. “There must be some mistake.”
One of the movers, a burly man with sympathetic eyes, hands me a sealed letter that Liam left for me to read.
The bottom of my world drops out from under me.
What is going on?
“Wait here,” I say. I rush into the apartment with my chest squeezing tight. I’m hoping with every cell in my body that this is some bad joke. With trembling fingers, I open the letter Liam had left for me.
The note, in his handwriting, says that he has changed his mind about us. He wants me to move out immediately but tells me not to worry because he has bought me my own apartment in another part of the city. He was able to expedite the purchase of the other apartment through my boss, and thinks I will be quite pleased with the Upper East Side location. He says it is a parting gift to thank me for our time together, and then apologizes for changing his mind about us. He says he’s sorry he can’t explain his reasons but it’s better this way, and then signs it, “Love, Liam.”
He’s buying me off?
The note blurs before my eyes. I crumple it up as tears begin to flow down my
cheeks. Then I unwrinkle it, grab a pen, and scrawl one line on it, in large, angry letters: “Dear Liam: you can keep your fucking apartment. Have a happy life. Love, Abby.”
Then I march out to the moving men and tell them we can start boxing up my stuff.
I’m moving my things into storage until I can figure out what to do.
Isabella says I can stay with her until I find a place. I take one small box of my personal items over to her apartment, along with a few changes of clothes. I leave everything else in storage.
With my job in real estate, I anticipate I’ll find the right apartment within a few weeks. Usually, the turnaround time for rentals and sale units in this city take awhile, but working for the most influential real estate company in the world has its perks.
Those perks, unfortunately, were also extended to my billionaire former boyfriend who was able to snap his fingers and buy me a luxury apartment on almost zero notice.
Later that evening, I sit with Isabella on her couch, consumed with sobs at the shock of it all.
“I thought he loved me,” I say through shaky breaths. “I truly thought he cared.”
“I’m sure he still does,” she says, handing me a Kleenex. “Maybe you two just rushed things a bit, and he needs to take some time to figure things out.”
“No. It was all a lie. He’s just like all the rest. He got cold feet. I’ve never met a man who is able to fully commit.”
“Maybe he’s dealing with something you don’t know about,” she says quietly. “Something he doesn’t want to bring you into. Maybe he’s protecting you.”
I stare at her. “From what? He’s told me everything about himself.”
She shrugs, refusing to meet my eyes. “It’s just something to consider. Things aren’t always what they seem.”
“I can’t imagine what he could be ‘dealing with,’ unless it’s his own fear of commitment. Typical.” Fresh sobs erupt from my chest, and I bury my face in my hands. I haven’t cried this long and hard since my dog died in the third grade. Or the first time my stepfather harmed me. I learned, at a very young age, to bury pain quickly in order to survive.
Maybe I can do the same with this pain.
I look up to see Isabella watching me with sad eyes. “I didn’t expect this of him,” she says. “I thought he was a stronger man than that.”
A jolt goes through me. Does she know something I don’t? “What do you mean, you didn’t expect this of him?”
She takes a deep breath. “I promised not to tell you…but, given the circumstances…given that he misled me about what he’d planned on doing…”
“What are you talking about?” My heart races. “Did you know he was thinking of breaking up with me?”
She shakes her head vigorously. “No, not at all. I had no idea. This is as much as a shock to me as it is to you.”
“What’s going on? You’re starting to freak me out.” I stare at her, my heart beating double-time in my chest.
She exhales slowly. “Okay, I’ll tell you what I can. He came by at the beginning of the week, saying he needed my advice about something. It involved you, along with a secret he’s been keeping. A lie.”
“A lie?”
“Yes. He’s been haunted by it. He wanted my advice on what to do. I told him he needed to tell you the secret. When he left, I thought he was going to do that. But I guess not.” She sighs. “I really don’t understand it. He should’ve just told you. But I guess he felt it was something the two of you wouldn’t be able to overcome. Maybe he wanted to give you a chance to find happiness with someone else.”
“What?” I cry. “I don’t want anyone else! What is he hiding from me?”
She shakes her head, looking stricken. “I can’t tell you. It’s not my place.”
“Please!” I grab her hands. “Isabella, you have to tell me.”
She shakes her head, pressing her lips together. “I can’t. I gave my word.”
“Is it another woman?”
Silence. She stares at me with a stricken look, her eyes wide.
Her non-answer is my answer.
“Oh my God.” My heart thuds to the floor. “So it’s another woman. Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I haven’t revealed anything. Don’t jump to conclusions.”
“I need to know why he left. If it’s another woman, I have a right to know. Does he have a child with someone? Is that it? Isabella, you can’t keep this from me.”
She shakes her head. “I can’t break my promise to him. It’s that serious. As it is, I’ve revealed more than I promised him I would. But you’re my best friend, and I want to do my best to help you. I’ll guide you in the right direction so you can find out on your own.” She gets up and goes over to her iPad. She types something in, and then studies the screen. I crane my neck, trying to see what she’s reading, but she hides it from me. She writes something on a piece of paper, and then silently hands it to me.
“What is this?” I stare down at the paper. On it, she has written, “Fairmont Estate.”
“You’ll find your answer there,” Isabella says, her face somber.
“Is this where she lives?” I ask. “It’s all the way in Upstate New York.”
Isabella doesn’t reply.
I sigh. “I hope the drive is worth it.”
“Is he worth fighting for?” she asks quietly.
“Yes.”
“Then there’s your answer.”
I look down at the paper. “Fairmont Estate, huh? So his girlfriend is some rich bitch, huh?”
Isabella doesn’t say anything. Instead, she just gazes at me with troubled eyes.
I wish she would tell me, but I understand why she can’t. When she makes a promise, she keeps it. She’s a person of honor, which is something I deeply respect. It’s one of the reasons we’re friends.
“So I guess I’ll be taking the train to Saratoga Springs tomorrow,” I say.
“You’ll find out what you need to know,” she whispers. Tears fill her eyes. “I’m sorry, Abby. I truly am.”
I look down at the paper, and then back up at her. My heart races, and my throat clenches tightly.
What is Fairmont Estate, and who lives there?
And what does it have to do with Liam, the love of my life? The man who has broken my heart?
four
The train ride up to Fairmont Estate is a long one, three hours to be exact. The passing scenery is beautiful: a blur of rich greens, golds, and reds. I’m unable to enjoy it, though, because I’m too distraught and anxious about what I’m about to discover. I try to read a magazine, but my mind keeps wandering to Liam and his secret…his lie.
If Liam has a child with someone else, I could probably deal with it. I could even deal with him having an ex-wife.
But I can’t deal with the thought of him two-timing me.
What is hardest for me to accept is that he lied to me, whatever his secret is. That tells me two possible things: one, he doesn’t believe in me enough to tell me the truth, or two, he has a questionable character.
Neither of those things bode well for a relationship.
So maybe he’s right. Maybe I won’t be able to overcome his secret. Actually, it’s not even the secret that’s the problem, because I believe that if two people love each other enough, they can overcome anything.
It’s the lie.
My guess is that it started out innocent enough in the beginning, with him omitting an important aspect of his life—a lie by omission—that he felt he couldn’t share right away. Then as more time went by, it grew larger, until he realized that it eventually would be a big issue between us, especially since it was taking him so long to reveal it. The more time that went by, the more upset I would be.
Any woman would be distraught. No woman likes being lied to, especially by the man she loves, and especially over a long period of time.
I need to find out what he’s keeping from me. I need to find out why he ended our relationship, and if any p
art of what we had is salvageable once I know his secret.
I won’t leave Saratoga Springs until I know the truth…until I know why Liam Black threw away the best thing that ever happened to us.
Finally, the train arrives, and soon I’m in a cab, on my way to Fairmont Estate. Green hills roll by, and then we enter a long, sloping driveway shrouded by tall trees on all sides. We pull to a stop in front of an imposing white mansion.
Fairmont Estate really is…an estate.
Figures. Of course Liam’s secret lover (or whomever he has hidden here) lives in such an impressive, elegant mansion. Maybe he feels he has more in common with a wealthy woman than someone like me, who comes from a humble background. Maybe love wasn’t enough to bridge the differences for him.
If so, I never knew him at all.
I pay the cab driver, and he leaves. I’m standing alone, looking up at this beautiful home. It’s elegant and breathtaking, with tall white columns and thick shrubs. I don’t know what I’m going to find here, but whatever it is fills me with anxiety. I take a deep breath, adjust my tote bag on my arm, and start to head toward the large door. I’m stopped in my tracks by a man’s voice, one I recognize.
Liam.
He’s here.
My stomach is suddenly one giant ball of knots. Heart racing and palms sweaty, I follow the sound of his voice. I pass through a tall wooden gate and find myself in a large garden that stretches down sloping hillsides. Liam is standing a few feet away with his back turned to me, on a flower-lined path next to a bench. He’s talking to a tall, thin woman wearing a navy-blue dress who is shrouding her eyes against the late afternoon sun.
They don’t see me, so I duck behind a hedge.
From my vantage point, I’m able to see and hear them without being spotted.
Liam looks so tall and handsome that he takes my breath away, and my heart pinches at seeing him. I long to run to him and feel his arms around me, but he’s no longer mine. That realization hits me like a backhand to the face. He’s not mine. He broke up with me, and now he’s here at some mansion, talking to some woman I don’t know.
Romantic Lies Page 2