by Kara Isaac
“Is it true? Are you married?” She couldn’t be. It wasn’t possible that, after everything, he’d gone and fallen for a married woman. Or that, in all their time together, Allie hadn’t so much as given a hint she was someone’s wife.
Her mouth tried to form words, but nothing came out for a few seconds. Her face was a hurricane of emotions. Finally, a defeated “I don’t know,” fell into the space between them.
He almost laughed. She didn’t know? How could you not know if you were married or not? It was a pretty straightforward yes or no question.
“Well, if she doesn’t know, I can tell you. Yes, she is.”
His fist itched to punch the smug look off Preppy Guy’s face. Feel the cartilage of his nose shatter the way Jackson’s heart had. Instead, he forced himself to his feet, shoved his crutches under his arms, and stumbled across the café, pushing through the people crowding the counter in his haste to get to the door.
Fresh air. A deep breath. His fingers clutching the hard metal of the handles of his crutches. A cool wind against his bare arms. His coat was still inside. Abandoned on the back of his chair.
Then it was around him. Hands draped it around his shoulders. The hands of a woman with a husband.
“How could you? How could you do this to me?” The words falling to the cement pavement, laden down by their own weight. He didn’t, couldn’t, turn. He couldn’t look at her.
She was worse than Nicole.
“I’m so sorry, I . . . Please let me try and explain. I was about to tell you.”
Sure, she was. That’s what all liars said when they were caught.
Her shoes now stood in front of him. Blue Skechers blocking his view of the cracked pavement.
“You’re married.” He directed his words to her feet.
“It’s been in court for two years. It’s complicated.” She sounded like she was choking back tears.
“You’re married.” He looked up, staring over her left shoulder at the top of a nearby mountain.
“Jackson. I . . .” Her voice cracked with anguish, or maybe it was giving up after telling so many lies—he couldn’t quite tell.
“Were you really ever going to tell me?” He clenched his fingers. “Did you get some kind of kick out of making a complete idiot out of me? Was this some sort of revenge for how things were at the beginning? Were you ever going to get around to saying, ‘Oh, and by the way, Jackson, I kind of have this thing called a husband’?” He spat the words at her, his anger finally breaking through his numbness. He wanted to push her to say something—anything—to try and hurt her as much as he was.
“I’m sorry. I never meant—”
“To hurt me. Yeah, yeah, I know the script, Allie.” It was the same lousy one he’d read on the note Nicole left him.
“Please, let me explain. Derek and I, we, he . . .” Their looks collided, hers pleading with his to give her a chance to explain. “Please don’t hate me. I was going to tell you. I swear. I tried, but we kept getting interrupted.”
Hate? He felt a lot of things. Betrayal. Confusion. Relief. Sadness. The anger that a few seconds ago had been choking him receded like a fast-changing tide. “I don’t hate you. I just . . .” His teeth tugged at his bottom lip.
She studied his face for a second, as if looking for something. “I’m sorry. I . . .” She ran her fingers through her hair. “You’re the last person who deserves this. Any of this. I’m never going to forgive myself.”
He looked at her. The copper hair. The perfect eyebrows. The eyes that, a few minutes ago, he’d wanted to find himself in forever. Nothing. Whatever had once drawn him to her was gone. He set his face like marble. “Just go, Allie. Just take your lies and go back to your husband. I hope the poor guy knows what he’s got in you.” He couldn’t stop the bitterness that imbued his final words.
Hurt flashed across her face, but she stepped back. “I’m so sorry, Jackson. It isn’t what you think, but you’re right, I should have told you.” And with that, she headed back to the café. Back to her husband.
* * *
She’d thought after she found out about Derek and Julia it wasn’t possible for her heart to be more broken—turned out she was wrong, because she didn’t remember anything hurting as much as the vise currently clamped around her entire being.
Maybe it was because this time she was the one causing the pain. Last time she’d been the victim; there was a certain amount of comfort that came with that.
She walked back into the café, the image of Jackson jumping up from the table as if he’d been struck with a flaming poker seared into her mind.
Where Jackson had been, Derek now sat. The guy who’d once captured her heart and then made a fool of her in front of everyone she loved, everyone who mattered. He was the reason she’d spent the last two years of her life living like a nomad instead of lecturing in the halls of academia.
She’d hoped never to have to see Derek again as long as they both should live. Lord knew she’d paid her lawyers enough to make it so. What on earth was he doing here?
Her eyes skittered over him. His sandy blond hair was a little longer than she remembered, touching the top of his collar; his body as lean as it had always been.
Derek looked up as she approached. “I’m sorry if that was awkward.” His face held a hopeful, almost beseeching, expression. His eyes implored her to speak.
If he’d been anyone else, she would have fallen for it. But she’d fallen too far, been hurt too much, wavered before that expression too many times to ever be so stupid again.
She looked down at the table, seeing not her so-called husband but Jackson. His stricken expression morphing into incredulity when she said she didn’t know if she was married. Not that she could blame him. It was an unbelievable thing not to know.
It was all her fault. Why hadn’t she told him earlier? Found a way to slip “Oh, and by the way, I might be married” into a casual conversation? Or better yet, “So, funny thing, I got married to this one guy, but it turns out he already had a wife.”
She pulled out a chair and slumped into it. “What are you doing here, Derek?” She didn’t bother asking how he’d found her. It didn’t matter. Not now.
“The courts have ruled my first marriage isn’t valid.” He lifted a shoulder. “Something about the paperwork not being filed correctly in Vegas. So you, my dear Allison, are still my wife.”
She didn’t even look at him. “I don’t believe you.” Her fingers gripped her seat. It couldn’t be true. There was no way this had dragged on for two years—cost her thousands of dollars—only for that to be the answer.
He pulled some papers out of the pocket of his jacket. “You may not want to believe me, but you have to believe these.”
She glanced down and saw the seal of the High Court. Not that that meant anything. Derek had proven himself to be capable of the most far-reaching of deceptions. She wouldn’t be surprised to discover document forgery was another of his hidden talents.
“I’ll believe it when my own lawyers tell me.”
“Can you look at me?”
She turned, emotions threatening to overwhelm her as she looked her betrayer full in the face for the first time since she’d fled their home. Her home.
He leaned over and touched her hand. She snatched it away.
“I’m sorry. I know I hurt you more than I could even begin to imagine. But please, I’m desperate. I can’t give up on us. Why do you think I’ve fought it so hard for the last two years?”
Well, that was a pretty easy one. M-O-N-E-Y. Namely, hers. An annulment would have left him with nothing. A divorce? Who knew what he’d gain from that. And that was before they even got to his questionable visa status, since it had been granted on the basis of their relationship.
He lifted his hand and grazed a finger across her cheek.
“Don’t t
ouch me.” She spat the words out through gritted teeth, slapping his arm away.
They couldn’t still be married. It wasn’t possible. He was married—had been married—to someone else, the day she walked down the aisle. All naïve and innocent, thinking she’d met the love of her life when instead she’d fallen for the world’s biggest con man.
She looked up to find tears in his eyes.
“I’m so sorry, Al.”
“Don’t call me that.” He’d never called her that before. The only one who had was Jackson. She wasn’t going to let Derek take that too.
Derek took a breath, as if trying to gather himself. “I’m so sorry for everything. I know I don’t deserve one, but, now that the court stuff is done, I’m here to ask for another chance to make it up to you and prove I can be the man you thought I was.”
Her whole body jolted, as if plugged into a live socket. What? This was not part of the plan! She was getting over this. Over him. Finally able to contemplate returning home, to her old life, without overwhelming humiliation making her want to find the biggest hole she could and bury herself in it.
Sure, she wasn’t quite there yet, but she almost was. But the plan did not include this—him showing up here. Or the court finding in his favor.
Looking at him stirred dormant emotions, and memories came rushing back. Memories she had been trying to forget. Of how he’d been the first guy to make her feel like she was really seen, known, loved. How he’d proposed by creating a literary treasure hunt, leaving clues in books that she was using to write her thesis. Of finding love notes in the middle of piles of marking. Of how good things had been in her naïve ignorant world before it all came crashing down.
They swirled around inside her, crashing up against what she’d been feeling just a few minutes previous for another man. The guy she had imagined for all of thirty seconds she might have a future with, until the past came slithering through the door and wrapped itself around her neck.
Twenty-Seven
MARRIED. SHE WAS MARRIED. JACKSON’S head spun as his feet hobbled down the path back toward the hotel.
One crutch caught in a crack in the pavement, almost throwing him onto his face. Of all the times to not be able to make a quick getaway.
For a few seconds everything had been perfect. The freedom of finally opening himself up, taking a chance. The look on her face said he wasn’t alone—only for it to all lie ruined around his feet, mocking him with the futility of it all.
His face burned. He had sworn he would never be that guy—the kind that got involved with a married woman. Some things were sacred.
With his ankle screaming, he sank onto a bench overlooking the picturesque lake, buried his head in his hands, and gulped in mouthfuls of cool air. How could he have been so stupid? He had cast all reason, logic, aside—beguiled by her openness and seeming honesty.
Clearly, from the way her face collapsed and the tension between the two of them, there was more to the story than he was privy to, but married? She couldn’t have found a way to drop that into conversation? When he’d told her about Nicole would have been a good start. A simple “Ironic that I’m married and in a big court fight with my husband.”
He sucked in a shuddering breath. It was okay. He was used to betrayal. It wasn’t even like this was a big one in the scheme of things. He’d known her less than three weeks. It wasn’t a big deal. In a couple of days he’d be back on a plane to America, leaving her and her drama behind.
It just proved his gut instinct to keep his distance from her had been right all along. In fact, everything would be fine right now if he hadn’t walked into that coffee shop and been struck by thirty seconds of temporary insanity. What had even possessed him to do that?
It wasn’t like it was ever going to work. They were from two completely different places, living completely different lives. What kind of idiots thought they had fallen in love after less than a month anyway? People on reality shows was who. And look how that usually worked out.
Yes, he’d been attracted to her. Yes, he’d liked her a lot. But it wasn’t the end of the world. If anything, it was further proof of what he’d known when he walked off the plane into this stupid country: the only person he could trust was himself.
In the whirlwind of all this insanity, he’d allowed himself to forget that for a few days. At least he’d found out the truth before he was really invested.
His head kept saying all the right platitudes, but his heart was thundering like it wasn’t getting enough blood.
There were only two days left on the tour. All he had to do was keep his distance. It would take a miracle, but he was desperate enough to ask for one.
God, help.
They were the only two words he managed to offer up before he felt Allie settle beside him, her distinctive perfume wafting on the morning breeze. He shifted away—as far as he could get without falling off the bench.
“Will you at least let me explain?” Her words were soft, so quiet he barely caught them, even though she was only inches away.
He looked up into her pained profile that stared straight across the mountain vista. She had also positioned herself between him and his crutches, so it wasn’t like he could get up and walk away.
He shrugged his shoulders. “It’s not like I can stop you.”
* * *
It was the flat disinterest in his tone that cut deeper than anything else. If he’d at least been angry, she would have known it mattered, but it was like he’d closed down every human emotion and was about as human as Michelangelo’s David.
Curling her fingers around the cool seat of the stone bench, she tried to think. Where to start? What to say?
Obviously anything between them had been shattered, but Jackson at least deserved to know the truth: that she hadn’t been playing with him, that what was between them was . . . well, as real as it could have been.
She closed her eyes for a second, gathering her composure to tell the story she hadn’t told anyone outside of her lawyer. And that was only because she had to. She kept hoping that if she didn’t think or talk about it, she could escape the stranglehold of humiliation that engulfed her.
“I met Derek in my final term at Cambridge. At a petrol station of all places.” In the middle of writing almost 24/7 to finish up her thesis, it was one of the few places she’d ever gone. He was using the fuel pump on the other side of hers.
It had been the definition of a whirlwind romance, given a helping shove by her own insecurities. She was boring, academic Allison. She never had guys falling over themselves finding her attractive or interesting. So when, suddenly, dashing Derek appeared on the scene, she’d fallen as easily for his charms and perfect salesman pitch as Pooh Bear for honey.
“We got engaged fast. Faster than a lot of people thought was wise. But I was in love. Or thought I was.” Before she’d known it, there had been a rock on her finger. Turned out it was fake, which her sister would have picked up on in a split second flat. But no—naïve, gullible Allison had fallen for that as well. Along with the fiction of how it had been his mother’s, who with her dying breath had made him swear he would save it for his one true love.
She couldn’t believe she’d fallen for it all. His whole story had basically mashed together the tragic components of twenty romance novels. It made her sick just thinking about it.
Not for one second had it ever crossed her mind that he knew exactly who she was. That she was the target of Derek’s perfectly executed campaign to both get out of the UK and set himself up for life. That her so-called soul mate had a gambling problem and was neck-deep in debt with the kind of guys who didn’t send letters requesting payment for debts, but rather broke legs.
She’d returned home with the PhD, a fiancé, and a great lecturing job lined up at the University of Auckland. She refused to listen to her parents and their reservations about a short
engagement, or to her own conscience giving her grief about marrying a man who didn’t share her faith. She’d just plowed on ahead with destroying her life.
“My family has money; it turns out he knew that. He knew before we’d even met who I was. I was just a pawn in his plans to set himself up for life and get a New Zealand visa.” Derek denied it—or, more accurately, his lawyers did, but they weren’t the ones left paying off the thousands of dollars he’d put on her credit card without her knowledge or trying to explain the tens of thousands that had just disappeared out of her accounts.
“Three months after we were married, I was giving a lecture. A woman showed up, Julia. Claimed she was Derek’s wife. She said they’d gotten married in Vegas a few years before.” She chanced a look sideways. Jackson sat, face set like a mask, no indication he’d heard a single thing she’d said save for a slight twitch in his jaw.
“I’ve spent the last two years in court fighting for an annulment. Derek told me they’ve ruled and I’ve lost. I’m so sorry. I have no excuse. I should have told you when things . . .” She trailed off. She had no idea how to finish the sentence. So she stopped talking and waited for him to say something, anything.
Silence for a few seconds, then Jackson shifted on the seat. “Okay, I let you explain. Now may I have my crutches please?”
Lifting them up, she handed them to him. He used them to push himself up to his feet then put them under his shoulders.
He looked down at her, face written with so much hurt it could fill a novel. “I trusted you. After everything, I trusted you. You knew about Nicole, all of it. And you still didn’t tell me.”
“I’m so sorry.” She could say those words for eternity and it wouldn’t be enough. And they both knew it.
He leaned heavily on his crutches, weighed down by her deception. “It’s a bit late for sorry. I just can’t do this. Whatever it is. Whatever you’re asking of me.”
His words cut through her like lava through a mountainside, stripping her of her ability to speak. All she could do was nod.