“Will you listen?”
He hadn’t expected she would ask or that he’d have to answer. He didn’t want to say yes. Agreeing to listen implied he’d do so with an open mind. How could he tell her that his mind was so closed on this subject an atom bomb couldn’t blow it open? He’d had a number of years to layer in the sealant.
But the puppy-dog blue eyes watching him made him hesitate. He had nothing really to lose by listening. It wasn’t going to change his mind. If it made her feel better to think she had good reason for her actions, well, it didn’t mean he would think so.
“Okay.” The word seemed to catch in the crevice of his throat.
“I’m not telling you because I expect you to forgive me or anything.”
At least she was realistic.
“I owe you an explanation—even if it’s not acceptable to you.”
In his angrier moments, he’d never have granted her the opportunity to explain. Sitting there with her, he didn’t have the will to deny her.
“I just want to see if it makes any sense or if I’ve just been fooling myself—you know, rationalizing.”
Yeah, he knew. That’s what he expected. A rationalization. What he didn’t expect was for her to own up to it. “I’ll let you know.”
In his palm, her hand tensed into a fist.
“It’s true. I was terrified my father would do something to you, break you either financially or physically, someway. It seems at the time I held an exaggerated view of his power over people.”
She shook her head as if silently accusing herself. “And I accepted it. Without question. I was barely through my first year of college. I didn’t have the courage to see the marriage through, to be the wife you deserved, the wife you needed. And I was afraid of paying the price for alienating my only parent. I didn’t feel like I had the strength of character to stand up to my father. I was scared.”
“Of your father? Or life with me?”
“Of everything.” Her delicate hand waved in the air as she tugged the other one from his grasp to wipe the perspiration forming on her brow. “Giving up college, giving up my family, taking on responsibilities, it all terrified me. Because I knew, deep down, I wasn’t mature enough or strong enough to be married to you. My walking away was proof of that. But it wasn’t proof I didn’t love you. I loved you. I just didn’t love myself.”
She hugged herself as if bracing for the worst. Part of him wanted to soothe her, tell her it was all right, but something held him back, something strong and powerful.
“I didn’t have faith in me. I wasn’t ready. I had a lot of growing up to do.”
Tears glimmered in her eyes and silently pleaded for absolution.
He couldn’t give it. Even though he felt the quiver of sincerity in her voice all the way to the recesses of his heart—where it mattered.
“Does it make sense?” she asked.
Placing abandoning him under the rational-thinking column would take a long while. And some hurts just didn’t lend themselves to reasoned arguments. She’d been young. She’d thought she’d been in love. She’d been afraid to try life with him. She’d broken his heart instead.
“Maybe you didn’t have faith in either of us,” he offered. Which was more likely the truth. She didn’t trust herself. But she didn’t trust him either. And her lack of belief, after all they’d promised each other, had been the final kick to his heart. “Did you feel like I pressured you, like it said in those divorce papers?”
“No.” She answered quick enough. At least that was something. “I married you because I loved you and I wanted to prove it. And make you happy.” She chewed on her bottom lip. “Until reality set in and I got cold feet.”
Chance didn’t know what was harder to hear—that she had loved him or that she’d loved him and still walked away.
“When my father showed up, I took the way out he offered,” she continued. “I am sorry. Sorry I hurt you. Sorry I wasn’t more worthy of the faith you had in me.”
The flushed rose color of her cheeks and the plea in her eyes nudged his heart like someone was poking it awake.
But the fact was, he wasn’t ready to accept her regrets. The simple words “I’m sorry” might be enough when you caused inadvertent hurt or made a mistake, but they sure didn’t seem adequate for walking out on the man you just admitted you loved and divorcing him from your life. Nope, not adequate by any measure.
Five years was a long time to nurse a hurt, he knew. And he wished he could tell her he was over it. But the fact was, he’d probably never get over it.
“I know you’re sorry, Libby. I am too.” It was the best he could muster under the circumstances.
Libby slouched back against the pillow. Chance folded his arms. Silence filled the space as a light rain pelted the window.
He wanted to gather her up and offer her comfort, even if he couldn’t offer forgiveness. Instead, they sat staring at a flickering TV screen as Cowboy jumped between them.
*