He turned away from the vulnerability in her eyes. He didn’t know how to feel about what she was saying.She thought I was too good for her?It couldn’t be true. But Anne wasn’t one to spew false flattery for her advantage. Besides, what had she to gain by telling him any of this? By coming here?
“My insecurities made me doubt”—her breath hitched—“our love. I was too afraid to believe that you loved me as much as I loved you. That you would keep loving me.”
“How could you…” He was too furious to continue. How could she have doubted he loved her? His love for her had consumed him. She had been his everything. He shoved his hand roughly through his hair, snapping a few strands. In the end, he could only say, “Howcouldyou?”
“I’m sorry.” Her bottom lip trembled, and she bit down onit for a moment before she continued. “I was wrong. But there’s more.”
He glared at her, daring her to continue and praying for her to stop. It hurt. All of this hurt. But she accepted his dare.
“My aunt convinced me to send in an audition tape for a role in a K-drama.” She took a shuddering breath. “I listened to her, but only because I thought I would never get the role. You see, my… my father had made some bad investments, and we were about to lose our house. Tessa was still in high school, and Juliette was… Well, let’s just say my older sister isn’t the kind of person who would find a real job to support her family. So it fell onmeto do something.”
His scowl turned into a frown as he listened. “But you did get the role.”
“Yes.” She looked down at her hands. “I told my aunt I couldn’t accept the role, because I found someone. I told her I was in love with you.”
He scoffed harshly, even though he knew it was true. She had loved him. Just not enough.
Anne flinched but soldiered on. “I told her I loved you and that I wouldn’t leave you.”
“Until you did.” He couldn’t stop the bitterness from creeping into his words. “Tell me this. Howdidshe convince you to leave me?”
“She told me my father would never approve of someone like you.” She cringed as he exhaled through his teeth. “That my mom, if she’d been alive, wouldn’t have approved of you either. I told her I didn’t care. But then she said you couldn’t possibly be in love with me. That a nineteen-year-old boy only had one thing on his mind. That you were too young to evenknowwhat love is. I told her she was wrong.
“But I guess she succeeded in sowing a seed of doubt in me, and my insecurities took root and grew. Even so, I had no intentionof leaving you,” she said hoarsely. “I held my ground until my aunt reminded me it was my mom’s dying wish that I keep my family together.
“My mom wanted me to take care of Tessa, who was only twelve when she died. As for my father and Juliette… she said they couldn’t help being who they were, and they needed me. And that once she was gone, we would only have each other. She made me promise to take care of our family. She said I was the only one who could.”
Frederick hated them all. Her father, her older sister, her younger sister, and even her dead mother. Maybe he hated her mother most of all. How could she have placed such a huge burden on her daughter? Anne had only been fifteen when her mother died. Didn’t she realize her daughter would take her wish to heart and give her everything to keep her promise? And she’d been living with that yoke around her neck for over fifteen years. Yes, he hated them all.
“I couldn’t turn my back on my family.” Anne sounded hollowed out, exhausted, and she had every right to be. “I had no way of making the kind of money I would as an actress in Korea no matter how many jobs I got here. But Ineededto make that kind of money to save our family home from foreclosure. It was the only way I could keep my promise to my mom.”
“Then…” He tasted salt at the back of his throat and sniffed sharply, looking away. “Then why wouldn’t you let me come with you?”
“I couldn’t let you throw away your college education when you’d worked so hard to get there.” A single tear rolled down her cheek. “I was afraid you would start resenting me… stop loving me. But I was more afraid that you wouldn’t be able to come back to the life you deserved by the time you realized you didn’t want me anymore. I convinced myself that leaving you—that ending things between us—was the best way I could love you.”
“Youwreckedme when you left me.” The words tore out of him, broke him open. Anne’s face crumpled, and she turned away from him. “No, you don’t get to look away.Look at me.”
When she complied,healmost looked away from the heartbreak in her eyes. But he took a shuddering breath and continued. “You wrecked me. It took years of therapy for me to patch myself back together. To build a life for myself. But the scars never faded. I was never the same. I willneverbe the same. So believe me when I say leaving me was not thebest wayyou could have loved me.”
“I didn’t know.” She held his eyes even though her whole body trembled, struggling to hold back tears. “Maybe I didn’t want to know. I wanted to believe I did the right thing.”
“You were wrong,” he rasped, his voice ravaged.
“I was wrong,” she said in a broken whisper.
“It wasn’t your decision to make.” He fisted his hands to stop them from shaking. “You had no right to break my heart toprotectme. That wasn’t you loving me the best way you could. That wasyouprotecting your own heart over mine.”
“I know.” More tears followed and rained steadily down her face. “I’m so sorry. But I need you to know… I didn’t give a damn about what my aunt thought of you. I knew she had it all wrong. I left and hurt you, but I never betrayed you in that way. I always believed in you.”
Frederick dug the heel of his hand into his chest, the ache unbearable. None of this should matter. It was all ancient history. Then why was his throat tight with unshed tears? Why did every muscle in his body want to give out with relief?
“My aunt’s prejudices are her own problem.” Anne’s face darkened with anger, but she let it go with an exhale. “Please don’t let it hurt you anymore, Frederick.”
He dragged the back of his hand across his eyes. “None of this matters anymore.”
“It does to me.” She wiped her cheeks with her hands, buther voice was strong and steady. “I’m not here to win you back. I’m here because you deserve to hear this. I’m sorry it took me so long to tell you.”
Frederick gave her a curt nod and glanced away.I’m not here to win you back.If she knew she’d made a mistake—if she truly believed she’d been wrong—then whywasn’tshe trying to win him back? He shook away the treacherous thought. He was being an immature child. Did he want her to try just so he could refuse her? Because hewouldrefuse her, wouldn’t he?
