I turn and bound up two stairs at a time, but when I hit the landing, she’s at the top, dragging a suitcase. She gives me a scathing look. “I’m out of here.”
“Wait. Let’s talk.”
Her hand tightens on the handle. “Is that woman still here?”
“Yes. She won’t leave.”
She walks down two stairs and the wheels bounce too loud against the steps. “Don’t worry, I will.”
“I don’t want you to leave. I want to talk.”
She looks at me. “I’ll stay if you answer one question.”
I am 100-percent certain this will be a question that will make matters worse, but what other choice do I have? “What?”
“Are you engaged to that woman?”
I shake my head. “No, not anymore.”
“But you were?”
“Um…kinda.”
She frowns at me. “Goodbye, Caden.”
“No, wait. Please let me explain.”
“You never thought to tell me this? Not once in all the times we’ve spoken?”
“No, I didn’t.” I shake my head. “It wasn’t relevant.”
“You having a fiancée didn’t seem relevant?”
“She’s not my fiancée. She was a horrible mistake, and I didn’t want to talk about it.”
“I don’t even know what to say to that.” She pushes past me, dragging her suitcase with her.
I grab her arm. “Cat, let’s just go upstairs and talk this through.”
She stares at me, her expression tight with confusion, her eyes searching. “Did you leave her in the middle of the night, like she said?”
I understand why she’s asking, because she had a father who did the same. And if I’d do it to one woman, I’m likely to do it to her too. More than anything I want for this not to be true, but I don’t want to lie. The truth is the only thing I can offer her at the moment.
“Yes, but it’s not what it looks like.” I squeeze her arm. “Cat, please.”
All the color washes from her face as a stricken look crosses over her features. “I can’t. Not now. I need to be by myself.”
She rips her arm away, and I don’t try to stop her. She crashes down the stairs and yells to her family, “I’m going to Uncle Beau’s. Leave me alone.”
Then she slams out of the house, and as the heavy door clicks closed, I watch my love, my life, and my future die a swift, sudden death.
She’s gone.
She’ll come back, of course. This is her home.
But I’m no longer an included part of that picture.
Just as she was starting to see it, I ruined it, just like I ruin everything.