Nothing Like Love (19 page)

The last three weeks with Zach had been heaven.

It wasn’t just the sex, although that was amazing. It wasn’t just working together on the play, although that had been amazing, too.

It was the stuff in between the work and the sex that made each day seem magical.

They talked for hours about everything in the world. They talked about their childhoods, their families, their first kisses. They talked about their favorite Shakespeare plays and traded quotes back and forth. They talked while they explored the west coast of Ireland and while they wandered around the grounds of the castle.

But all good things must come to an end, and now it was her very last day in Ireland. She and Zach were sitting on the grass in the walled garden he’d first shown her last week.

The day and the setting were so beautiful it hurt a little. For the first time since she’d been here, the blue sky above them didn’t have a single cloud in it. The air was warm but not hot, and the flowers in their secret garden were like an impressionist painting.

Zach had put together a picnic as a surprise for her. He laid down a plaid blanket on the green grass and brought out a basket filled with her favorite treats from the castle kitchen—tiny sandwiches and scones and homemade bread and butter and the Irish cheeses she’d fallen in love with.

And then, of course, there was the champagne.

It was called Belle Epoque, and the name—as well as the exquisite flavor and frothy effervescence—was the perfect metaphor for the time they’d shared in Ireland.

After they’d finished their food and their champagne, they fell silent. Zach was leaning back on his elbows, Simone was leaning against him with her arms wrapped around her knees, and they were watching the fountain in the center of the garden.

“What are you thinking?” Zach asked after a while, kissing the back of her neck.

How could she feel so happy and so sad at the same time?

“I was thinking that I’m really going to miss you,” she said, wincing at the catch in her voice. She didn’t want to ruin their last day together by being sad that it was over. That wasn’t her style.

Zach shifted behind her, and then the warm, solid weight of him was gone.

Before she had time to miss it, he was standing in front of her—and then he was kneeling in front of her, and there was a ring in the palm of his hand.

“Simone, I love you. I want to spend the rest of my life with you. Will you marry me?”

It was so perfect, so romantic, that for a moment she didn’t believe it was happening. Was Zach Hammond really kneeling down in front of her in the castle garden, holding out a diamond ring that shone and flashed in the sun?

She looked at his face, so strong and handsome and earnest. His blue eyes were full of love—a love she knew was real even if nothing else seemed real, because it was the same love she felt in her heart.

But then, just like it had on the airplane, panic gripped her.

“You said good-bye to Isabelle three weeks ago.”

He frowned. “What does Isabelle have to do with us?”

She hugged her knees tighter. “You had her up on a pedestal for years. Now that she’s fallen off of it, you need someone to take her place. I know you think you love me, but . . . what if that’s all I am? A placeholder for your fantasy woman?”

Zach put the ring back in his pocket and leaned toward her. “You’re not a placeholder for anyone or anything. Simone, you—”

She couldn’t let him finish. “Zach, this has been the most magical time of my life. But that’s the problem.” She scrambled to her feet. “Magic doesn’t last. Magic isn’t real. You’re the most wonderful man I’ve ever known and . . . and . . .” She took a breath, and then she said it. “And I love you. But I’m not the woman who can make you happy. We don’t fit. You’re romance and idealism and I’m cynicism and rough edges. And even though it was wonderful for a while, I’m not a romance person. I’m a real person. I’m a real person, and I don’t think you could deal with me. Not for a lifetime.” To her horror, she started to cry. “Oh, God, I’m sorry. Zach, I—I’m sorry.”

The worst part was, she knew how easy it would be to transform the pain in Zach’s eyes into joy. How easy it would be to transform her own pain into joy—at least for a little while.

All she had to do was say yes. Never had any word in the English language tempted her with such terrible power. But if she said it, how long would their happiness last before Zach’s dream of forever came crashing down to earth? He would change, or she would—or both of them. And the pain of that—of losing Zach after letting herself believe they could share a lifetime together—wouldn’t just hurt like she was hurting now.

It would be the kind of hurt she would never recover from.

If she got out now, she would survive. But if she waited even one more minute . . .

Panic clawed at her, and she knew she had to go. She looked at Zach once more, knowing it would be the last time, and then she ran.

She’d packed her suitcases that morning, so all she had to do was stuff her toothbrush in her purse. She called a cab, and while she waited for it to arrive, she hid behind the potted shrub at the front door.

She felt awful for not saying good-bye to Julia, but she couldn’t stand the idea of facing the woman who would have made the best mother-in-law in the entire world.

But when she thought about Zach, she felt more than awful.

She felt like dying.

She spent a miserable night at the airport hotel, staring at the cracked ceiling and hating herself. But she knew that the very fact that she’d run away from Zach meant she wasn’t the right woman for him.

The next morning, sitting in Shannon Airport, she was almost too miserable to be worried about flying.

She pulled out her cell phone and stared at it. Zach had tried to reach her several times yesterday but not once today. Maybe he’d finally accepted what seemed so obvious to her.

She still had half an hour to wait before they’d start boarding her flight. If she was going to die in an airplane crash, who did she want her last call to be to?

The obvious answer was Zach. She couldn’t marry him, but she loved him. As long as she lived, she would never love anyone else.

But she couldn’t call Zach. Not if she wanted to get out of Ireland alive in order to die over the Atlantic.

Kate, maybe? She’d loved Kate a lot longer than she’d loved Zach.

But as she stared at the phone in her hands, she realized that there was someone in the world she’d loved even longer—someone she needed to talk to.

She scrolled through her contacts and dialed a number in Ohio.

The phone on the other end rang and a familiar voice answered. “Hello?”

“Dad, it’s me.”

“Hey there, sweetie! Are you in Ireland or back in New York?”

“I’m in Ireland, but I’m at the airport. I’ll be home today.”

“I still can’t believe you got on a plane. I’m so proud of you. And we’re on for Labor Day weekend, right? I decided I’m too damn old to sleep on your couch, so I splurged on a hotel reservation. It’s only a few blocks away from your place. Is that all right?”

“Sure.”

“Great. So is anything up? Or are you just calling to say hi?”

She hesitated so long that after a minute her dad asked, “Honey? Are you still there?”

“I’m still here.” She hesitated one more moment, and then she asked the question she’d sworn she’d never ask him. “Dad, there’s something I need to know. Why did you have an affair?”

“An affair? What are you talking about?”

He didn’t sound guilty—he sounded bewildered. Was it possible he’d forgotten?

“I saw you with her, Dad. When Mom was sick. A blonde woman in green cat’s-eye glasses? You met her more than once. She had this brown suede coat and a purple scarf, and—”

“Oh, my God.”

Simone closed her eyes. “Yeah.”

“No. No. Simone, have you been thinking all these years that . . . oh, sweetheart. That woman wasn’t my mistress. She was my therapist.”

It was her turn to be bewildered. “Your
therapist
? But . . . you never told us you had a therapist.”

“I know. I needed help, but I didn’t want to tell you or your mother. You guys had enough to deal with without worrying that I was going off my rocker. So I kept it quiet.” There was a pause. “You thought I was having an affair? Wow. Was it really that easy to think the worst of me?”

“Oh, Dad.” Suddenly she started to cry. “Oh, Dad.”

“How could you have believed something like that? And if you did, why didn’t you talk to me about it?”

Why had she jumped so quickly to that conclusion? From the moment she saw her dad with that woman she’d been sure he was having an affair . . . and she thought she knew why. It hurt so much to watch her mother dying that there were times she thought about running away. Even though she never had, she’d hated herself for those moments of weakness. Having an affair, she’d thought, was how her father ran away.

“Because I forgave you. I understood why you did it. Or I thought I did.”

“I loved your mother with every fiber of my being. I would have died before I’d do anything to hurt her. How could you not know that?”

Until that moment, Simone hadn’t known how much of her life had been built on her belief that even the very best of men—even a man as loving and loyal as her father—would eventually betray the person he loved.

All this time she’d been wrong. All this time she’d believed a lie. But she couldn’t blame that mistake for the way she’d responded to it. Someone else . . . someone like Zach . . . wouldn’t have reacted the way she had even if he’d believed the same lie.

Someone like Zach wouldn’t have been so ready to close his heart to love.

For a minute she couldn’t speak. All she could do was sob.

“It’s all right, honey. Don’t cry. We’ll talk more about this in person, okay? But something else occurs to me. My therapist was gorgeous. What did you think she was doing with a short, balding English professor? Your mother was the only woman in the world who ever thought I was sexy.”

“Oh, Dad. Talking about Mom isn’t the way to make me stop crying.” She wiped her nose with her sleeve. “I love you so much.”

“I love you, too. I’ll see you in a few weeks.”

She put her phone back in her purse and buried her head in her hands.

This wasn’t the way it was supposed to work. The way it was supposed to work was that you thought the best of someone and then they broke your heart.

Zach had been right about her. She did think the worst of people. Because Simone Oliver wasn’t going to wait around for some guy to break her heart. She’d break it herself first and use the broken pieces to keep the world at bay.

She thought about her dad, and Noah, and Zach. How could she have been so blind? The world was full of love and devotion, and she’d missed it. She was so busy trying to be realistic about people that she’d missed the magic in people.

The magic of true love.

Was it too late for her and Zach? She’d rejected his marriage proposal and run away from him. Could he ever forgive her?

Maybe not. But she had to try.

And then, when she jumped to her feet and started for the exit, there he was.

For a moment she thought she’d hallucinated him. But would she have hallucinated him here? The proposal yesterday was the fantasy—the beautiful garden, the romantic picnic, the perfect ring.

This was the opposite of perfect. This was an airport—fluorescent lights and security guards and hundreds of metal death traps visible through the windows.

And here was Zach, looking at her like he’d already forgiven her . . . even though she didn’t deserve it.

When he spoke, his voice was natural, matter-of-fact—but his words etched themselves on her heart.

“My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun;

Coral is far more red than her lips’ red;

If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun;

If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.

I love to hear her speak, yet well I know

That music has a far more pleasing sound;

I grant I never saw a goddess go;

My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground:

And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare

As any she belied with false compare.”

And just like that, she was crying again.

“I’ve always loved that sonnet,” she said, knuckling the tears from her eyes.

Zach smiled at her. “I’ve always hated it. I thought the man who wrote it couldn’t really love the woman he wrote it for.” He took a breath. “But I’ve learned a lot about love since I met you, and I think I understand those words a little better now.”

He crossed the space between them and took her hands in his. “You were right about Isabelle. She was my fantasy woman. But you . . .” He shook his head. “What I feel for you is nothing like what I felt for her. You’re not my fantasy, Simone—you’re my reality. The reality I want for the rest of my life. You’re the woman I want wiping my ass when I can’t do it myself anymore. And I want to wipe yours.”

She started to laugh while she was still crying. The combination made her hiccup, and then Zach was laughing, too.