“Loyalty—and sticking with something—isn’t a flaw, Jack. It’s a quality. One of your many qualities.”

“Maybe if it had been just me—” He shrugged. “Who knows? But it wasn’t me. I had the girls.”

The girls. Those two beautiful girls. Clare thought about Aiden, about Todd and their happy, settled family life.

“I’m so mad at her right now.” She stepped away from him and closed her hands over the rail. A family of ducks skittered away, perhaps sensing danger. “She made some crazy decisions in her life, but this—”

“You know Becca. She needed to win, whether that was in business or in love. She needed more, bigger, better.”

“They don’t come better than you, Jack.”

“But she already had me. That was probably why it collapsed. I should have kept her uncertain, unsure, but that isn’t who I am. I admired her strength and her focus. I loved the wildness and the restlessness. I understood it. But all qualities have a dark side, don’t they? In the end, that wildness and restlessness drove her to leave.”

“Did you—” Was she going to make it worse by talking about it? “Did you try to stop her? Did you see someone? Get therapy?”

“No.” He pulled off the towel and draped it over the rail. “I wanted her to go, Clare. The children weren’t aware, but I knew that probably wouldn’t last. I didn’t want them growing up with that. I wanted them to have stability. They deserved that. And I made a rule for myself after the first time. That was it for me. I set boundaries, and she knew what they were.”

“The first time?”

“She left me before.” He turned to look at her. “The first time was when Izzy was three months old.”

“That can’t be true. She would have told me.”

“She told no one. She came back. I don’t know why. There was Izzy, of course, but I like to think it was because she loved me.”

“She did. Oh God, Jack, she did love you.” I met a man. “I know she did.”

“I think she did, too, in her own way. But it wasn’t enough. The other part of her, that damaged insecure part, was stronger. Always pulling at her, pushing her away from the safe and secure. Maybe she didn’t know how to be if she didn’t have to fight and strive. It was easier when she was dancing because she threw everything into that, but after the injury things went downhill. We had a brief time when things seemed stable—Molly was a result of that time.”

“I always wondered why you didn’t have children right away.”