My knees felt weak as I stood there with my head spinning. I’d never spoken about this with anyone, but I took a deep breath and continued anyway. “Will proposed to me, surrounded by peed-on pregnancy tests in the bathroom—he proposed right then—he told me he loved me and would raise my baby with me and treat it like his own child. I believed him, but I told him no. I loved you. I wanted you, Luke. I told him that, and he said he didn’t care. He said he had loved me for years and—” A strangled sob escaped my throat, and I couldn’t say any more.

“He was a good man.” Luke sighed, defeat coloring his features.

“Luke, he was my best friend, I loved him. We didn’t get together until Dylan was almost two. But he—even though I was still writing all those letters to you, trying to get you to come back, making endless calls to try to find where you were—he refused to give up on me. He was there for Dylan like a father would be. He was there for me like a husband would be. And all that time as I leaned on him, I felt so much guilt. I told him that he should find someone else to love him like he deserved, but he always said no. Then I got a box in the mail.” I paused and studied his face. This would hurt but keeping it from him would be like a lie. “It was full of every letter I had ever sent to you. All were unopened.” I grabbed on to Luke’s hands and held them tight. “I gave up then. I buried you in my heart and mourned you like you died.”

His hands convulsed in mine as he pulled me closer. I was half a step away from being in his arms. His eyes held mine but this time I didn’t want to look away.

Defeat clouded his eyes. “I should have listened to my heart, not my fears. I should have listened to my soul screaming at me that it belonged with yours, not my fucked-up mind telling me I would hurt you again. I should have listened to you, Lily. Can you ever forgive me? Am I asking the impossible of you?”

As I stood there, for the first time since I had been back home, I got out of my head. My heart demanded that I listen to it, listen to him. His words had shattered my doubts.

“I love you, Luke,” I blurted, and his jaw dropped. “I never stopped loving you, not ever. I loved Will with all my heart. But you—Luke, you are part of my soul—so, yes, I forgive you for everything. I just wish—”