“Wait, my real wedding?” she said, looking surprised. “I thought out of everyone you would understand.”

“Understand what?”

“I don’t want to get married.”

Clarke blinked. He’d known this woman his whole life, and she very rarely surprised him. But she shocked the hell out of him now.

“Why the hell did I have to glue those wedding cake pictures, then? Since when have you not wanted to get married?”

Her smile was a little sad. “Since Brayden.”

His fingers clenched hers, and he noted out of the corner of his eye that their server was doing yet another walk-by, but wisely read the situation and kept moving so as not to interrupt.

“Dree, you know better than anyone that he was actual human waste. I’m not glad he died, but I’m glad you’re not with him anymore. You can’t let him ruin your life.”

“I’m not!” she insisted. “I’m perfectly happy single.”

“What happens when you meet someone?”

She hesitated. “Well, that hasn’t happened, has it? The closest has been Randy, and look how that turned out.”

He shook his head. “You were never going to marry Randy, even if he hadn’t turned out to be a married weirdo. But, and I mean this as a compliment, you’re marriage material.”

“Says the man who doesn’t want to get married.”

“Says the man who knows you. And I know you’ve always wanted a husband and a family and a dog.”

She pressed her lips together, seeming to gather her thoughts. “You said I couldn’t let Brayden ruin my happiness.”

He nodded. Damn straight.

“Well, the thing is, Clarke, I… I’ve never been able to forget about the fact that I ruined Claire’s happiness.”

“What the hell are you talking about? What’s Claire have to do with whether or not you get married?”

“Because I was so busy believing in happily ever after and buying into the prince sweeping me off my feet. I was so selfishly absorbed with being in love with Brayden that I never stopped to realize that I was stomping on someone else’s happily ever after. That I was stealing someone else’s prince.”

Her voice was so genuine, her expression so open that Clarke felt a surge of frustration with himself for not realizing sooner how deeply she’d let the Brayden thing affect her. He’d known, of course, that it had. How could it not? The man she’d thought she’d marry had been married to someone else the entire time.

But he’d also thought that through her friendship with Claire and Naomi, she’d made peace with the fact that no part of it had been her fault. He told her that now, but she immediately shook her head.