I know that my feelings for Adam vastly eclipse his for me. Perhaps I should care more about that than I do, but unlike you I never had expectations of grand passion or romance. I know he is marrying me because he feels driven by obligation. His feelings for me are a fraction of his feelings for you, and we would not have found ourselves in this position were it not for the baby...”

Liza stopped. Baby? Baby?

“Liza?” Her mother’s voice came down the phone. “Why have you stopped?”

“Ruth was pregnant?”

“Yes. Please keep reading. I want to hear all of it.”

Pregnant.

No wonder her mother had walked away and not tried to fix it.

Liza forced herself to carry on reading.

“You know that all I ever wanted was a child, and a family of my own. You used to tease me about it. What was the point of a college education if I had no intention of putting it to good use? Where was my ambition? But I was never like you. I know that Adam came to see you after he found out—” Liza heard her mother’s indrawn breath. That part obviously came as a shock. Should she pause? No. Not unless she was asked to. “He told me that he went to you and begged you to take him back. To forgive. And he told me that you refused to listen and that you told him to live up to his responsibilities. He tried to see you again, but you’d left. You walked away to give us a chance. You removed yourself as an option. Even in our parting you were a better friend to me than I was to you.”

Liza broke off, her throat thick with tears. “Mum—”

“Don’t stop, Liza. It’s hard to hear and I’d like to get through it as fast as I can. You have no idea how relieved I am you’re the one reading them.”

Liza swallowed. Her job wasn’t to judge or ask for more detail. Her mother needed her to read the letters.

She wiped tears from her cheeks and focused on the words.

“And now he resents me, and for that I don’t blame him even though he is at least half responsible for this child we made. I have no expectations that he will be faithful, and next time I write to you—and I will write, even if you don’t read these letters—I may well be a single mother.”

Liza cleared her throat. “He wanted you back. You loved him, and you could have had him back.”

“I loved him more than anything, and I was heartbroken, but I knew I would survive without him. I wasn’t so sure about Ruth. She was always vulnerable. From that first day we met in college, I protected her.”