Pretend Love Romance by Penny Wylder
Leo
Fuck.
My mother and Diana standing in the door is like a vision from my nightmares after what I just said. My stomach plummets through the floor, and it sinks even deeper when Diana turns away. She says something to my mother and then she’s gone. I blink for one eternal moment before I’m running after her.
My mother stops me with a hand on my chest. “No.”
“I need to talk to her.”
The fury in my mother’s eyes knocks me back a step. “No, I think you’ve said quite enough for Diana. You’re going to let her go, and we’re going to talk.”
“That can wait.”
“Now, Leo.” She marches out of the lodge and toward the cabin she’s staying in, and I glance back at my friends. Even though we were fighting five minutes ago, they’re still my best friends, and there’s sympathy on their faces. But there’s nothing they can do.
I follow my mother in body if not in mind. My brain is across the property at my house where Diana probably went. I have to fix it. I have to. I don’t know how much she heard, but even if it was only the last line, I don’t blame her for being hurt. Free of everyone and everything…I’m a fucking idiot.
I meant the pressure of this situation and the fact that even though I’m loving every second with Di, the water temperature is rising higher, and I’m being squeezed like a vise on all sides.
She hasn’t heard what I need to tell her, which is that I’ve already decided that I don’t want to be free of her. Ever. Fuck the conventional ideas of how long it takes people to fall in love, I’m already there. I love Diana, and I want to marry her. Even if it’s not right now.
But if she said yes, I would take her to the courthouse tomorrow. That’s how sure I am. I was planning on telling her tonight—that not only did I want the relationship to be real, but that the ring was real.
I couldn’t explain the impulse that made me go into the jewelry store and buy the ring. It was one of the first ones that I saw, and I could afford it on my own. My parents had no part of that. I felt the rightness of that ring the way that I’d felt the bone-deep attraction to Di on that first day. So I bought it and let her think it was cheap and something to throw away. But it’s real.
Everything about us is real.
My mom shoves open the door to the cabin and calls my father. She tosses her bag onto the couch and turns to me, face full of fire. My dad has no idea what’s coming.
“Is it true?” she asks me, and her voice is deceptively calm and even. That’s when my mother is her most lethal. Right now I deserve it.
I blow out a breath. “Yes, it’s a lie.”
“What’s a lie?” my father asks.
“Diana isn’t my fiancée,” I tell him. “She agreed to pretend so I could save the business. I was desperate, and she thought she owed me something because I saved her life. But it was all pretend.”
He shakes his head. “Why would you do that?”
“Because,” the anger that’s built up over years and this week explodes again, and I pace back and forth as I speak. “I’m tired of you questioning what I’m doing with my life just because it’s something that you wouldn’t have chosen. I didn’t want to take your money, but I didn’t have a choice, and now that I have it’s like it’s wrapped around me and I can’t escape it.
“Don’t get me wrong, I’m thankful for your willingness to help. But I don’t want to have to get married in order to have you choose to support me. I want to get married. I’ve always wanted that, but you two have a great marriage, and that takes time. I’m not ready. Or I wasn’t ready. What kind of life could I give a wife right now with my whole day spent trying to run a business? The only reason we’re not slammed with people is that the river is too high.” I come to the end of a rant in a rush, and I feel like a balloon that’s deflated. All of that was waiting to come out of me, and once the hole was poked there was no stopping it.
My father sits on the couch heavily. “That’s a lot of information.”
“We thought that this business wasn’t serious, Leo,” my mother says gently. “It seemed like some sort of youthful frenzy, and not a long-term plan.”
“No.” I shake my head. “This place is everything to me. I love what I do. And that’s why I was so desperate to save it. Say whatever it took to make that happen. I regretted the lie as soon as I said it, and I’m sorry.”
There’s no more anger in my mother’s eyes when she speaks. “And do you regret Diana?”
Emotion hits me in the chest. “No.” My voice is thick with it, and I’m shaking with the remnants of adrenaline and the need to run. “It was supposed to be fake, but…it’s not. At least to me.” I laugh. “You got what you wanted. I want to marry her. But I think I fucked that up.”
Mom hugs me. “Go get her. We’ll be fine. Now that we understand.”
“That’s it?” I look at my father. “That’s all it takes to change your mind?”
He laughs. “No. We’ve seen how you care about this place, Leo. I apologize for thinking that I was pouring money into a half-baked idea that you were trying to execute. You’ve done an incredible job, and I’m happy to help you keep it. As for Diana, and marriage in general, you’re right. It’s not our place to force you. But if you love her, go get her.”
I don’t wait for any more words, sprinting out the door at full speed. I don’t stop, and my stomach drops when I see that her car is gone. But I still let myself hope that she’s not gone. Maybe she moved it. Maybe.
“Diana?” I call as I burst through the door. “Diana.”
She’s gone. There’s no need to check every room in the house, I can feel the emptiness. On the counter, the ring sits. So much larger than its small size, it’s the only thing in the fucking room. I feel like I’ve been punched in the gut and double over as if I have, my chest tight like there are fists squeezing my lungs. She’s gone.
There’s a knock on my open front door, and my mom is standing there. She followed me.
“It’s too late,” I say. “She’s gone.”
“So go to her. I’ve seen the way that she looks at you, and when we spoke at lunch, she told me some things. She loves you.”
“When I said I wanted to be free of everyone, I didn’t mean her.”
“I know,” she says, smiling. “Your father apologized, but I need to. I’m sorry for causing you this kind of pain. I’m not sorry that you found her. Go make it right.”
Determination hardens in my gut. I don’t know where Diana lives—there’s so much about each other that we don’t know. I don’t care. This is too right.
I may not know where she lives, but I know how to find out.
