Chapter Nineteen #2
“Everything.”
Grace brought Stella to a complete stop. “Oliver, you spent this entire summer helping me remember Benjamin with joy, and showing me how to treasure what I had lost while embracing the life that is still before me.”
She took a breath as she loosened her grip on the reins, allowing Stella to lower her head and lazily graze on the grass.
“I wanted to do the same for you. And since the only thing you told me about Odette was how much she loved horses,” She gestured weakly towards Champion, “This was all I had to work with.”
Oliver felt the air leave his lungs in a rush.
The world seemed to be spinning around him, and all he could see was Grace.
She had done this for him—she had looked her greatest fear in the eye, all in an attempt to help heal his broken heart.
Oliver pushed every ounce of reservation aside, sliding off of Champion’s back in one swift movement and offering his hand to Grace. “Can we rest here for a moment?”
Grace glanced around them, the realization of where they were settling into her eyes as they landed on the pond.
She nodded as he stepped closer so she could place her hands on his shoulders.
His hands circled her waist and gently guided her to the ground.
Oliver forced himself to step back the moment her feet touched the grass, his hands feeling empty the moment they were no longer holding her.
Grace reached into the pocket of her dress, pulling out the same handkerchief he had given her the last time they stood in this spot.
“I believe this belongs to someone else,” she said as she held it out to him. His fingers brushed hers as he took it, the warmth spreading through his chest. Oliver brushed his thumb gently over the O delicately stitched in the corner.
He hadn’t known why he had given her Odette’s handkerchief.
The moment he handed it to her, he expected to feel an emptiness in his chest, but instead, he felt something much more dangerous.
He hadn’t realized it at the time, but it wasn’t just a token of surrender—he had been offering her his heart.
“Grace,” he breathed, his throat burning with the swell of emotions pressing against it.
“When I told you that I could not offer you something you were not ready to accept, I was not talking about Benjamin.” He faltered for a moment, dragging a hand across his mouth before letting it fall helplessly to his side.
“If it were simply a matter of you needing more time to heal, I would wait. I would wait for you until the end of my days, if that is what you asked of me.”
Oliver caught the hitch in her breath, but the steadiness of her gaze never left his face. “What I fear is that my past will be too much for you to bear.”
Grace nodded solemnly, and Oliver braced for her to reject his heart and walk away. Why would she want to hold his pain when she had just learned to live with her own?
Instead, she took a step closer. Her eyes were full of tears, but the unmistakable strength that lay beneath them was what broke him into pieces.
“What I ask of you,” she whispered gently, “Is that you allow me to help you carry whatever it is that is hurting you.”
Oliver drew a deep breath, feeling the ache in his chest tighten with every memory he had been carrying alone for so long.
He reached out his hand, relief rushing over him as Grace did the same, lacing her fingers through his.
He pulled her closer to the bank of the pond, knowing that the horses would be perfectly content to stand and graze for as long as they were allowed.
“I met Odette when I was sixteen,” he began, his voice tight and brittle.
“Her father was an instructor at Eton, but our meeting was completely by chance. She and her mother were visiting from France, and I, being the ever-graceful gentleman, flattened her completely walking out of a shop in town one day.”
Grace laughed softly, the sound bringing a soft smile to his lips.
He still remembered the delicate, rose-colored gown Odette had been wearing that day.
It had nearly matched the color of her cheeks as he knelt on the ground beside her, helping her gather the parcels that he had scattered all over the ground.
Her mother had been furious, scolding him shamelessly in front of half the town that was wandering up and down the streets, but he was too mesmerized by the golden flecks in Odette’s dark brown eyes to notice anything else.
Even at 15, she had been breathtaking. Her long, dark curls had slipped out of her pins from the fall, and as she studied him with curiosity, her mouth turned up ever so slightly, lighting up every soft feature of her delicate face.
She was a beauty too pure for this world, and much too pure for Oliver, but what was a young boy supposed to do once he realized that such a beauty existed?
“I always told her that even though it was she who was knocked to the ground, it was I who took the harder fall that day. I was completely enchanted by her.”
Oliver recounted how he snuck off to town every chance he could, hoping to catch a glimpse of her, and hoping even harder that her mother would not be present so he could have a moment to speak with her properly.
One day, fate was on his side, and he spotted her walking the streets with only her maid.
“She agreed to write to me once she returned to France,” he continued.
“The letters never stopped for two years. Each time she came back to visit her father, we would meet, secretly, and make plans.” Oliver’s eyes flicked to Grace, and he found her watching him with such a gentle expectancy it gave him the courage to press on.
“When I turned 18 and left Eton, I asked her to marry me. Our parents thought it was foolish. She was too young, I was too reckless and they forbade it. As I am sure you are aware, I have never been one to follow instructions very well.”
Oliver closed his eyes, trying to press down the guilt and the shame that started to rise. The money he had hidden from his father, and the lies he told to Nathaniel, taking advantage of their friendship and the wealth of a Duke to secure himself passage to France.
“I convinced her to run away with me,” he said, his voice dropping to a whisper.
“We fled to Scotland and married in secret.” Oliver’s voice broke, and Grace’s hand instantly tightened around his.
Memories of the weeks spent in Scotland came in floods.
Neither one of them had been eager to face their families, so they used their limited funds to stay hidden for as long as possible.
Oliver knew he would have been content to stay there with her forever, until the day Odette had told him she was with child.
“Suddenly, the only thing that mattered was making sure they both had a life that they deserved. It was already winter, but I knew we didn’t have enough money to make it on our own until spring.
I made the decision to take Odette back to France so I could return to England and repair my relationship with my parents.
It was cold and wet, and the money we had only allowed for moderate accommodations.
By the time we got back France, Odette was so ill she could barely stand. ”
Oliver could still feel her weight in his arms as he carried her into her parents’ home. He could still hear her begging him to stay until she was well enough to travel, but he had been so eager to prove himself worthy of her and their child, he had left the very next day.
“I was home barely a week before I got word that she was gone. The illness had settled into her lungs, and there was nothing the physician could do for her.”
Oliver swallowed the lump in his throat, letting the silence stretch between them. He could feel Grace’s presence steady beside him.
She had not said a word, but she had not yet walked away. When he dared to look at her, her eyes were wide, glimmering with empathy and unshed tears. Her hand was still firmly clasping his as if her touch could keep him anchored in this moment with her.
“I blamed myself,” he admitted, his voice hoarse.
“For running away, and for thinking I knew better than the whole world. I forced her into that journey, and I left her when she begged me to stay. I wasn’t there when she needed me.
” His gaze dropped to the water, the reflection distorted by ripples moving across the surface.
“I failed her, Grace. Every single promise I made her, I broke.”
He finally forced himself to look at her fully, searching her eyes for some sign that not all hope was lost. “And now I am here, with you, wondering if I even deserve a chance at a future again.”
Grace stepped closer, a single tear trailing down her cheek. “You know what it is to love and to lose, and you still had the strength to open your heart again,” she said softly. “That doesn’t make you broken, Ollie. It made you someone that I could fall in love with.”
The tears he had been holding back blurred his vision. He let out a sob disguised as a laugh, “I love you, Grace.”
Every mask Oliver had ever hidden behind shattered with his admission.
No more charming facades to keep his heart from breaking; no more pretending he was shallow because it hurt too much to let people see the depths of him.
The moment he allowed Grace to see his brokenness, he felt his heart begin to mend.
“The very first time I laid eyes on you, I envied the joy and peace that you radiated so effortlessly. When I saw you again this summer, it was your strength and your fire that had me utterly entranced.”
Grace laughed, her tears, “I was miserable.”
“You were captivating,” he said simply. “The way you hold yourself in the face of adversity, the way you guarded your own heart while still trying to protect those you care about, the way you speak truth without pretense.”
Oliver lifted a hand to her cheek, his thumb wiping away a tear. “The truth is, Grace, it is you who healed me. You have made me brave enough to want things that I had stopped believing in.”
Grace closed her eyes, as she leaned into his touch.
“I love you,” she whispered. “I love how you light up a room just by being in it, and how you can turn anything into a competition. I love how you are secretly the kindest man I have ever known, and the only thing you seek to gain is to make those around you happy.” She placed her hand over his.
“You made me feel alive again, even when I did not want to be.”
Oliver smiled, letting his hand slowly slide down to cradle the back of her neck, fighting every urge to lower his lips to hers. “You said that you remember everything that happened in the study.” He said, a small grin tugging at the corners of his mouth.
Grace tilted her head, her lips curving to match his teasing smile. “I do.”
“So,” he murmured, a low chuckle vibrating in his chest. “Is there something you would like to ask me?”
Grace laughed as she shook her head, “You truly are insufferable.”
Oliver wrapped both of his arms around her waist, pulling her against his chest. Her hands pressed against his coat as she looked into his eyes, shining as bright as he had ever seen them.
“Ollie…” she whispered. “Please kiss me.”
He needed no further invitation. Her breath mingled with his, and he felt the rise and fall of her chest against his as he closed the distance between them.
Oliver had once overheard a young woman declare that a first kiss was one of the most magical moments one could experience, something to be cherished and remembered.
But Oliver couldn’t imagine anything more magical than this—the kind of kiss that only came when you’d lived enough to know what was at stake.
The kind that carried every heartbreak, every ache, and every broken dream, and left you with the hope of a future.
It wasn’t his first kiss, but it was the only one he would ever need.
Grace’s fingers curled around his coat, pulling him closer.
Her lips moved perfectly in sync with his, deepening their kiss until the world completely dissolved around them.
Oliver’s hands moved to frame her face, softly stroking her cheek, letting everything else melt away—the sounds of the pond, the feel of the wind, the weight of the past—there was only Grace.
When they broke apart, Grace leaned her forehead against his with a breathy laugh.
“Will you kiss me again?” She asked, a soft flush spreading across her cheeks.
Oliver nodded, lifting her chin to whisper softly against her lips, “I will kiss you forever, my love.”
And he did. Again. And again.