CHAPTER THIRTY FOUR
JACK
The formal tone, so unlike Sophia’s usual warmth, tells me everything I need to know about what is coming. But I deserve it. I will stand here and take whatever she needs to say.
The grandfather clock in the corner ticks relentlessly, each second stretching into eternity. I pace the polished floor, hands shoved deep in my pockets, rehearsing apologies I know will be inadequate.
I hear her footsteps before I see her—measured, controlled, the same steady tread I’d come to recognize in the ER when she was facing something difficult.
She appears in the doorway, still wearing the clothes from earlier, her hair pulled back in a simple ponytail.
No makeup. No armor. Just Sophia, raw and real.
“Thank you for meeting me,” she says, her voice eerily calm.
“Of course.” I take a half-step toward her, then stop when I see her almost imperceptible flinch. “Sophia, I—”
“No.” She holds up a hand. “I need you to listen. Just listen. Can you do that?”
I nod, throat too tight for words.
She moves further into the room but keeps her distance, positioning herself beside the massive stone fireplace. Her fingers trace the mantle absently, eyes anywhere but on me.
“I’ve spent the last several hours trying to understand,” she begins. “Trying to make sense of what happened between us. Of who you really are.”
“I’m still me,” I say softly. “The same person you—”
“You’re not, though.” She cuts me off, finally meeting my eyes.
“The Jack I knew didn’t have a mansion with staff.
Didn’t own a vineyard empire. Didn’t order $300 bottles of wine without blinking.
” Her voice remains steady, but I can see the hurt churning beneath her composed exterior.
“The Jack I knew didn’t lie to me for months. ”
“I didn’t lie—”
“ Don’t. ” The word cracks like a whip. “Don’t you dare say you never lied.
Omission is still deception, and you know it.
You deliberately created a false impression.
You watched me stress about money, about Madison’s college fund, about yard service…
” She laughs, a hollow sound that cuts me to the bone.
“God, I was worried about affording yard service, and you own half a mountain.”
“I wanted you to know me,” I try. “Not my family’s money.”
“But the money is part of you, Jack. It shaped who you are. Your education, your opportunities, your choices.” She crosses her arms tightly across her chest. “And you kept it from me. Why? Did you think I was so shallow I’d only want you for your money? Or so weak I couldn’t handle your real life?”
“Neither,” I say desperately. “I just…I wanted to be seen for who I really am, not what I come from.”
“And instead you became a lie.” Her eyes glisten with unshed tears.
“Do you have any idea what it’s like to stand in that house, with your mother looking at me like I’m some kind of curiosity, realizing that everything I thought I knew about you was carefully curated?
Do you know what that does to a person? To their trust? ”
I swallow hard. “I’m sorry. I should have told you. I wanted to, so many times, but—”
“But what? What possible excuse could justify bringing me and my daughter to the literal other side of the world before revealing the truth?” Her voice finally cracks, emotion bleeding through her careful control.
“There is no excuse,” I admit. “I was a coward. I kept waiting for the right moment, and it never came, and then it was too late.”
“It was too late the moment you decided I wasn’t worthy of the truth.” The first tear slips down her cheek, but she doesn’t wipe it away. “Do you know what hurts the most? It’s not the money. It’s not even the lies. It’s that you didn’t trust me with who you really are.”
“I trust you completely,” I insist.
“No.” She shakes her head slowly. “You don’t. Because trust requires honesty, Jack. It requires vulnerability. You were so afraid I’d see your wealth instead of you that you never gave me the chance to prove I could see both.”
Each word lands like a physical blow, because she is right. About all of it.
“I’ve spent years rebuilding myself after Troy,” she continues, her voice dropping to near a whisper. “Learning to trust my judgment again. Believing that I deserved better than what he gave me.”
She pauses, the silence heavy between us. When she speaks again, her voice has changed, becoming both stronger and more vulnerable.
“Troy used to tell me that women were ‘built for sex and silence.’ That the only time I had real value was when I was on my knees or on my back.” Her eyes lock with mine, unflinching despite the tears now flowing freely.
“And for years, I let him convince me that was normal. That being wanted meant being used.”
A sickness rises in my throat. I’d known Troy was toxic, but this…
“And then you showed up,” she continues. “You made me feel like I was more. Like I was worth something.” Her voice breaks on the word. “You didn’t just lie, Jack. You made me feel safe again. And that was worse.”
The full weight of what I’d done crashes down on me with devastating clarity.
I’d known about Troy’s financial manipulation, his condescension, his control.
But I hadn’t known about this deeper degradation.
And in my fear of rejection, I’d reinforced the lesson her ex had taught her—that she couldn’t trust her own judgment.
That the men she chose would inevitably betray her.
“Sophia,” I whisper, my own tears falling now. “I never meant—”
“I know you didn’t mean to hurt me,” she says, wiping her cheeks with the back of her hand. “That’s what makes it so painful. You did this with good intentions. You convinced yourself you were protecting me, protecting us. Just like Troy convinced himself his control was ‘for my own good.’”
“I am nothing like him,” I say, the words strangled with emotion.
“No, you’re not,” she agrees. “But the effect is the same. I trusted you. I opened myself to you. I let you into my life, into Madison’s life. And now I’m standing here questioning every moment we shared, wondering what was real and what was carefully edited.”
She moves toward the door, then pauses, not looking back at me. “Madison and I will stay until our return flight next week. I won’t punish her by cutting this trip short. She’s already excited about coming here, and Emma’s rugby lessons, and I won’t take that away from her.”
“I understand,” I manage.
“We’ll stay in the guest house. You can stay…wherever you actually live here. But I need space, Jack. A lot of it.”
“Of course. Whatever you need.”
She nods once, still facing away. “You know what the worst part is? Despite everything, there’s a part of me that still…” She takes a deep breath. “A part of me that wishes I could just forget all this and go back to how things were. How pathetic is that?”
Before I can respond, she steps through the doorway, pausing one last time. “Goodnight, Jackson .”
The emphasis on my full name—a name she’d never used before—is the final twist of the knife. She disappears down the hallway, her footsteps fading until only silence remains.
I sink onto a nearby bench, the full weight of what I’d lost crushing the air from my lungs. The tears I’d managed to control in front of Sophia now come in earnest, my body shaking with silent sobs.
Not just for the relationship I’d destroyed with my cowardice, but for what Sophia had endured before me. For the woman who’d survived Troy’s degradation only to have her hard-won trust shattered by my deception. For the chance I’d destroyed to be the man she deserved.
I don’t know how long I sit there, broken open in the entrance hall of my family home. Long enough that the tears eventually subside, leaving behind a hollow clarity. I have done this. No excuses, no justifications. Just my own fear and insecurity.
And somehow, if she would allow it, I have to find a way to make it right.
Not to win her back—I have no right to expect that. But to show her that her judgment hadn’t failed her. That the man she’d fallen for is real, even if his circumstances aren’t what she’d believed.
I owe her that much. Even if it is the last thing I ever give her.