Chapter 37
LIZA
Iwas on what I had morbidly started calling my widow walk. It was my daily trek along the beach where I mourned my lost love like some tragic heroine from a Victorian novel. It was dramatic and self-pitying, and I didn’t care. If I couldn’t be happy, I could at least lean into the misery.
The good thing about being alone was that I didn’t have to pretend to be happy.
Nobody was asking if I was okay. My phone was off.
It had been off for a couple of days and I planned on leaving it that way.
I was sulking something fierce. I was sad, but I was also healing.
It gave me time to figure out what the hell I was going to do.
The sun was starting to set. It was my favorite time of day. It was melancholy. And soothing. I’d been walking for about an hour, my feet bare in the wet sand, my hair whipping around in the ocean breeze.
I was thinking about my dissertation, and the chapter I’d finished this morning.
I was debating whether I should try to find a position at one of the marine labs nearby or if I should just cut my losses and leave Cloudhaven entirely.
I knew I needed to leave. The town was too small.
I didn’t want to run into Darek, and if I stuck around, I would definitely see him.
And Daisie. I didn’t think it would be fair to the little girl.
“Liza!” The voice was small and high and achingly familiar.
Great. My solitude was making me hear things.
“Liza!” That sounded way too real not to be legit.
I turned, and my heart stopped.
Daisie was running toward me, her little legs pumping for all they were worth, her hair flying behind her. And behind her, not running but walking with those long-legged strides that covered ground faster than seemed possible, was Darek.
Panic flooded through me. What was I supposed to do? Run away? Jump into the ocean? Pretend to be someone else? Act like I didn’t see them on the empty beach?
I didn’t get the chance to make a decision. Daisie was there, throwing herself at me, and instinct took over. I caught her, wrapping my arms around her small body. She was warm and real and sobbing into my shoulder.
“I missed you,” she said through her tears. “I missed you so much.”
“I missed you too, sweetheart.” My own voice was thick with emotion. “So much.”
She pulled back, and I saw she was holding something.
“What’s that?” I asked.
I could see it was a card made of construction paper, covered in glue and glitter and cut into the rough shape of a whale. It was clearly handmade.
“It’s an apology card,” Daisie said, pressing it into my hands.
“Oh, Daisie, you don’t have anything to apologize for.”
“I know. It’s from Daddy. He made it. He just thought I should give it to you because I’m cuter and you might not throw it away if I’m the one giving it to you.”
Despite everything, I felt a smile tug at my lips. “Your dad made this?”
She nodded and scrunched up her little nose. “He’s not very good at crafts. But he tried really hard.”
I looked at the card more closely. The whale shape was lopsided and the glitter was a hot mess. For a billionaire who built luxury yachts, it was impressively terrible.
And somehow, that made it perfect.
Darek had reached us now, standing a few feet away, his hands shoved in his pockets. He looked nervous. Uncertain. Nothing like the confident man I first met in that coffee shop.
“Did you read the card?” he asked quietly.
I opened it carefully, mindful of the glitter situation. Inside, in Darek’s strong handwriting, it said: I’m sorry I was being a little krill-joy. Whale you forgive me?
I stared at it, feeling tears prick at my eyes. It was terrible. The puns were awful. The whole thing was ridiculous.
And it was the sweetest thing anyone had ever done for me.
“Liza?” Darek took a step closer. “I know a card isn’t enough. I know I hurt you. I didn’t trust you. I pushed you away when you were trying to tell me the truth. But I’m hoping—I’m asking—if you’ll give me a chance to apologize properly. To explain.”
I wanted to say yes. But the hurt from that morning in the boathouse was still raw.
“I don’t know,” I said honestly. “That was really hard, Darek. What you said. The way you looked at me like I was some hired help you were dismissing.”
“Daddy cries at night,” Daisie announced, clearly tired of the grown-ups talking. “I hear him sometimes.”
“Daisie,” Darek said, his face flushing. “That was supposed to be a secret.”
“But it’s true! You do cry! And you’re sad all the time and you don’t eat your food either and you keep looking at Liza’s room.”
“Okay, okay.” Darek put his hand on his daughter’s shoulder. “You’ve made your point.”
The image of Darek crying at night broke my heart. Knowing he had been just as miserable as I had been.
“Please,” he said. “Please just come back to the house with us. Let me apologize properly. Let me tell you what I should have told you a week ago. And if after that you want to leave again, if you want nothing to do with me, I’ll accept that. But please give me a chance to make this right.”
I looked at him and saw the dark circles under his eyes. He looked rough. And while that made me sad, it also gave me some satisfaction to know he had been suffering a little.
I looked at Daisie, still holding on to my hand.
I had missed them so much. Both of them. This past week had been the longest of my life, and every day I wondered if I made a mistake by leaving. I kept telling myself I should have fought harder. Clapped my hand over his mouth and made him listen to me.
“Okay,” I heard myself say. “Let’s talk.”
Daisie cheered and hugged me again, and over her head, I saw Darek’s face transform with relief.
“Thank you,” he said quietly. “Thank you for giving me a chance.”
“I haven’t forgiven you yet,” I warned. “We’re just talking.”
“I know. That’s more than I deserve.”
We walked back toward my cabin, Daisie between us, holding both our hands. She chattered the whole way, telling me about everything I had missed in the past week.
Normal kid stuff. The kind of everyday moments I had been missing.
When we got to the cabin, Daisie ran ahead to explore, pushing open the door and looking around with wide eyes.
“This is so cool!” she announced. “It’s like a tiny house! Can I live here?”
Darek followed her inside. I watched his expression shift from curiosity to shock to something like horror.
“You’ve been living here?” He looked around at the single room, the futon, the tiny kitchenette. “Liza, this is so… small.”
“All I could afford,” I said defensively. “Not all of us are billionaires.”
“I didn’t mean anything by it.” He stopped, ran a hand through his hair. “I just meant you should have called me. Should have let me help.”
“It’s a shack but it’s been fine. Katie gave me a good rate, and it’s on the beach. I’ve been able to work on my dissertation.”
“I could have this whole thing moved to my backyard if you want,” Darek said, still looking around like he couldn’t believe people actually lived like this. “Put it on the property. You could have your own private writing space.”
Despite everything, I laughed. “You want to move an entire shack to your backyard?”
“If it means you’ll come home, yes.”
“I love it here!” Daisie called out. “It’s like a fairy house! Can we stay for dinner? Please?”
Darek looked at me, eyebrows raised. “Do you have food?”
“I have ramen and canned soup. And I think there’s some bread that’s probably still good.”
“How about we go get actual food instead? There’s a seafood place down the road. We could talk there.”
Part of me wanted to stay in the cabin and keep things small and contained. But Daisie was looking at me with such hope. And I was hungry. And I couldn’t deny the idea of getting out of this tiny space was appealing.
“Okay. But I’m not dressed for anywhere fancy.”
“You look perfect,” Darek said.
We piled into the SUV, Daisie in the back seat singing some song about whales. He drove to a casual restaurant right on the water. The kind of place with picnic tables, paper plates, and the best fried clams in Maine.
We ordered food and sat outside as the sun finished setting. For a few minutes, it felt almost normal. Like we were just a family grabbing dinner and the past week hadn’t happened. It all felt so right.
Darek gave Daisie some quarters to play some of the games lined up against the wall. It was just Darek and me at the table. I knew we couldn’t avoid the conversation any longer.
“I’m sorry,” he said before I could speak.
“I’m so sorry, Liza. For everything. I was scared and I lashed out, and I hurt you in the process.
It’s not your fault. It was me. The whole Sasha thing really screwed me up.
I was just waiting for you to leave. I kept expecting to get hurt and I guess I thought if I struck first, you couldn’t hurt me. ”
“But you hurt me. Really badly.”
“I know. And I don’t know if I can ever make that right. But I need you to understand—it wasn’t about you. It was about me. I’m a little gun shy about giving my heart to anyone again. I’ve been terrified of letting someone in again only to have them leave.”
“So you pushed me away first.”
“Yeah. And it was the stupidest thing I’ve ever done. Della called me. Told me you refused the payment. She said you quit Faux.”
“I didn’t want the money. Taking it would make everything you accused me of true. It stopped being a job for me pretty early on. I thought you knew that.”
“I did. I do. You were planning to stay. I believe you wanted to build a life with us.”
“I did,” I admitted. “I had already decided I was going to tell Della I was done with Faux. But with the hearing and stuff, I put it on the backburner. I figured I had a few days.”
He closed his eyes briefly, pain crossing his face. “I’m such an idiot.”
“Yeah, you kind of are.”
“Can you forgive me? Can we try again? Because this past week has been hell. Daisie is miserable, I’m miserable, and I know it’s my own fault, but I don’t want to do this without you.”
I looked at him and saw the vulnerability in his expression.
“I love you,” he said quietly. “I’m in love with you. And I know I screwed up, but I’m asking for another chance. Please.”
Daisie came running back, oblivious to the tension. “Can we go out on the boat tomorrow? All three of us?”
“That depends on Liza,” Darek said, not looking away from me.
Daisie climbed onto my lap. “Please come home, Liza. Please. I miss you so much. And Daddy’s really sad without you. And I’m sad without you. And the house is too quiet. Please?”
I wrapped my arms around her, breathing in the familiar scent of her shampoo, feeling her small body pressed against mine.
I missed this. I missed the feeling I belonged somewhere, with someone.
“Okay,” I said and felt both of them exhale in relief. “We can try again.”
We ate dinner as the stars came out. Daisie talked about everything and nothing, and slowly, the hurt started to ease. Not disappear. It was still there. It was a tender spot that would take time to heal. But I could breathe again.
I was going home.
As we walked back to the SUV, I waited to get into the front seat. He shut the back door after making sure Daisie was secure. I grabbed his hand and pulled him close.
“I love you, too,” I whispered.
His whole face lit up. “Then we can fix anything.”
It wouldn’t be perfect. We did have things to work through and trust to rebuild, but we would.