Louisa George - The Secret Art of Forgiveness - A feel good romance about coming home and moving on

She glanced at the French fizz. ‘Are we celebrating something?’

‘Among other things, your genius. Here, have a glass.’

As she turned to give her coat to the waiter Brett poured. There was a little clink and then the lovely sound of bubbles popping. A lot like how her stomach felt. ‘Twice in one day – I could get too used to this. Thanks.’

‘You’re going to have to get used to it if you’re the top performer.’ Brett winked. ‘So, how was the rest of your day?’

‘Good, I think. Terry from Kids First seemed open to our ideas. He liked that we’d done charity work before. You know, we really could push that angle to other not-for-profits – our pro bono work really resonates. Anyway, we’re going through to the next round.’

‘Excellent. And not a bad idea. We could discuss it in our next strategy meeting.’

‘I really like that we have the opportunity to help those kinds of organisations.’ She took a sip, realising she was babbling on a little. Nerves. Which was strange, because there was nothing about Brett that made her nervous.

Why are we here? She tried to telepathically question him because she didn’t want to second-guess the whole situation and look stupid if she’d got it so completely wrong, but he was just smiling at her and nodding as she carried on rambling, ‘And how was your day, Brett?’

‘Just great. We had an epic shoot out at the High Line; it had just the right urban-grungy feel we were lookin’ – hey, you know what? Let’s not talk work.’ His eyes were glittering a dark navy and he had an anxious smile – the way she’d seen him when his mother had phoned about his father’s heart scare. That was so unlike Brett, the normally uber-confident ad VP. He held her glass back out to her. ‘You want to drink up a little? Ahem…’

She glanced at her glass and noticed there was something in the bottom. ‘Oh. What’s this?’

Not wanting to put her fingers down into the champagne she drained the glass, then tipped out a… ring. Her heart squeezed tight. ‘Oh, my God, that is so beautiful.’

‘Tiffany. If you don’t like it, we can take it back.’

‘No, no. I love it. It’s beautiful.’ A single solitaire in what she guessed was a platinum band. It caught the soft light and twinkled. And a lump formed in her throat. She didn’t want to presume… and couldn’t work out what the flutter in her chest was… because the excitement was still there, but the panic was too. ‘But…? What’s it –?’

The next thing she knew he was at her side, lowering himself down onto one knee, and she was quite sure there was about to be an explosion in her chest as all the excitement and panic intensified until she could barely breathe.

‘Emily, you know how I feel about you. You’re the other half of me. I just can’t imagine a life without you in it. And I don’t want to spend another moment away from you. Will you… will you, please, do me the honour of being my wife?’

This is real.

A proposal. Not a break-up. Not a disaster.

Why did she always imagine herself on the brink of a disaster?

Because bad things happened and she just wanted to be prepared.

But she looked at the ring in her palm, and at his earnest eyes and nervous smile, and felt the sharp sting of tears. This was probably the furthest thing from disaster, ever. Brett Fallon was everything a woman could possibly want; a damn fine man with a heart of gold and exquisite taste in diamonds. He made a dull day brighter. He made waking up very appealing, and going to bed even more so. He came from a lovely home with darling parents – married for thirty-seven years in December – who treated her as one of their own. He was stable, supportive and kind. And despite the little thrum of panic that she put down to nerves, she smiled. What other answer could she possibly give?

‘Yes. Of course, Brett. Of course. Wow. Yes!’

Laughing, he stood up and whipped her into his arms, hugging her close. His mouth on her throat. ‘Thank you. Oh, God! I am so relieved you said yes.’

She inhaled his comforting scent and kissed him, although kissing and trying to force air past the lump in her throat were particularly difficult. She burst out laughing. ‘Well, wow. Yes. We’re getting married!’

‘Hell, yes.’

‘What do we do now?’

He was grinning insanely and it felt pretty damned good to know she’d put that smile on his face. ‘I don’t know; I’ve never been engaged before.’

‘That makes two of us. More champagne?’

‘Whatever you want, fiancée.’ He topped up her glass and for a few moments they just sat there grinning at each other. Literally speechless. Then he took out his phone. ‘We could call some people? My folks?’ There was a tentative pause. ‘Yours?’

‘Yours, definitely. Yes.’ A knot formed in the pit of her stomach and some of the excitement died away. It was at times like this that she missed her mum so badly, the grief sometimes swamping her, catching her breath, taking her by surprise. She would have been so proud that her daughter was marrying someone like Brett. But Emily doubted, sadly, that the rest of her family would be interested. ‘I’m not sure the timing is right to call England.’

‘It’s only, what…?’ He looked at his watch and did the maths. ‘Eleven p.m.? Midnight? Someone will be up? Surely they wouldn’t mind a call for such exciting news?’

‘I imagine that in sleepy Little Duxbury everyone’s been safely tucked up for hours. I think we should leave it. Really.’

‘Sure?’

‘Yes. Another time.’ She filled her glass again and took a drink, not wanting to get into this right now.

His smile slipped. ‘Hey, babe, what’s really going on here? Don’t you want them to know?’

‘Oh, yes, of course I do. Please don’t read anything into it. It’s just… well, you know how it is…’ She didn’t want him to think she wasn’t proud to be engaged to him. But she couldn’t expect a guy from a perfectly formed two-point-four to grasp the realities of communicating with a stepfamily who’d prefer you not to be around.

She imagined the uninterested response from her stepfather. The polite and stilted congratulations from Tamara and Tilda and the collective sigh of relief that, finally, she wasn’t their responsibility any more. Although, when she’d left in the middle of the night all those years ago, she’d wanted to show them that she didn’t need them anyway. ‘You know things are rocky between us. I’ve got to pick my moment to call them.’

His head tilted a little to the side as he looked at her. ‘Actually, now you mention it, in all the years we’ve been together I’ve never seen you speak to them.’

Not speaking to her family was the best way to keep things on a stable footing. ‘Emails work. It takes the emotion out.’

‘You’ve never mentioned any emails, either.’

‘No? Well there haven’t been many… just change of contact numbers, Christmas newsletters, that kind of thing. It’s just the way things are.’ Thousands of miles and many years had left a chasm that a quick phone call – or even a succession of calls – couldn’t fill. They just weren’t like his family; they didn’t do the happy, thick-as-thieves, shared jokes thing. At least, she wasn’t part of it if they did. And now her ugly past was spoiling her lovely present. She dug deep and infused her voice with the excitement of earlier. ‘Hey, but we could phone your folks now? Shall we?’

He, too, found another smile and, God love him, took the hint and moved on from the tricky subject of her difficult family ties. ‘I think Dad might be out of town tonight; he said something about a conference in Philadelphia. I’d like to call when they’re together. I know… we could drive up and see them this weekend?’