Page 144 of The Perfect Mistake

Her hands push against my chest. “I can do the math, too. Do you think I haven’t run the numbers in my head?”

“I’m sure you have, but experiencing it will be different.” I shake my head again and think about my dad’s words today. He won’t be the only one having those thoughts. Gold digger. Trophy wife. Can’t be a love match. Married the nanny…

She’ll be followed by those assumptions wherever we go.

And she’s so above it, so beyond it, the thought of anyone thinking something negative about her because of me cuts like a knife.

Isabel gives me another shove, so I step back. She slides off the island, crossing her arms over her chest. “This is about what your dad said today, isn’t it?”

“Not at all.”

“You’re lying,” she says. “I heard you two talking in the study. Him saying… saying I only want you for your money, or your status, or this apartment. As if all I’ve ever wanted are some pretty things.”

“He’s an asshole,” I say fiercely. “Don’t listen to him for a second.”

“But you think like him, don’t you?”

“Of course I don’t. You don’t have a gold digging bone in your body, and even if you did, it wouldn’t matter. If you were mine, I’d spoil you until you begged me to stop.”

Her eyes widen. “But you think others will think it. Is that it? You’re afraid of what others will think? What the… the moms at St. Regis, at the fundraising events, will think? What Connie will think, too? Headlines about the Contron CEO hooking up with the nanny?” She takes a step back, and her eyes flare. “Have you bought into that clichéd narrative too?”

I take a step forward and grip her shoulders. Her eyes flick up to mine, and I hate the shininess I can see in them. Hate it with a passion. “Listen to me,” I say. “I don’t give a fuck what other people will think. I did for a great many years. But if there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that it doesn’t matter. It’s wind. It’s noise. It’s nothing compared to what we know is the truth.”

“Then why did you mention it?” she says. “Why does it bother you?”

“Because it will hurt you. You’ll have to suffer people’s assumptions, their side-eyes, their questions. I might already have ruined your relationship with your best friend… But I can’t ruin more things for you. You deserve the world. You deserve everything, and I want to cut anyone down who’s ever hurt you.”

“But that’s you,” she whispers, and a tear slips down her cheek. “You’re the one hurting me. With your hesitance, and your vagueness, and your overprotectiveness. I just don’t believe any of it.”

I blow out a breath in frustration. “This is the only thing I’ve thought of for weeks. The math of us, and the kids, and what your friends and family might think. And what you’ll think eventually.”

“What do you mean? What will I come to think?”

“The age thing might feel small now. I don’t think it will in a few years.”

“That’s not true. It’s never been true.” She puts a hand on my cheek, and it’s not cool anymore. It feels shockingly hot. “Either you don’t see yourself clearly, or you don’t trust me very much. What makes you think I’ll ever see you as too old? Or resent the beautiful kids sleeping in the other rooms right now?”

“Because I’ve seen it before,” I mutter.

Her eyes widen. “What?”

“I’ve seen it happen.”

“With Victoria?”

“No, with my mother. She was only eight years younger than my dad, but she was so… full of life. And that dimmed when she had us, and when he was gone for weeks at a time on business trips. I can’t see you go through that. You deserve so much better.”

And I can’t have you resenting me.

It would kill me.

Isabel’s hand slips from my cheek, and her voice hardens. “You take what you want. I’ve seen you do it for years, read about it in the newspapers. Contron is bigger than ever with you as the CEO. You don’t make excuses, and you don’t hold back. So why now? Why here with me?”

I close my eyes and offer the only truth I have left.

“Because I can’t be responsible for causing you pain. With work, the company… I don’t care about them in the same way I care about you.”

Because I love you, I think. And it’s breaking me.

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