Page 59 of Upon an April Night

She stared up at him. “I beg to differ.”

The silence was excruciating. Dréa had been standing quietly in the driveway with her arms crossed over her chest for the past ten minutes. Duncan waited for her to speak. He’d already done plenty of talking over the past couple days and all she had done so far was listen. She was the one who had come to the house to talk, so he waited for her to do just that.

When ten more minutes had crawled by, he could take it no more. “I’m sorry about all this. I know I’ve said it before, but—”

She held up a hand to stop him. “All I’ve done is think since you told me. Part of me wants to end this now and pretend I never met you.”

“Dréa.” His heart ached over the pain he was causing her.

“I always saw myself marrying a man who had never been with anyone but me, someone who had waited for me like I waited for him. But when I met you, and I heard about your past and how God had changed you, I was willing to look past that, because I believed God had brought you into my life.”

She closed her eyes, clearly fighting back emotion.

“But you lied to me when you left out what happened with Jamie. You told me all that stuff from your past, yet you had just slept with her weeks before we started dating.”

“That was wrong. I know that.”

“You bet it was wrong. And I should throw this ring in your face right now and get on the next plane home.”

“But …” He looked at her with hope.

She sighed. “But the other part still wants to marry you and start the life we’ve been planning.”

He took her hands in his. “We can. We can start that life. I know this complicates things, but we’re all adults, and we can figure out a way to move forward in this.”

She pressed her lips together and pulled her hands from his. “I haven’t decided yet. I feel like maybe everything happened too quickly between us. Maybe we jumped into this without knowing each other well enough.”

“Don’t say that. This wasn’t a mistake. I know how I feel about you.”

“Maybe so, but I think you might be in denial about how you feel about Jamie.”

“What does that mean?”

“You must’ve felt something for her to have done what you did.”

“She’s my friend, and we made a stupid mistake. It was a moment of weakness, that’s all.”

“I know we haven’t known each other for a long time, but I think I know you well enough to say you wouldn’t have slept with her if there weren’t some kind of feelings there. If God truly changed your heart in the way you see women and sex, and you viewed it as only right within a marriage commitment, like you told me you did, then that means you would’ve seen Jamie differently and maybe you acted on those feelings because you saw her as someone you could be with for life.”

Duncan shook his head. “That’s just it. I didn’t see her that way. I’ve only ever thought of her as my sister’s flirty friend. And yes, I’ve always been attracted to her, but that’s all it was. Physical attraction. I knew she wasn’t a virgin, that she liked to party and sometimes slept with guys. Definitely not someone I saw a life with. I still don’t know why I did it, only that the temptation was there, and I gave in to it.”

His mind flashed back to that night again, and he did his best to push those memories away.

“I won’t be your second choice, Duncan.”

“You’re not! I swear!” He took hold of her arm to stop her from walking away. “Please don’t go. We can work it out.”

“I don’t know if we can.”

He gently turned her. “Listen. I’ve waited five years for God to bring me the woman He wants me to marry, and it’s you. I wouldn’t have asked you to spend your life with me if I was in love with someone else. If you need to go back to Denver and think, that’s what you should do. Take all the time you need.” He took hold of her left hand and lifted it. “But please do it with this ring right here on your finger.”

Dréa was quiet for a minute before she slid her arms around his waist and rested her head on his shoulder.

He wrapped her up in his arms and held her tightly. “I love you.”

“I love you,” she whispered back.

Her admission released all the tension he’d been holding, and for the first time in days, he felt like things might be okay after all.

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