Breathe by Donna Alward Page B

thought possible. It had become too much for him to handle, and instead of dealing with it he’d run away and left her alone.
    Anger? Absolutely. At her, for making the choices she had. At Stefano, for being such a failure as a man and a husband. At himself for neglecting their friendship as long as he had, and for not seeing what was happening right beneath his nose. Why hadn’t Alex or their father done anything about it? They’d all failed her. But especially him.
    And disappointment. Beneath all the other feelings was a heaviness that he recognized as disappointment. Anna had been his ideal back then. A girl who didn’t make mistakes. She was everything he wasn’t. Privileged, beautiful, classy. Smart, serious, level-headed. He’d liked those things about her. He’d gone to Kelowna with Alex needing space, but knowing when he returned they would figure everything out.
    And on the night he returned, it had been her engagement party to Stefano. Everything he’d known to be true about Anna dissolved in that moment when he’d realized she was marrying someone else.
    Now it had all come to a head with this—Stefano dead, Anna left behind with two children. Children that might have been his had things been different.
    He realized he’d been standing in the same place for a long time. Anna put the pot of potatoes on the range, and he saw her brush her fingers across her cheeks when she thought he wasn’t looking.
    He wanted to console her. Yet at the same time all the other resentments were so close to the surface he didn’t know how. Or even if he should.
    â€œYou are not the only one who made mistakes.”
    â€œI don’t want to talk about it anymore, Jace. I came here not necessarily to forget, but to look forward instead of backwards to things I can’t change now.”
    Oh, that burned. He wondered what sorts of things she’d change. If her regrets even went back as far as his.
    â€œAnd looking forward means what?”
    She straightened her shoulders. Moisture still clung to her sooty lashes and he wanted to reach out and touch them with his finger. He didn’t. With each passing hour, her being here went deeper than a debt to an old friendship. Now he wanted answers. Now he wanted to know if everything from back then was true. Or if it had been a girl’s fantasy.
    â€œIt means finding the best life for my children. They deserve more than I’ve given them. They are my priority, first and last.”
    He pressed his tongue against his teeth. It was no girl standing before him now, but a beautiful woman, a mother. Longing warred with hatred and he closed his eyes, taking a breath to steady his nerves. She had changed, grown. Why couldn’t she have thought this way when they were younger? Why had she been rash and hurtful? She’d destroyed his world so very casually, ending it all with a wink and a bright smile the day of her party with Stefano. It had been years and the slash of pain had tempered to a dull ache. But now, with the flush and bloom of motherhood plain to see, the knife’s blade sharpened again.
    The thought raced through his mind unbidden: It should have been me.
    â€œJace?”
    She came forward and put a hand on his arm. He stared down at her fingers. It wasn’t so long ago they would have been manicured and polished. Now they were smooth, soft, unadorned.
    He reached down and removed her hand from his arm.
    â€œCall me when dinner’s ready, will you?” He heard clipped tones in his voice but didn’t care. “I have to do something.”
    It was a paltry excuse and he knew it. It had been easier thinking she’d loved Stefano and was grieving. Now he felt adrift, not knowing anymore what was true and what wasn’t, and wondering how on earth to find out without getting in too deeply himself.

    Jace took himself down to the vineyard. Normally walking through the rows of vines comforted