Page 247 of Modern Romance Collection March 2025 (1-4)

But he would be. Over years. As she tried and tried to fit into a life that wasn’t for her.

A life that he knew didn’t expand to fit those who were in it.

“Stevie, I must speak with you.”

“Okay, it’s a good start, because you’re talking.”

“I’ve been thinking. And I do not come to this conclusion with any great relish. But I think… I think I made a mistake. In asking you to be my princess.”

He was right. The expression on her face was like being shot. He would go down in a plane one hundred times, have his leg cut clean through, to avoid experiencing this ever again. That meant he was doing the right thing, though. It had to. Because it was self-sacrificial. Because it was so painful. It had to be. It had to be.

“What are you talking about?”

“This isn’t the life for you. You do well with the people, but the rest of it… It will not work. This is how it was with my mother, and in the end, it only caused pain. For all involved. I have realized that I am more my father than I initially thought, and I do not think—”

“I don’t believe you. I think you’re pushing me away because you need to protect yourself. Because you don’t like that I said I loved you. Because you are bound and determined to turn that into an insurmountable hill. One you can’t climb.”

“This is exactly why it won’t work. You cannot even listen to me when I speak.”

“Because you lied. To yourself as much as anybody. You lie. I know what we have together. How can you say all of these things?”

“Because… Because it is true. Because maybe if we were just two people who were in a plane crash together, who met on the side of a mountain, this would be different, but it’s not, and neither are we. We are nothing more or less than what we were born to be. You’re a pilot. A good one. You’re a caregiver. And astonishingly worthy one. I am a prince. And the role that my princess will play is a prescriptive one. Ask my mother, who felt hampered by it for those years. It is not an easy life to ask someone to live.”

“Maybe not. Maybe not, but isn’t… Isn’t it reasonable to think that if you have enough love it will become easier? Because I’ve lived a life that couldn’t be described as easy. But I had my family. I had love. And that’s why I do it. That’s why I do any of it.”

“But someone should do something for you.”

“This isn’t for me, Adonis. You’re doing it for you. I told you that you needed to figure out how to heal, but you would rather wound yourself all over again. It’s like if you continued to stick a log into that cut in your leg. How are you supposed to heal? You won’t let it. It does a disservice to you. To me. To us.”

“All right, then. Maybe that’s it. Maybe it’s as simple as that. You need someone who will heal. And I don’t know how. And so, this cannot be. It cannot. Don’t worry, I have purchased a house for your family…”

“We have a house,” she said. “We were never charity cases, we were never asking to be.”

“Let me,” he said. “Let me, please. Because this is… Because I want to fix it. Because I don’t want to have given your sisters a taste of this life and then take it away. That’s not what I’m trying to do.”

“You want to be the hero of the story,” she said. “Heroes are brave, Adonis. And you are a coward. It’s as simple as that. You cannot redeem it. Not when you’re so patently making the wrong choice.”

“You think that I have the capability to love. Perhaps I don’t. In the same way that I don’t have the capability to heal. Did it ever occur to you?”

“No. Because the man I met on the hill, Clem, I was pretty sure that man could survive anything. Once you were here, once you had all this baggage, once you had to be you, that’s when I saw your difficulty. But it’s all hiding. Out of habit. I don’t hide. So maybe you’re right. Maybe this can’t be. Maybe we can’t be.

“But I love you all the same, and I want to make sure you know that. Because you haven’t had enough people in your life tell you that they love you, at least I don’t think so. Because I’m not even sure you know what it is. So if you are lying in bed at night, with one of your many, many lovers, years after I’m gone, and you wish that you knew what it felt like to be loved, I want you to remember that once you did. But you weren’t brave enough to let yourself have it.”

It was Stevie who stormed out. She did not have to be thrown out. And he was the one who felt small and fractured. And yet resolute all the same.

She thought that there was another way.

There wasn’t.

She was only a pilot. And he was a prince. Eventually, she would understand. Eventually, she would thank him.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Steviefelthalf-dead. The house that he had bought for them in Montana was gorgeous. Her sisters and her father were happy enough with it, even if they were all baffled by the sudden change. But everybody was tiptoeing around her, refusing to question it. She knew why. They felt like if it had been her choice nobody could express disappointment that they’d had to move back to icy, snowy Montana rather than remain in Olympus.

Everyone was concerned about her.

She was annoyed about it. Because she wanted to rant and rave about her broken heart, but she also didn’t want her family to feel guilty.

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