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"Next flight leaves tomorrow evening," I said, finger hovering over the purchase button. "Are you ready to find out if love really is stronger than legacy?"
"I'm ready to find out if we're brave enough to deserve the love we've been hiding from," Daphne replied.
"Let's go get our girl back," I said, and clicked confirm.
The Texas sun beat down mercilessly on my shoulders as I stood at the edge of the local rodeo grounds, sweat already beading under the collar of what had seemed like my most casual shirt in London but now felt like formal wear at a barn dance.
My Savile Row suit—chosen because it was the least formal option in my wardrobe—might as well have been a neon sign announcing "British aristocrat, completely lost and possibly having a breakdown."
The boots I'd hastily purchased at the Austin airport weren't just pinching my feet; they were conducting what felt like a systematic torture campaign against every toe.
The cowboy hat Daphne had insisted I buy sat on my head like a foreign object, and I was fairly certain I was wearing it backwards. Or upside down. Possibly both.
The air itself was different here—thick with humidity, barbecue smoke, and the scent of horses mixed with fried food and something sweet I couldn't identify.
It was overwhelming in a way that made my carefully controlled London existence feel sterile by comparison.
"You look like you're about to face a firing squad," Daphne observed, adjusting her own hat with considerably more confidence than I could muster. She'd somehow managed to look effortlessly appropriate in jeans and boots, while I appeared to be playing dress-up in someone else's life.
"What was I thinking, Daphne? This isn't just about being out of my element—this is about standing in front of people who have every reason to hate everything I represent and asking them to trust me with their girl." I pulled at the brim of the ridiculous hat, watching a group of children chase each other with the kind of carefree joy I'd never experienced. "These people raised Lili. They know her worth better than anyone. What if they look at me and see exactly what Mother always said outsiders would see—a privileged man who thinks his intentions matter more than the damage his family has caused?"
"Then you'll prove them wrong," Daphne said simply. "The same way you proved Mother wrong when you chose Lili over family loyalty."
The festival stretched before us like something from a different century—or at least a different continent. String lights were being hung between oak trees, a makeshift stage had been erected near the central pavilion, and everywhere I looked, people moved with the easy familiarity of a community that had gathered like this for generations.
The air thrummed with bluegrass music, children's laughter, and conversations in accents so thick I had to concentrate to follow them.
"There," Daphne said suddenly, gripping my arm with enough force to leave marks. "Edward, there she is, and her Mother Rose. Cece knew she was going to be here today."
My breath didn't just catch—it stopped entirely.
Lili stood near the main stage talking to a middle-aged woman who looked like her Mother, but the rolling suitcase and carry-on bag beside them told a story I wasn't prepared to read.
Airport tags. Recent packing. The careful organization of someone making a planned departure.
"She's leaving," I said, the words feeling like glass in my throat. "Today. Right now, probably. I'm too late."
The implications hit me hard. She was moving on. She'd made peace with my absence. The three weeks of silence had given her time to realize she was better off without me. I'd flown across an ocean to grovel to a woman who was already walking away from everything we'd had together.
"Edward, breathe," Daphne said urgently. "We don't know—"
"Look at her," I interrupted. "She's radiant. Happy. Settled. Like someone who's made the right decision and is ready to move forward with her life."
And she was.
Even from fifty yards away, I could see that Lili looked free. Unburdened.
Like the weight of loving someone from my world had finally lifted from her shoulders. Her blonde hair caught the afternoon sunlight as she laughed at something her Mother said, and she was wearing a sundress the color of Texas bluebonnets that made her look like she belonged to this place, these people, this life that had nothing to do with British manors or aristocratic complications.
"Which means we got here just in time," Daphne said firmly, though I could hear the concern in her voice. "Edward, you have to move. Now."
As if she could sense my stare across the crowded space, Lili looked up.
Our eyes met across perhaps fifty yards of festival chaos, and I watched her face cycle through emotions like weather patterns—shock giving way to disbelief, disbelief melting into something that might have been hope, hope battling with wariness and the memory of too much hurt.
Her hand moved to her throat, fingers worrying at the spot where a necklace would rest, and I realized she wasn't wearing the small silver pendant I'd given her in Sussex.
She'd taken it off. Of course she had.