Page 22 of I Do, You Don’t (You Don’t #1)

Lara

S ummer winds down, and I’m grateful for it.

This year has been one of reinvention, of growth.

Business is booming, ironically, a direct consequence of Matthew’s defamatory article.

He tried to tear me down, but instead, his words became the headline for a different story: one of strength, not deceit.

I’ve chosen to use that platform to speak my truth, turning every interview into a teaching moment for my clients.

We can’t predict the future, I remind them.

Sudden bills, illness, job changes, life has a way of ambushing us.

My story is proof that we must always be prepared, that we need a backup plan.

What would mine have been? A prenuptial agreement.

Not for a future divorce, but for a wedding that never happened.

My backup plan would have been a business agreement disguised as a marriage contract, one that ensured the financial repercussions were split evenly.

Gideon, like most grooms, might have said, my money is your money, so it doesn’t matter whose credit card the catering goes on.

It would have mattered, and it did.

Now I’m sitting with Calvin and Drew. Calvin is casually absorbed in business, Drew is obsessively stalking Matthew online, and I’m scrolling through client details on my phone.

The air in Calvin’s office carries the rich scent of old leather, laced with the faint, smoky sweetness of expensive whiskey.

Sunlight cuts the room int o sharp, golden stripes, tracing lines across the polished mahogany desk and pale gray walls.

There’s no haze of cigarette smoke here, no clutter, no stacks of files.

Just space, silence, and a quiet authority that doesn’t need to be spoken.

Calvin stands behind the desk, a tall, deliberate figure in immaculate tailoring. Even the crease in his trousers feels intentional, another detail in the carefully constructed persona.

On the far wall, Drew is curled into a low black-leather couch, legs folded, laptop balanced on her knees. The cushions are worn, shallow dips carved from hours of late-night battles fought on that spot. Her fingers fly, tapping out another digital strike against Matthew.

I’ve told her to let it go, but she only shakes her head, tucks a strand of hair behind her ear, and says, “I’m fighting fire with fire.” Her voice carries a rare certainty, righteous, almost. The glow of her laptop spills across her face, a beacon of the war she refuses to abandon.

I see her now, not as the fierce defender she wants to be, but as the girl who was once left broken by a man she loved years ago.

A pang of recognition cuts through me, a quiet ache that runs deeper than my own recent pain.

Drew understands my heartbreak not only because she’s my sister, but because she’s lived a version of it herself.

Her mousy silence was never a choice, it was a consequence. And watching her stand up for me now, fighting for the belief that I deserve better, is a silent, powerful testament to her own healing. Her fury on my behalf is, in truth, her own justice.

It amazes me how close the three of us have become. From near-strangers to something that finally feels like family.

The room is hushed, the only sound the soft tapping of keys, until Calvin’s phone dings. He inhales sharply, just enough to pull Drew’s and my eyes to him. Without a word, he turns the screen so we can all see.

It’s a video. At first, the frame wobbles, as if the person holding the phone can’t keep their hand steady.

Then it sharpens, comes into focus. I recognize the place instantly: The Pigeon Express newsroom.

Glass walls, too clean, too bright, yet also far too cubicle-like.

Around the edges, twenty or more staffers hover in silence, some standing, others half-sitting on the arms of rolling chairs.

Their faces are tense, expectant, as though waiting for something inevitable and terrible.

At the center of it all, standing alone, is Gideon. No tricks. No edits. Just a man, exposed, forced to carry his own secrets in the open.

I don’t realize I’ve moved until my knees press against Calvin’s desk.

I’m half-leaning over it, the blue light from the phone painting my skin.

Drew is up now too, her laptop forgotten, hands braced on her knees.

Calvin doesn’t move much, but he leans forward, one elbow on the desk, chin in his hand, eyes narrowed.

He’s hard to read. Maybe that’s the point.

Taking initiative, I reach over and mute the video at first. I don’t want to hear Gideon’s voice.

not yet. I’m afraid of what it will do to the room.

But the image is enough: Gideon’s shoulders squared, his tie cinched too tight, sweat gleaming on his hairline.

He looks terrified. His right hand clamps the desk, knuckles white.

Every few seconds, he draws a breath that looks painful.

Gideon doesn’t look down. He just blinks, then stares straight into the camera. For a split second, it feels as if he’s looking at me, through the glass and wires, past the years and the distance. My heart jumps. I’m sure the others can hear it too, pounding out of my chest.

Beside me, Calvin is coming apart. Not in any dramatic way, nothing anyone could headline, but the little muscle in his jaw is ticking, and that says everything. The room doesn’t smell much like whiskey anymore, not really. Now it just smells like my sweat.

On the ph one, Gideon breathes in, holds it, and then starts talking. There’s no performance here, no practiced cadence or newscaster polish. His voice is raw, almost broken, every word fighting its way out. I nudge the volume up. Everyone in the room hears it. There’s no pretending otherwise.

“Lara Wood did nothing wrong.”

Drew gasps. The reporter, Matthew, flinches as if Gideon had slapped them.

Calvin doesn’t move, but his fingers dig into the desk.

He actually said my name. I never thought he’d do it, not like this, not in front of everyone.

It’s one thing to send clients my way, but another to expose himself on a live stream.

He keeps going, each word landing like a blow.

“I’m the man who left her at the altar.” His voice is close to breaking, the syllables splintered and unsteady. “I’m the one who broke her heart.”

Nobody knows what to do. The room freezes, then shudders into a kind of uncertain motion.

Some people on stream look away, others stare, and a few are so fascinated they can’t even breathe.

A woman beside Matthew, a boss, probably, starts to reach for him, then stops, her hand hovering in the no-man’s-land between pity and self-preservation.

A phone rings on camera. No one answers it.

Gideon squares his shoulders. “I failed her. I believed lies instead of trusting her. I betrayed her trust, and for that, I will spend the rest of my life trying to atone.”

He closes his eyes. When he opens them again, they’re glassy and wet, but he’s still holding it together.

“I can’t undo the pain I caused. I can’t erase the story that’s been written about Lara, or about myself.

But I can choose the truth. I can own what I did.

And I can say, to everyone wat ching, that she is not what you made her out to be.

She deserves peace. She deserves forgiveness. ”

On the video, it’s dead quiet. The journalists look like they just watched someone slice themselves open on live stream. Someone off-screen mutters, “Shit,” and the mic picks it up, echoing all the way into Calvin’s living room. Drew’s hands cover her mouth. She’s crying.

The feed ends on Gideon’s final, unsteady nod. The silence afterward is sticky, heavier than the smell of whiskey pooling in the corners of the room. Drew is shaking. Calvin sits very still, hands folded, mouth drawn in a flat, unreadable line.

It’s then that I remember.

I remember falling in love with Gideon, his passion, his love for me, his confidence.

In the video, I caught glimpses of the old Gideon, my Gideon. And while I’m not ready, it makes me consider: would I be willing to risk another chance at love? We were both brave once; can we be brave again?

As I’m thinking, someone’s shadow glows against the frosted glass of Calvin’s door. Then there’s a sharp knock, three times, insistent and urgent. Calvin’s jaw clenches even harder. He seems to know who’s there. “Not now.”

But the knocking gets louder, more desperate. Calvin stands and moves toward the door. He’s careful, each step measured, but his hands shake. He yanks the door open.

Delilah. Of course it’s Delilah. She looks like she’s been dragged through every ring of hell and left standing in the hallway.

Mascara streaks down her face, hair wild and half-loose, and what I assume is last night’s dress is wrinkled and damp in places that shouldn’t be damp.

There’s a cut on her leg, a bruise on her shin, and her eyes are so red it al most hurts to look at them.

No one says anything. The moment stretches, thin and sharp, like if you touch it, it might break.

“Calvin, please” She tries to step past him, but he blocks the doorway. “Go away,” he says, flat and brutal.

But Delilah isn’t going anywhere. “I need to talk to you,” she says.

The words are shredded, desperate. “I need to make this right.” Her hands flutter, torn between reaching for him and hugging herself.

Only then does she notice me, folded behind the desk, trying to look smaller than I am, not because I’m scared of her, but because I’m more focused on moving forward.

She crosses the room in three stumbling strides and drops to her knees beside my chair. Her hands are freezing. “Lara, I’m so sorry,” she whispers, already crying. My name sounds strange coming from her.

Calvin can’t take it. He grabs her arm, hauls her upright. He’s furious, his grip bruising. “No. You don’t get to hurt her anymore. Do you hear me? You’ve done enough.”

Delilah opens her mouth, but nothing comes out. She’s shaking so hard I think she might fall apart right there on the rug. My heart is pounding. I can barely breathe.

“Wait.” My voice is steady, somehow. “Let her speak.” Calvin hesitates, but after a second, he lets go, and Delilah almost collapses onto the couch, barely holding herself together.

She’s small, hunched, a shadow of the girl I remember. She sits at the edge of the cushion, not touching me but close enough that I can smell the panic rolling off her.

She knots her hands together. “I know I’ll never deserve your forgiveness,” she says. Even Drew, still crying quietly at her laptop, looks up.

“I just need you to know why.” Delilah’s voice is a whisper.

“I was scared. Gideon and I… he was always my person. Even before he was yours. So when I found love with someone else, and that person rejected me, I panicked. I was afraid to lose love and my best friend at the same time.” Selfish. I tell her so.

“So because you lost the chance at love, you wanted your so-called best friend to lose it too?”

"That's not how I saw it then. My feelings were jumbled, and I was breaking apart. At the time, I thought I was saving him. I’d get to keep my best friend, and my best friend would remain safe with me. I see now how wrong that is."

She breaks off, breath ragged. “I lied. I told him you were cheating. I faked texts, I made up stories about you and Calvin. I even photoshopped a picture of you two together.” She glances at Calvin, but he just looks tired.

“I wanted to stop,” she says, voice barely audible. “But it kept getting worse, my feelings, that is. And then it was too late.” She scrubs at her face with the back of her hand. “I hurt you. I hurt him. I broke everything. I don’t expect forgiveness. I just need you to know I’m sorry.”

It hangs there. No one moves. The apology is a living thing, heavy and squirming. It’s not enough. But it’s real.

Calvin studies Delilah like he’s seeing her for the first time. “It’s no excuse,” he says quietly.

Delilah just shakes her head. “I know.”

Drew sighs, shaky. “You ever notice it’s always because we think we’re not enough?” She closes the laptop. Whatever she was doing with Matthew doesn’t matter right now.

I look at Delilah, her ruined makeup, her shaking hands, the way her body curls away from the words she just said. Empathy is a spark, faint and stubborn. She’s just a person who got scared. A person who panicked. The villain of my story then, but not forever.

There’s nothing to say. I hand her a tissue. She takes it, hands trembling, and wipes her face. I think about what forgiveness might feel like someday. Not now. Maybe not ever. But maybe.

Calvin stands at the window, staring at the city. Drew hugs me, and I let her.

The whiskey bottle on the desk glows in the sun, untouched.

Tomorrow’s family BBQ will be a different kind of battle: burgers, laughter, the smell of coleslaw and smoke. A small reminder of what matters. Family.