|28| Stelline-2

"Louisa..." My heart ached. I couldn't believe I'd once had doubts about her intentions with Nathan. "You don't know you were the other woman. He was already dating you when he reconnected with her..." She let out a bitter laugh before taking a large gulp of prosecco. Admittedly, that was a weak argument on my part. I just wanted to make her feel better. "Izzy, he'd been with Marina all throughout school. They'd only broken up the previous summer when he decided to go to uni in the U.K. I was definitely the other woman." Pedro's excuse when he'd hit on me was that he'd misread the situation. Some girls in long-distance relationships prefer to have something a little closer to home, he'd said. I hadn't technically been in a long-distance relationship at that point-Nathan just lived further away than we'd been used to. In hindsight, I wondered whether the desires of those supposed girls actually reflected his own opinion on long-distance. He wanted to have his cake and eat it, too. "Well, other woman or not, you were definitely the better woman. What kind of girl finds out her boyfriend has been two-timing her and then blames the woman and not the guy?" Louisa offered me a grateful smile. "You're a good friend, Izzy. But it's fine. Hurt people react in illogical ways. She'd been with him for years and I was just some random floozy from England. Easier to blame me than go through the drama of a break-up, right?" "I just don't know how you can stay with someone who's treated you like that. Regardless of whether she blamed you or not, Pedro still cheated. Repeatedly." "I know. I was there, remember?" I sighed and forced a smile out of guilt. "Sorry. He just makes me so angry." "But you can see why I'm hesitant to jump into something else, right? Casual or serious. I'm just not ready. Can't even bring myself to take the next step with my hot accountant." No wonder Louisa felt an office romance was the safer option. It would be much harder to hide secret girlfriends when all your colleagues know your business. "Like you say, you need to be ready. Risk goes both ways. You don't want to ruin something that might be good by rushing in before you're ready." "Cheers to that," she said, knocking her glass against mine and effectively putting an end to the closest thing to a Pedro-related conversation we'd had in a long time. ❤ Maybe Louisa truly had planted a seed of doubt in Jack's head by implying his friend might not be above hitting on Jess, or maybe he'd had enough drinks to persuade himself that he didn't need to be so sensitive about their romance in front of me. Either way, he'd ramped up his affections towards her and I was relieved that they no longer seemed to be treading on eggshells around me. "Was Lou okay?" Nathan asked me as we caught some fresh air at the bottom of the steps leading up to the front door. "Yeah. Not that I'd know if she wasn't. She puts on a brave face, doesn't she?" "I think she's just brave." "Fair enough," I said. "She's definitely rational about the whole thing." "That's the impression I've got, too, whenever I've spoken to her about it." He opened his mouth as if to say something else, but then promptly shut it and wound his arm around my shoulder, pulling me tight against his body. I cuddled closer to the warmth emanating from his chest, my hands sliding inside the back pockets of his jeans to shield them from the icy air. "Something on your mind?" I asked. My voice sounded muffled against his shirt, but Nathan released a long sigh, obviously having heard me. "Yeah. Just anything Pedro-related makes me feel awkward." "Awkward?" I repeated, leaning back from his chest to gauge his expression. His lips pursed together as he gazed down at me, brow furrowing. A gust of wind ruffled his fringe and he jerked his head to flick the hair away from his eyes. "Awkward in a guilty sense." "Why do you feel guilty? I'm the one who introduced them." "Not because of Pedro. Because of Marie." "Oh. Well, it's not really the same thing." Tightening his arms around my body, Nathan planted a soft kiss to my forehead. I relaxed against his chest again, closing my eyes. "I know it's not," he said, "but I still caused you pain, just as Pedro hurt Louisa. And I like to think I'm a much better man than Pedro." "Nathan." I stepped out of his arms and climbed up a step until we were face-to-face. "You are a better man than Pedro. We've dealt with that situation and moved on. Don't keep torturing yourself over it." "I can't ignore what I put you through-" "No," I said, "I know you can't. But continually trying to punish yourself won't make it any better. Nor will making comparisons. We just need to move forwards." He sighed and wound his arms around my waist, fingers splaying across my back. Heat soaked through my coat and dress, alighting my skin beneath the layers. "I know we were only joking about it earlier," Nathan said, "but I'm genuinely so excited to marry you, Bella." His eyes bore into mine with such an intensity that all thoughts of Marie disappeared from my mind. There, on that stone step in Paris, we might have been surrounded by a bitter wind and threat of rain, but the City of Love brought me nothing but positive thoughts of the future on Valentine's Day. ❤❤❤