Page 86 of You'll Be the Death of Me

“Australia?” Dell asked with a curious frown, and reached for the letter. She was skimming right as Cole spoke the same words her eyes landed on.

“They offered me a job in their English department,” he said as if it was slowly coming back to him. “I really wanted it, but I... didn’t take it.” His words faded out like he was feeling the weight of that difficult yet disappointing decision all over again.

“Why not?” Dell asked.

He turned to her with a look of regret and perhaps a bit of shame. “I couldn’t take the leap. Moving to the other side of the world seemed like too big of a risk.” He huffed a tiny laugh. “I’d forgotten that happened.”

The sad note in his voice put a lump in Dell’s throat. “Do you regret it?”

“I mean, I kept the offer letter, so I’d say yes.”

“I can only hear half of this conversation, so I’m going tokeep digging in boxes,” Jason said, and leaned farther into the closet.

Dell took Cole’s hand with a comforting grip. “That would have been a very big change. It’s understandable you didn’t want to uproot your whole life.”

“You’re just being generous,” he said with a half smile. “You’duproot your whole life like that, no problem.”

“Well, sure. But I’m me. And you’re—”

“So risk averse I’m paralyzed?”

Dell opened her mouth to defend him, right as Jason gasped.

“Yowza! Was he a jewel thief or was this rock meant for someone?”

Both Cole and Dell whipped around to see Jason holding open a small velvet box with an oval-cut diamond ring in it.

Dell’s mouth popped open again. A stab of jealousy hit her right in the chest. She turned to Cole, hoping he was about to confirm he was in fact a jewel thief and they hadn’t just discovered the engagement ring intended for the weeping near-widow he’d forgotten about.

His eyes were wide with memory. And hurt. “It was for someone,” he said slowly. “Pamela. I asked her to marry me, and she said no.”

The pain in his voice only amplified the pain Dell was feeling. She knew nothing of the woman but already despised her for not being careful with Cole’s heart, which she so clearly had once held and then broke.

“Sore subject?” Jason said with a grimace, and snapped the box shut.

Dell winced at the sharp sound. She had a million questions for Cole but wasn’t sure she had the right to ask any of them.

“It was a long time ago,” Cole said, as if he knew she was wondering. “Right after grad school. It was part of the reason I applied for that job in Sydney; I wanted to run away from everything. But I was even too afraid to do that. She broke my heart but even more so broke my confidence. I stopped going for things I wanted after that.”

Dell could hear in his voice he was having a breakthrough. A realization was dawning over him that slid many pieces into place—and she could see it too. He’dlearnedto become a passive rule follower because taking a risk with his heart on the line had failed and wounded him. Badly.

“I’m sorry that happened to you,” Dell said, and clasped his hand in both of hers. “She obviously didn’t deserve you and made a terrible decision by saying no.”

Jason grimaced and quietly put the ring box back. “I’ll just seal up this little box of regrets, then.”

“I don’t regret it,” Cole was quick to defend. “But I regret how I let it hold me back.” He gave Dell a searching look. “Not just in relationships, but in... everything. I never took another risk again. I guess other than that skiing trip, and look how that turned out.”

She gazed back at him and could see a world crumbling and reshaping in his eyes. A broken heart underpinned who he’d become. Even if it had healed, the scar lingered with an ache. She wished she could erase the pain for him.

Cole looked at her with a twist of his lips. What he was thinking, she couldn’t be sure. “Can we stay here for a while? I’d really like to spend some time with my parents, if I can. And my dog,” he added, and patted Chaucer’s head, who’d been glued to his hip the whole time.

“We can do whatever you want,” Dell said to him with a smile.And then she got an idea. “How about we take a little risk right now?”

“How do you mean?” Cole asked with a hint of worry sneaking into his voice.

“Before I give Robbie his body back, why don’t you borrow it and give your mom a hug?”

Alarm leaped across Cole’s face. At the same time, a boundless hope lit up his eyes. “Oh, I can’t—”