My Cone and Only (King Family #1) - Susannah Nix Page 0,48

and fell in love. And yet there was no mention of him at all.

All those stories my grandfather told me about their love at first sight had begun to feel like lies. But had he been lying to me or had my grandmother lied to him?

On some level I knew it didn’t matter. They were all long gone. For better or worse, the story of their lives had reached its conclusion before I’d ever laid eyes on these letters. Whatever choices they’d made or twists of fate had intervened to determine their future were the reason I was alive today. The words on these pages didn’t have the power to change anything about the past.

But I couldn’t put them down. The more I read, the more invested I became in this man who’d obviously loved my grandmother. He wasn’t just some fly-by-night lay. I only had his side of their correspondence, but based on his references to her letters and their conversations when they were together, she’d had some pretty serious feelings for him too.

My fingers shook with eagerness as I opened the very last letter in the bundle. I hoped it would explain what had happened between them and why two people so obviously in love hadn’t ended up together. If the answer wasn’t in this letter, I’d probably never know.

My dearest, sweetest, most precious Lillian,

You’ve made your wishes clear, and I will not stand in opposition to your happiness. My soul is shattered by the prospect of a life without you, the only woman I have ever loved, but I know I must give you up.

How can I say goodbye to a joy such as the one we’ve shared? The answer is that I cannot, and will not. Though I bid farewell to you and vow never to burden you with my company in the future, I will carry my devotion to the very end of my days.

The moments we shared will live forever in my heart. The memory of your soft sighs, tender kisses, and eager caresses will sing me to sleep every night that I draw breath. No other woman will ever be able to match you or replace you in my affections. You will always be the first, the best, the only girl for me. Though you may forget me and offer your heart to another, know that you will remain my dearest, truest love.

My life. My world. My Lillian.

* * *

Wretchedly and forever yours,

HB

My chest hitched as I reached the end of the letter. The writing blurred, and I rubbed away the inexplicable tears that had filled my eyes.

I hadn’t learned anything except that my grandmother had abruptly ended the relationship for reasons I’d never find out. After everything I’d read, all the emotions spilled out across these brittle, yellowing pages, I wanted more closure than this.

I wasn’t usually a crier, but I couldn’t seem to hold myself in check. Whoever the man was who’d written these agonized, impassioned words, he’d reached out of the past and touched some kind of nerve. I couldn’t stop thinking about him, and how miserable he’d sounded, and how sad it all was. I couldn’t stop hurting for him and my grandmother and the life they never got to have.

What the hell was the matter with me?

I never cried like this. And where was my allegiance to my grandfather, who I’d known and loved, and who had loved my grandmother for most of his life? I felt like I was losing my mind, bawling over sixty-year-old letters from a total stranger.

It was more than just the letters though. They’d been the catalyst, but now that the floodgates were open, the emotions I’d been tamping down for the last few weeks were bubbling up and erupting all over me. The stress over the house situation, the injustice of it, and my own impotence and inability to solve the problem on my own. My frustration with Wyatt. My unavoidable dependence on him after his rejection of me. The unrequited feelings I was afraid I’d never be able to shake.

Feelings that weren’t so different than the author of these letters had described at the loss of his first and only love.

It was all just too much. Long-overdue sobs tore their way out of my throat. Apparently I was being punished for trying to hold my shit together, because I couldn’t stop crying now that I’d started. Tears streaked down my face unchecked, and my whole body shook with every painful breath