“I think you should give me my notebook right now.”
He opened the drawer and pulled out the notebook. Matthew held it out for her. She grabbed it but he didn’t let go. “Sydney, I never meant to hurt you.”
“How was I supposed to feel after you read this and used it against me?”
He let go of the notebook. “I didn’t use it against you. I wanted to give you your fantasy. What can I do to fix this?”
“Nothing,” Sydney said as she whirled around and left. “Don’t even try.”
6
SYDNEY WISHED SHE COULD feel numb. It had been two days since her confrontation with Matthew but the anger continued to swirl inside her. She felt vulnerable and exposed to the one person who mattered most. And he’d used that information for his own gain.
She curled herself into the sturdy lawn chair, gripped her wineglass a little tighter and watched her friends sit at her patio table and read the notebook. It was quiet in her backyard and the sun was just beginning to set. There was no place to hide.
But she didn’t have to hide with Isabel and Laura. She’d written the diary for them. She’d been trying to prove a point. A point that she seemed to have forgotten in the process.
“Wait, wait,” Laura muttered, grabbing the edge of the paper as Isabel tried to turn the page. “I’m not done yet.”
Isabel rolled her eyes. “This is why I suggested we read it at separate times.”
“Where’s the fun in that?” Laura asked as she continued to read.
“You’ve probably read enough to get the idea,” Sydney said.
“Are you kidding?” Isabel protested. “We’re at the point where X takes you in the front of his pickup truck.”
“You make it sound much more romantic than it actually is,” Laura said.
“It’s not me in the truck,” Sydney reminded them. “Although all of Seedling seems to think so.”
“And X is not Matthew Stone?” Laura teased, arching her eyebrow.
Sydney stared down at her wineglass. “Let’s just say he was the inspiration.”
Laura leaned back in her chair. “I hate to admit it, Isabel, but Sydney’s proved her point. It’s quite possible that The Secret Diary of an Anonymous Victorian Lady is made up.”
Isabel sat up straighter. “No, I refuse to believe that.”
“If you didn’t know this was fake,” Laura gestured at the notebook in Isabel’s hands, “you’d believe Sydney and X did all of this around Seedling.”
“Maybe they did.”
Sydney didn’t respond. She had lived out some of those scenes. At the time she’d imagined it was because she and Matthew wanted the same things. She believed they had the same fantasies.
That should have been her first clue. Men had different fantasies. Different ideas when it came to romance. With men, all was fair in love and war.
Isabel slapped the notebook onto the table. “I’m telling you, Hazel and Ernest were real. It’s obvious.”
“I’m willing to agree they were real people, but I don’t think the events mentioned in the book are real. Hazel could have been a repressed woman who had fantasies about someone unattainable. She could only experience her erotic ideas by putting them down on paper.”
“No.” Isabel shook her head. “That would have been too risky. What if someone had read her diary? Look at what happened even centuries later to Sydney.”
Laura made a face. “Writing down fantasies is too risky but having sex in the carriage house isn’t?”
Isabel gave a huff of exasperation. “Hazel was caught up in the moment. The man she desired wanted her. Her joy was palpable on every page.”
Sydney paused as she took a sip of wine. She understood exactly what Isabel was talking about. The joy of finding someone who you wanted to be with all the time—and knowing they felt the same way. The happiness that radiated from you even when you were alone. The love that wrapped around you as a couple, shielding you. Those emotions were missing from her fake diary because she only experienced them after she wrote the erotic scenes.
“I was wrong,” Sydney said slowly as she set down her wineglass. “Hazel and Ernest are real.”
Laura’s mouth dropped open. “What are you talking about?”
She turned to Isabel. “I’m so sorry I challenged you on this book. I was so determined that no secret love affair could be this sweet and hopeful. It’s because I didn’t have that. I had never been in love like that. Happy and confident. Safe in the knowledge that someone adored and cherished me. Head over heels in love like Hazel.”