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The trip was supposed to be exciting. At least, that was what Colin had told everyone.
New cities, new experiences, a few weeks abroad before returning to London, exactly the sort of thing he had always loved. The kind of adventure he usually couldn't wait to begin.
The first couple of days were fine, busy enough that he didn’t have time to think too much.
By the third day, however, he started noticing a problem.
It happened in a small street café just off a crowded plaza. Colin had stopped for coffee before heading back to his hotel, idly scrolling through photos he had taken that morning.
Across the street was a bookstore with tall windows and a chaotic display of books stacked in uneven towers.
His first thought was immediate.
Pen would love that place.
The thought came so naturally he almost smiled. Instead, he locked his phone and leaned back in the chair with a quiet sigh.
That wasn’t strange.
Penelope loved books. Of course she would like a shop like that. Thinking of her in moments like this wasn’t unusual.
Except it didn’t stop there.
Later that afternoon he passed a tiny flower shop tucked between two buildings. Yellow roses filled a bucket near the door.
Penelope would probably say the place was magical, hidden in the middle of the city like a secret.
He could practically hear her voice saying it, amused and fond all at once.
This was becoming… inconvenient.
Because the truth was, every interesting thing he saw triggered the same instinct.
I should tell Penelope about this.
He had already reached for his phone twice that day before remembering.
The last time they had spoken had been in the Bridgerton garden. And the conversation had ended with three words that refused to leave his head.
I love you.
Colin scrubbed a hand over his face as he walked back toward his hotel.
He had replayed that moment more times than he cared to admit. Her steady voice, the way she had clearly forced herself to keep talking, the awful realization that she had probably been carrying those feelings alone for years.
And his response.
Or rather his complete lack of one.
He had said she was important to him, which was true. But now, days later, it felt like the most useless thing he could possibly have said.
That night, alone in his hotel room, Colin sat on the edge of the bed staring down at his phone.
Penelope’s name sat near the top of his messages. Their conversation history was full of ridiculous things, memes, articles, long, rambling discussions about books, voice notes where Eloise interrupted halfway through. It all looked so normal…
Which made the silence since the garden feel heavier than it should.
He opened the chat.
Typed something.
Deleted it.
Typed again.
I miss you.
Delete.
I’ve been thinking about what you said.
Delete.
Colin groaned quietly and dropped the phone beside him.
This was ridiculous! He was a grown man, had traveled across half the world by himself, navigated unfamiliar cities, argued with airline staff in three different languages…
And somehow texting Penelope Featherington now felt terrifying.
He leaned back on the bed, staring at the ceiling, the longer he thought about it, the clearer one thing became.
He missed her more than anything.
More than the comfort of home.
More than the familiar chaos of his family.
Not in the casual way he missed people when he traveled. Not like Eloise or his mother.
Like the world had quietly lost some of its color without her.
He missed telling her things, hearing her laugh, the way she looked at him like whatever ridiculous story he was telling actually mattered.
When Penelope had confessed her feelings… He hadn’t even considered rejecting her, he had simply been too shocked to understand what he felt. But now, with days of distance and far too much time to think, the answer was starting to form whether he liked it or not.
And it made the memory of that garden conversation feel dangerously unfinished.
His phone buzzed.
Colin grabbed it eagerly and saw the new message across the screen.
Eloise Bridgerton
For a second he frowned in confusion.
Colin, call me. Now.
His stomach dropped. Eloise answered on the first ring.
“Colin.” Her voice was tight.
“What happened?” Fear shot through him.
She said the words that made his entire body go cold.
“Penelope was hit by a car."
Colin did not remember packing.
Later, he would vaguely recall throwing clothes into his suitcase with no real regard for what they were, nearly forgetting his passport, and knocking over a glass of water in the process.
What he remembered clearly was the sound of Eloise’s voice on the phone. The words repeated in his mind with brutal consistency.
By the time he reached the airport, his thoughts had already spiraled into catastrophic territory.
How badly had she been hurt?
Why hadn’t Eloise explained more?
Why hadn’t Penelope called him herself?
The flight felt endless.
Colin spent most of it staring blankly at the seat in front of him while his mind replayed every moment of their last conversation in the garden.
He had boarded a plane and flown across the ocean while she stayed behind believing he did not feel the same.
The thought twisted painfully in his chest.
If something happened to her…
Colin shut his eyes tightly. When the plane finally landed in London, he was one of the first passengers off. He called Eloise from the taxi.
"Tell me she’s alright," he said before she could speak.
"She’s alive," Eloise replied.
"That is not the reassuring sentence you seem to think it is." Colin exhaled sharply.
“She’s fine,” Eloise said quickly. “Well, mostly fine. Mild concussion, some bruises, a very dramatic bandage on her forehead. The doctors kept her overnight, but she’s home now.”
“Home where?”
“Her apartment.”
Of course.
Penelope had moved out of her family’s house three years ago, to a small place in Bloomsbury, if Colin remembered correctly. Eloise huffed on the other end of the line.
“Calling it an apartment is generous, honestly. It’s barely larger than my wardrobe.”
“Eloise.”
“Yes, yes, I’m getting to the point,” she said impatiently. “I’ve been staying with her since she got back from the hospital.”
Colin frowned slightly.
“What about her family?”
Eloise made a disbelieving sound.
“Oh, they sent flowers.”
“That doesn’t answer the question.”
“I think you know pretty well what that means.”
Colin resisted the urge to sigh.
“Is she awake?”
“Yes.”
"Is she..." he hesitated, the words catching slightly in his throat, "herself?”
Eloise was quiet for a moment.
“She seems like herself.” she said carefully, but something in her tone made Colin uneasy.
“What does that mean?”
“She’s insisting she’s perfectly fine and attempting to make tea when she should still be resting.”
That sounded reassuringly like Penelope.
“Where are you now?” Eloise asked.
“In the taxi. I’ll be there soon.”
“Good,” Eloise said. “Because if she tries to move that ridiculous stack of books again I may actually lose my mind.”
The apartment building was exactly as Eloise had described: slightly crooked in that way old London buildings tended to be.
His heart was pounding too loudly in his ears.
He took the stairs two at a time and knocked on the door. It opened almost immediately.
Eloise stood there with her arms folded.
She looked tired, but, more importantly, she looked relieved.
“You look terrible,” she said by way of greeting.
“Thank you.”
“You didn’t sleep, did you?”
“No.”
Eloise stepped aside.
“She’s in the living room.”
Colin moved past her instantly.
The apartment was indeed tiny. A small open space that served as both living room and kitchen, with a narrow hallway leading to what must have been the bedroom.
Penelope sat on the couch, with a blanket draped over her legs and a mug in her hands. There was a bandage near her hairline and several faint bruises along her arm.
Colin stopped walking for a moment, simply staring at her. The tension that had been strangling his chest for the past 34 hours snapped all at once.
“Pen.”
She looked up, her eyes widened in surprise.
“Colin?”
He crossed the room in three strides.
“Are you alright?”
She blinked at him, clearly startled by the intensity in his voice.
“I… yes?”
He crouched in front of her without thinking, his eyes scanning her face, the bandage, the bruises.
“You hit your head.”
“Apparently.”
“Apparently?”
“That is what the doctors told me.”
Colin held her hands, examining the bruises creeping up her arms, his heart heavy.
“You scared the life out of me.”
Penelope softened slightly.
“I’m sorry.”
Behind him, Eloise cleared her throat.
“Well,” she said, grabbing her bag from the counter, “now that the cavalry has arrived, I believe I deserve food that did not come from Penelope’s questionable kitchen.”
Penelope frowned.
“My kitchen is perfectly adequate.”
Eloise ignored her and looked at Colin.
“I'm going to stop by Phillip's house, I'll probably have dinner with him and the kids, I can come back here afterwards.”
“I can stay here with her, don’t worry.”
“Are you sure?"
“Yes.”
Eloise’s eyes flicked briefly between him and Penelope with a suspicious smile appearing on her face.
“Try not to argue too much while I’m gone.”
“Why would we argue?” Penelope looked confused.
Eloise didn’t answer, she simply grabbed her coat and walked out the door.
Colin turned back toward Penelope.
For a moment neither of them spoke.
“After everything you told me before I left…” He started hesitantly and Penelope tilted her head slightly.
“What do you mean?”
“In the garden.” Colin frowned.
“What garden?” She blinked.
“Bridgerton garden.”
Penelope stared at him for a moment.
“Colin… I have absolutely no idea what you’re talking about.” She said, very slowly.
For several long seconds neither of them moved. Then Colin laughed once, softly, though there was very little humor in it.
“Very funny.”
Penelope blinked.
“I’m sorry?”
“The joke,” he said, gesturing vaguely between them. “You can stop now.”
Her confusion appeared to deepen.
“Colin, I genuinely don’t understand what you’re talking about.”
Something uneasy twisted in his stomach.
“You told me,” he said slowly, “that you loved me.” Penelope’s eyes widened slightly.
“Did I?”
“Yes.”
She shifted a little under the blanket, considering that information with an expression that was far too thoughtful for his liking.
“Well,” she said after a moment, “that does sound terribly embarrassing.”
Colin stared at her.
“You don’t remember?”
“Should I?” She hesitated.
He leaned back slightly on his heels, searching her face.
“You confessed your love to me,” he said carefully. “In the garden. The night before I left.”
“The night before you left we were at your family’s party.”
“Exactly.”
She spread her hands slightly.
“I’m afraid I still don’t see where the confession part comes in.”
Colin blinked.
“You said,” he insisted, “that you had been in love with me for years.”
Penelope made a small, thoughtful sound.
“Hm.”
“Hm?” he repeated incredulously.
“That does sound like something dramatic enough for me to say at a party,” she admitted.
“Penelope.”
“But surely,” she continued mildly, “if I had done something that humiliating, I would remember it.”
“It was not humiliating.” Colin’s jaw tightened.
“You said I declared my love for a man who did not return the sentiment.” She raised an eyebrow.
“That is not what happened.”
Penelope looked at him patiently.
“Isn’t it?”
He opened his mouth and closed it, realizing that, from her perspective… That might very well be what it had looked like.
“I didn’t reject you,” he said finally.
Penelope shrugged slightly.
“If you say so.”
“I do say so.”
“Then that’s reassuring for the version of me who apparently confessed her feelings,” she said.
Colin stared at her.
“You’re speaking about yourself in the third person.”
“Well,” Penelope said reasonably, “if I don’t remember the event, she does feel like a different person.”
He rubbed a hand over his face.
“This is absurd.”
“Is it?”
“Yes.”
Penelope sipped her tea infuriatingly calm.
Colin studied her more closely.
“Did the doctors say anything about your memory?”
“Why?” Penelope blinked at him.
“Why? Because you're telling me you don't remember a conversation we had two weeks ago!” She seemed to consider that.
“Well,” she said slowly, “they did mention that mild concussions can occasionally cause temporary gaps in memory.”
Colin felt something uneasy settle in his chest.
“So you might have forgotten.”
“It’s possible,” she said.
He leaned forward slightly.
“You cried.”
“I did not…” Penelope stopped.
Colin’s eyes narrowed.
“You remember.”
“I do not.”
“You just reacted to something that supposedly never happened.”
“I reacted to the suggestion that I cried,” she corrected.
“Which you did.”
“I would never cry in front of you.” Colin let out a disbelieving laugh.
“You absolutely would.”
Penelope crossed her arms.
“I absolutely would not.”
They glared at each other for a moment, suspicion crept into his expression.
“Penelope, you don’t remember confessing your love to me?”
“No.” Her expression flickered, just for a second.
“Interesting.” Colin leaned forward slightly.
Penelope cleared her throat and looked away.
“I believe you are reading far too much into this.”
“Oh, I don’t think I am.”
Her gaze snapped back to his.
“And why is that?”
Colin folded his arms.
“Because if you truly didn’t remember,” he said carefully, “you would probably be asking far more questions.”
She lifted her mug again, pretending to focus very carefully on her tea.
“Well,” she said lightly, “if you have finished interrogating me, I would appreciate the opportunity to recover from my near-death experience in peace.”
“Near-death?” Colin repeated.
“I was hit by a car.”
He hummed softly.
“A near-death experience that made you completely forget that you confessed to having spent years loving me in silence.”
“That does sound like something dramatic enough for me to say.”
“You also said you knew I didn’t feel the same.” Penelope shrugged again.
“Well. That part at least sounds accurate.”
He leaned forward.
“Why would you assume that?”
“Because you said so.”
“I did not.”
“You just did.”
“I meant that you assumed it before.”
“Well,” she said carefully, “if I had confessed my love to you and you did not immediately reciprocate, that would be a fairly logical conclusion.”
Colin stared at her.
“You’re describing the exact situation that happened.”
“I’m describing a hypothetical situation.”
“No, you’re not.”
“Yes, I am.”
They glared at each other. Colin leaned closer.
“You’re lying.”
“I am not.”
“You have selective amnesia that only applies to emotionally inconvenient conversations.”
“We only talked about one situation that I don't remember, I may have forgotten other things besides that particular conversation.” Penelope looked up at him warily.
He paced once across the small living room, running a hand through his hair.
“Fine,” he said.
“Fine?” she repeated.
“If you truly don’t remember,” he said tightly, “then there’s no point in continuing arguing about it."
Penelope’s stomach twisted slightly.
“Because I remember perfectly what you said.”
Her fingers tightened slightly around the mug.
“And frankly,” he added, his voice quieter now, “it has been driving me mad for two weeks.”
His expression had lost its teasing edge. Now he simply looked tired and frustrated.
“I have replayed that conversation in my head every day since I left,” he said. “And the worst part is that I didn’t understand it at the time.”
Colin met her eyes.
“You said you loved me. And I stood there like an idiot,” Penelope didn’t move. “I told you that you were important to me. But that wasn’t the answer you deserved.”
Colin ran a hand through his hair again.
“I thought distance would help me figure out what I was feeling,” he admitted. “But instead I spent two weeks noticing that every interesting thing I saw made me think of you.” He laughed softly, though there was no humor in it. “A bookstore. A street musician playing that ridiculous song you hate.”
Penelope’s eyes widened slightly.
“And every single time,” he continued, “my first instinct was to tell you about it.”
He looked at her again.
“So forgive me if I find it slightly frustrating that you now claim not to remember the conversation that caused all of this.”
Penelope’s voice came out softer than she intended.
“Colin…” He stepped closer.
“You said you loved me. And I should have told you something then,” Colin held her gaze. “I should have told you that I love you too.”
The words settled into the room like something fragile.
For a moment Penelope didn’t breathe, her mind had been perfectly prepared to hear many things from Colin Bridgerton, but not that.
“You seem very surprised to hear that I love you.”
She tried to recover quickly.
“Well, naturally.”
“Why naturally?”
“Because.”
Colin raised an eyebrow.
“Because?”
Penelope lifted her chin slightly.
“Because if I had truly confessed my love to you and you did not immediately reciprocate, I would have assumed the answer was no.”
“That is exactly what happened.”
“Yes.”
“And yet,” Colin continued, watching her carefully, “your reaction suggests you did not expect me to say it.”
Penelope looked away.
“Did the accident only make you forget the conversation,” he asked, “or did it make you forget how you felt about me as well?”
She studied him for a moment.
“If I truly had confessed my love to you, and you left the country without responding… I imagine the sensible thing would be to attempt to forget those feelings.”
That answer hurt more than he expected.
“So you’re saying the feelings are gone?”
Penelope shrugged. Colin held her gaze.
“Penelope,” Colin said quietly, “do you still love me?”
Her brain stopped working completely. Every carefully constructed excuse, every clever deflection she had prepared was gone. Destroyed by one very calm, very direct question.
Colin waited patiently.
Finally she cleared her throat.
“Well,” she said carefully, “that does seem like the sort of question one should answer with a fully functioning memory.”
Colin studied her for another moment. Then something shifted in his expression.
He walked calmly toward the small kitchen area and set his bag down.
Penelope watched in horror as he began unpacking.
“What are you doing?”
“Settling in.”
“You are not staying here after all that.”
He glanced over his shoulder.
“Of course I am.” Colin turned back to the counter, opening cabinets with casual curiosity. “Do you want anything for dinner?”
“What?”
“I’m hungry,” he said simply. “You should probably eat something too.”
She stared at him.
“Soup?”
“Good choice.” Penelope relaxed slightly.
He returned to the fridge.
“Did the doctors say when the memory gaps might stop?”
She hesitated.
“I believe they said a few days.”
Colin shut the fridge and leaned casually against the counter.
“If your memory returns,” he said lightly, “you might suddenly remember confessing your love to me?”
Penelope swallowed.
“That would be… unfortunate.”
“Would it?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because it would be embarrassing.” Colin nodded slowly.
“So tell me something,” Colin said casually. “When we were in the garden that night…”
Penelope groaned.
“I told you I don’t remember.”
He opened a cabinet, pulled out a bowl calmly, moving around the kitchen with suspiciously cheerful efficiency and started chopping vegetables.
“You’re enjoying this way too much.”
He glanced over his shoulder.
“I have no idea what you mean.”
She dropped her hands and glared at the back of his head. Colin stirred something in a saucepan.
“What dress were you wearing that night?”
“The green one…” Penelope answered automatically and froze.
The silence that followed was deafening. Very slowly, Colin turned around, one eyebrow lifted. She stared at him and he stared back.
He leaned against the counter.
“The green one.”
Penelope closed her eyes.
“That was a guess.”
“A very confident guess.”
“I own several green dresses.”
“You sound very certain.”
Penelope pointed accusingly at him.
“You asked the question in a misleading way.”
“How exactly?”
“You made it sound hypothetical.”
“I said that night.”
“Yes.”
“That sounds fairly specific.”
Penelope sighed heavily.
“I’m injured.”
“You’re lying.”
Colin turned back to the stove, clearly pleased with himself.
“That question was a trap.”
“Yes.”
“You did that on purpose.”
“Yes.”
“That’s cruel.”
“I warned you,” he said. “You’re terrible at lying.”
Colin tasted the soup thoughtfully.
“Needs salt.”
She glared at him.
“You ambushed me.”
“You faked amnesia.”
Penelope pointed again.
“I never said I had amnesia.”
“You heavily implied it.”
“I said the doctors mentioned memory gaps.” Colin chuckled.
“You are astonishingly manipulative.”
“Thank you.”
“That was not a compliment.”
Penelope shifted on the couch, trying to look dignified despite the blanket and bruises.
“I have made a series of terrible decisions today.”
“So you do remember?” Colin crossed his arms.
Penelope slid further down into the couch.
“…yes.” The word came out reluctantly.
Colin exhaled.
“How long have you been pretending?”
“…Since you walked in.” She hesitated.
Colin rubbed a hand over his face.
“You let me believe you had a concussion-induced memory problem.”
“I do have a concussion.”
“You let me explain the entire emotional journey I went through on that trip.”
“That part was unexpected.” Penelope winced.
“You made me confess my love for you.”
“In my defense,” she said carefully, “when you started the conversation, I thought you were going to politely reject me.”
“What?”
“You said you had been thinking about what I told you before you left,” she explained. “Historically, that is the beginning of a very polite rejection speech.”
“That is not what I was doing.”
“Well,” she said, gesturing vaguely, “you didn’t say you loved me until much later.”
Colin stared at her for a long moment and started laughing. Penelope looked offended.
“This is not funny.”
Colin shook his head, still smiling slightly.
“You are unbelievable.”
They looked at each other, the humor slowly faded from his expression.
“What you said in the garden,” he said quietly. “That part was real?”
“Yes.”
“And you still feel that way.” She met his gaze.
“Yes.”
Colin stepped closer.
“Good,” he said softly.
Penelope blinked.
“Good?”
He leaned down slightly, close enough now that she could see the faint exhaustion in his eyes from the flight. The air between them felt charged now, heavy with everything that had been said and everything that had almost gone wrong.
“Yes.”
“And that doesn’t concern you?”
“Not particularly.”
Penelope blinked.
“Why not?”
Colin’s mouth curved slightly.
“Because I’m fairly certain I was going to do it anyway.”
“Oh.”
Her heart skipped.
“Penelope,” he said softly.
“Yes?”
“Are you going to keep staring at me like that, or are you going to let me kiss you?”
Her brain short-circuited.
“You want to…?”
“Yes.”
Colin reached for her, one hand gently cupping her cheek as he leaned down.
The kiss was soft at first. Penelope made a small surprised sound against his lips, which only seemed to encourage him.
When he finally pulled back, she looked slightly dazed.
“Well,” she said faintly.
Colin smiled.
“That seemed overdue.”
“By several years,” she admitted.
He sat down beside her on the couch.
Immediately his attention shifted to the bruise on her arm.
“Oh no.” Penelope groaned softly.
“What?”
“That look.”
“What look?”
“It’s the same look Eloise had yesterday.”
Colin frowned.
“I’m not sure what you mean.”
“You’re about to become insufferable, aren’t you?”
“I beg your pardon.”
“You’re going to start hovering.”
“Of course, I’m here to take care of you, you’re hurt and I love you, and you love me! Hovering is in the law.”
“You sound ridiculous, you know that?”
Colin glanced at the bruise again.
“You should rest.”
“I have been resting.”
“You should be in your bed.”
Colin stood suddenly.
“What are you doing?” Penelope eyed him suspiciously.
“Taking you to bed.”
She couldn't stop him from picking her up.
“I can walk.”
“Yes, but you shouldn’t.”
“Colin.”
He carried her toward the bedroom anyway.
“Put me down.”
“No.”
“This is completely unnecessary.”
Colin set her carefully on the bed.
Then stepped back, clearly pleased with himself. Penelope glared at him.
“You are unbelievable.”
“You’re injured.”
“I have bruises.”
“And a concussion.”
Penelope flopped dramatically back against the pillows.
“I preferred it when you thought I had amnesia.” Colin laughed.
“I did not think you had amnesia for very long.”
“Yes, well, I was improvising.”
"You were terrible at it," Colin repeated, though his voice had softened into something far more intimate.
"I was under pressure," Penelope countered, but she didn’t look away this time.
Colin finished the soup in silence, the rhythmic sound of the knife against the cutting board filling the small kitchen. When it was ready, he didn't let her get up. He brought two steaming bowls to her room.
They ate while sitting on her bed, Penelope wrapped in her cocoon, while Colin sat leaning against the edge of the bed, facing her. It felt domestic, like a glimpse into a life he hadn't known he wanted until this very moment.
"It’s actually good," Penelope admitted, blowing on a spoonful of broth. "I didn't know your skills extended to the kitchen."
"I learned a thing or two abroad," Colin said, looking up at her. "Mostly because I was tired of terrible hostel food, but also because it gave me something to do with my hands when my mind was... elsewhere."
Penelope’s gaze dropped to her bowl, a faint blush creeping up her neck.
They finished the meal with a new kind of ease, the tension of the 'confession' having finally broken. Colin took the empty bowls away, and when he returned, he noticed Penelope’s eyelids drooping, the exhaustion of the concussion and the emotional upheaval finally catching up to her.
"You should rest," he said, his voice dropping into that protective tone that made Penelope’s heart do a somersault. “Are you comfortable?”
“Yes.”
“Do you need anything?”
“No.”
“Water?”
“No.”
“Another blanket?”
“No.”
Penelope eyed him suspiciously.
“Where are you going?”
“I’ll sleep on the couch.”
Her brow furrowed.
“You are not going to sleep on a couch that is approximately the size of a shoebox.”
“It’s perfectly adequate.”
She shifted slightly on the bed.
“There’s plenty of space here.”
“Penelope, I don’t think taking advantage of that situation would be very gentlemanly.”
She rolled her eyes.
“I’m asking you to sleep. Not seduce me.” Penelope patted the empty space beside her. “You need rest too.”
Colin hesitated.
“You’re sure?”
“Yes.”
He lay down beside her carefully, as though she might break if he moved too quickly.
Penelope turned slightly toward him. Almost immediately, Colin wrapped an arm around her. She smiled softly.
“See?” she murmured. “You’re hovering already.”
“I’m making sure you don’t fall out of bed.”
“I have never fallen out of bed in my life.”
“There’s a first time for everything.”
Penelope tucked herself closer against him.
He stiffened slightly for a moment.
Then relaxed.
“Colin?”
“Yes?”
“I’m glad you came back.”
His arm tightened slightly around her.
“I’m glad you’re alright.”
She tilted her head up slightly.
“You really flew all the way home because Eloise said I was hit by a car.”
“Yes.”
“That’s very romantic.”
“That was my intention.”
“It worked.”
Colin huffed quietly.
“Get some sleep.”
Penelope smiled against his shoulder and fell asleep wrapped in the arms of her very determined new boyfriend.