As he crossed the room, her phone, which sat on the coffee table, lit up. He frowned at the message. Alotof messages. All from Scott.
What was going on with them? Were they on a break or was it actually over? And why hadn’t they married?
He gritted his teeth, reminding himself it was none of his business, no matter how much he wanted tomakeit his business.
He crouched in front of her and touched her arm. “Sadie.”
Nothing. Not even a flicker of her eyelids.
He lifted his hand to her face, gently cupping her cheek. “Sadie, wake up.”
This time there was a small scrunching of her eyes, then another, before they slowly opened. She frowned. “Eastern?”
“Yeah, honey, it’s me. Sorry I’m home so late.”
Her gaze moved between his eyes before her own widened. “Avery—”
“She’s in bed.”
Sadie nodded slowly before pushing up to a seated position. “Sorry I fell asleep.”
“Don’t apologize. I’m the one who got home so much later than expected. Next time, you’re welcome to take my bed.” Even if the thought of her sleeping between his sheets knotted his gut. Would the bedding smell of her after? Sweet like honey.
She shook her head. “Oh, no, that’s okay. The couch is comfortable.”
Hell no. Having a woman sleep on his couch went against every gentlemanly instinct inside him, and his fatherhadraised him to be a gentleman.
He reached behind him and grabbed her phone, handing it to her. “This was lighting up.”
Her brows flickered. She only looked at it for a moment before turning it face down on the couch. “Thanks.”
He should keep his mouth shut, but the question was out before he could stop it. “Everything okay there?”
She lifted a shoulder. “It would be…if he’d just leave me alone.”
Something hard lodged in his throat. “He’s harassing you?”
“It’s partly my fault. I walked out on our wedding day and never told him why. Although, by now, I’m sure his mother has.”
He sat beside her on the couch. “Want to talk about it?”
Her gaze returned to the phone. “Have you ever been confused about something, then at the last hour, finally gotten clarity?”
“Everyone’s probably experienced that at some point.”
She laughed, but the sound didn’t have much humor behind it. “Not like this. I sat there on the morning of my wedding day, in my ivory wedding dress. My hair and makeup were done, and I was holding the most expensive flowers I’d ever held in my life…flowers that I chose so carefully six months prior. It was twenty-six minutes until I was supposed to walk down the aisle. I remember because that number seemed almost ominous, staring back at me from the clock on the wall. I was waiting for the next minute to tick by, and it felt like I was waiting for my death sentence. Dramatic, I know. But that’s when I realized…I couldn’t walk down that aisle.”
He watched every flicker of emotion that moved across her face, and each seemed darker than the last. “Because you were scared that you were making the wrong decision?”
“Because I wasterrifiedthat I was making the worst decision of my life. All I could think was…my heart had never beat fast for Scott. My palms had never felt clammy in his presence. And everything I could see in front of me just felt so…ordinary.”
“And you didn’t want ordinary?”
“No.” This time when she looked up, the darkness was gone, and a hopeful bliss crossed her face. “I want delirious happiness. I don’t need easy, but I want a love that makes me excited andbreathless. I want to feel wildly happy when I see his name pop up on my phone. I want my belly to clench when he’s near me.”
Some deep part of him wanted her to have that too. All of it. “So, you walked away from the wedding twenty-six minutes before you were supposed to walk down the aisle because you knew it wasn’t right?”
“Actually, I went to find him, to tell him that I couldn’t do it. I knew the room he was using to get ready, and I just hoped he was still there. He wasn’t answering my calls.”
