“We came upon a huge swarm of dancing fireflies.” Her face lit up at the memory. “It was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen.”
“Youwere the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen,” Darius took a small step forward, “standing in the grass in that fairy-like gown amidst a circle of glowing lights. It was that night I realized what I’d been feeling for you had changed.”
“And yet you never said anything.”
“You were my best friend. How could I risk that? And I was right, wasn’t I?” Darius’s voice softened. “When I kissed you ten months later, I ruined everything between us.”
“Because you never spoke to me again. It was your silence that ruined everything.” Eve’s eyes flashed. “You’ve already told me why you did it, but you need to know how much you hurt me back then. I didn’t know what I’d done wrong.”
“That was all on me and my insecurities.”
“Was it insecurity that made you walk away from your wedding?”
So they were there.
“No, it was love.” He winced at the disbelief now on her face.
“Hello, is this Melanie?” Joe asked. “Thank you for answering.”
Darius took Eve’s hand and pulled her away from the others, grateful that she didn’t fight him. He accepted the phone from Joe and put it on speaker, so she could hear.
“Mel, can I tell her the truth?” Darius asked, keeping his voice low, though he could sense those behind them straining to hear.
“Um . . .”
His heart raced. What if she refused? Darius glanced at Eve whose face was inscrutable.
“All right,” Melanie finally said, “but she has to promise not to tell anyone else.”
He breathed a sigh of relief. “Thank you.” He disconnected and met Eve’s gaze, saying, “That was my ex-fiancée.”
“I can vouch for that,” Joe said. “It was like pulling teeth to get her to see him.”
“Can we talk alone?” Darius asked. “I promised her you’d be the only one to know the whole story.”
She glanced back at her parents and grandfather who’d approached but still stood back a few feet. When her mother gave Eve an encouraging nod, Darius was grateful.
“In the solarium?” he asked.
“But I want to know too,” her grandfather said, his voice irritated.
“Well, we don’t always get what we want,” her father said, waving them away.
* * *
Eve’s stomachwas a nervous mess as she led the way into the solarium. She didn’t know if she could sit still, so she went to stand by the one wall of glass that had no furniture in front of it, keeping her back to him. What would she see if she turned around and looked at those dark eyes? The shadows underneath them spoke of the stress he’d been under since she’d last seen him.
“My old fiancée is now married to a senator who’s running for his second term,” Darius began, coming to stand behind her. “At the time our wedding was scheduled, he was running for Congress. I have no idea when they met or how long they’d been seeing each other. I’d graduated and was busy working on getting my teaching credentials while she focused on wedding preparations.”
The tightness around Eve’s heart began to ease. It’d beenherseeing someone else. Poor Darius. How had he found out? He stepped closer, enough that she could almost feel the warmth of his body on her back.
“Did you catch them together?” she asked.
“No. Like her, he was very conscious of social status, and it wouldn’t have looked good for a wannabe congressman to be seen as the one who’d broken up an engaged couple, even in these more liberal days. I could tell something was bothering her at the rehearsal dinner the night before, but I put it off to nerves. I had the jitters too. Her parents had poured a ton of money into it, and a couple of the society pages were calling it the wedding of the year, which was ridiculous. I’d suggested the money would be better spent as a down payment on a house. But Melanie wanted her party, especially since her rich parents were paying for it. It was kind of a big thing that their daughter had agreed to marry a man whose sole ambition was to be a high school art teacher.”
That woman was an idiot. One of the things Eve liked about Darius was something his ex-fiancée had looked down on.
Darius put a hand on Eve’s shoulder, and her skin came alive under his touch. She barely noticed the ache in her chest in spite of her racing heart.
