That didn’t seem to dull her excitement.
She stopped a few feet short and put her hands on her hips. The smile of excitement switched to an undeniable mischievousness in a flash.
“Well, if it isn’t Darius Williams.” She tilted her head to the side. “I was getting a little worried you’d somehow found a new way back to town since I’ve been gone.”
His brow rose in question.
The woman seemed to be in her own world. Her gaze swept up from his feet to his eyes.
“I can tell you for sure the one thing that changed is how tall you are,” she continued. “You outgrew me by almost a foot. Not sure if I like that, to be honest.”
Darius had been the only detective in McCoy County for years. He hadn’t seen a lot of things compared to bigger counties or cities—nothing that had left him speechless or staggering, at least—and even outside of work his surprises, scares and startles hadn’t been much at all. Nothing to write home about. Nothing to flip, rock or shake his world.
He could take a hit.
He could dole one out too.
He could button up his emotions, and he could unleash hell, if need be.
Even walking up to a woman waving him down in a wedding dress wasn’t enough to move the needle on his radar fromcautioustoconfused.
But then the stranger moved her hand up above her head to emphasize how he was taller.
And that’s how he saw the small scar along the side of it.
It instantly reminded him of the scar on his back, jagged and uneven. Darker than his olive skin color and easy to spot if he wasn’t careful with the sleeves of his shirt.
If the location were different, it would almost look like they had tried to match—
Darius’s eyes flashed to the woman’s face.
At first the woman had been nothing but average. Nice-looking in a pleasant, fine way. Green eyes, brunette. Hairstyle that might be expected for a wedding and a smile that was all right. A woman who might not stop traffic but could stop one driver.
But now?
Darius saw something else entirely.
Someoneelse.
The scar seemed to be the secret password to unlocking an entirely new version of the woman standing in the road, wearing a wedding dress.
“Evie?”
The name came out of his mouth on reflex.
“I guess some things always look the same no matter how long it’s been.” She nodded and then dropped her hand with a little shake. Like it was the most normal interaction in the world, she continued with a smile still. “Though, I guess you might not have figured it out had I been in a crowd. So I’m not sure this counts all that much.”
Her shoulders tightened, and her smile disappeared, all before Darius could mumble out a word in response. She tucked her hand and its scar into one of her coat pockets.
The scar that matched Darius’s.
The scar that had changed his life.
The scar that would have been much worse had a little girl named Evelyn Myers not protected him with everything she had.
Now, scar out of sight, there might have been a fully grown woman standing across from him, but Darius couldn’t help but feel like he was staring into the determined pine-green eyes of the same little girl next door back then.
“I have never once asked for it but, you, Darius Williams, owe me a favor,” she said, smile absolutely wiped clean. Her next words were spoken with a familiar resolve that gave him no space for a response. Not that he would have known what to say if he’d had the time to do so.
