Her mouth fell open in shock. She wanted to throw her arms around him so badly, but she knew it wouldn’t be what he wanted. But he looked so nervous, as if he worried she wouldn’t appreciate what he’d done. How could she not?
“I know how much the animals mean to you, Ash.”
Tears blurred her vision and her heart ached. She loved him so much. “Thank you,” she whispered. “I can never thank you enough for this. It means the world to me.”
“You mean the world to me,” he said softly.
Her eyes widened and her heart thumped so hard against her chest that she put a hand over her breast to steady herself.
But before she could question him, he turned to the others and said, “As much as we’d love to stay and celebrate with you, I have to take Ashley one more place.”
After saying their goodbyes, Devon ushered Ashley out to the car again. She sat in her seat, bemused and a little hopeful, but for what she wasn’t sure. Something was different about Devon. Something that went deeper than simple regret or guilt.
“What did you mean, Dev?” she asked softly as they drove away. “Back there when you said I meant the world to you?”
His hands tightened around the steering wheel and his jaw worked up and down.
“Exactly what I said, Ash. There is so much I need to say to you, but I’m asking you to be patient with me. This isn’t a conversation I want to have in a car when I’m driving and I can’t look at you or touch you. So I’m asking you to give me a little while. There’s a place I want to take you and then I want us to talk and I want you to listen to everything I have to say.”
Her mouth went dry at the intensity in his voice. He was tense. Almost as if he feared she’d refuse and demand he take her back. Wanting in some way to alleviate his obvious stress, she reached over to lay her hand on his leg.
“Okay, Dev. I’ll listen.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Devon continuously had to ease up on the accelerator as he headed out of the city. He was impatient and time was running out for him, but the roads were slick and the very last thing he wanted to do was endanger his wife and child.
His wife and child.
The words and the image were powerful.Hiswife and child. The woman he loved and had hurt so terribly. A child resting inside her womb. Their creation. His family. Something that belonged solely to him.
What would he do if he wasn’t granted a second chance to make amends?
He couldn’t—wouldn’t—focus on that possibility. To do so would drive him insane. It was up to him to make her forgive him or at least agree to give him one more chance to make it all right.
She was so beautiful, but there was an aura of sadness that surrounded her. It was as if a light had been extinguished or a black cloud had crawled across the sun and clung stubbornly as the storms rolled in.
He wanted her to smile again. He wanted her to be happy. But more than anything he wanted to bewhyshe was happy. He wanted her to be happy withhim.
The trip to Greenwich, Connecticut, took longer than he’d like. The drive was silent and tense. They both seemed nervous and ill at ease. By the time he turned onto road that would wind around to the front of the sprawling home he wanted Ashley to see, they only had an hour of daylight left.
He pulled to the curb just before the bend in the private lane and shut the engine off. Beside him Ashley’s brow furrowed in obvious confusion.
He walked around to her side of the car and opened the door. He pulled her out, carefully arranged her scarf and cap so she’d be warm and then took her hand and tugged her onto the road.
Snow drifted in the ditches and spread out over the landscape, a pristine covering of sheer white. It reminded him of her. Magical, almost like a fairy tale.
He’d once told her that life wasn’t a fairy tale, but damn it, she was going to have one. Starting right now.
“It’s beautiful here,” she said breathlessly.
Enchantment filled her eyes as she stared out over the rolling hills. Her face had softened into a dreamy smile and he felt a stirring in his heart. This was how he wanted her to look every day. Happy. Sparkling. So damn beautiful she made him ache to his bones.
He pulled her up short just as they reached the sharp bend in the road. He kept hold of her hand and pulled her to face him, his heart pounding damn near out of his chest.
Their breaths came out in visible puffs. Snowflakes began to fall again, spiraling lazily down, some sticking in her hair, some melting and absorbed by the splash of sun in the barren white of winter.
“Ash.”
