“Yeah, yeah. You’re welcome.” She sighs, moving to close the door, but just before it shuts, she says quietly, “She still loves you, by the way. Don’t think she ever stopped.”
I turn back to her. “What makes you say that?”
“I can see it on her face.” She smiles softly. “I know the look well.”
Without waiting for a response, Darby shuts the door. I leave the alcove that houses the bathroom, moseying through the rest of the gallery, talking briefly with our friends. But my eyes are always focused on where Elena is, who she’s talking to, and what she’s doing. She spends most of the next hour in deep conversation with Penelope, who introduces her to another couple. A Black woman with long, braided hair—the only person here dressed almost as immaculately as Elena—and a brunette white man. She laughs at something he says, and it makes my gut twist, though it’s clear the woman next to him is his wife.
I don’t know what it says about me that I want to own her so badly I’m unwilling to let her gift another man with something so simple as a laugh.
After that, Elena disappears for a while, but I have to pretend it doesn’t make me frantic while I’m in conversation with Dahlia and Everett, because he doesn’t seem concerned about his sister’s whereabouts. Finally, she returns from the stairwell at the back of the showroom, a narrow rectangular box beneath her arm and Penelope at her side.
Her face is brighter than I’ve seen it in years, and in a move so unlike her, Elena initiates a hug with the red-headed artist.
As they pull away, she glances around the room in search of something, and when her eyes find mine, her lips tug into a wide smile. The exact kind of smile I vividly remember seeing that very first time, because it made me question the chances of an eleven-year-old boy going into cardiac arrest after my heart took off in a gallop so fierce it could’ve knocked me on my ass.
It’s racing like that again, like a blow right through my chest, and I almost feel the need to stumble back and clutch my ribs.
Elena beelines straight toward me, ignoring all the commotion around us. She stops just as her toes meet mine, head lifting. “I bought a painting.”
She says it like she’s proud of herself, like she’s the one who made the art. I understand the feeling, though. When you’ve shut yourself out for so long, neglected care and joy and connection, taking it back feels monumental. It is monumental.
I know it’s hard for her to feel accomplished in the things she thinks she’s supposed to be achieving—her job, her writing. She’s likely still drowning in debt, and who knows when she’ll be able to afford a car or a place to live on her own—but right now, she’s fought back enough financial independence to get herself to this event tonight, to buy herself a gift.
Even if it was to spite me, she got out of bed today, she got herself together, and while she doesn’t need the frills of elegance to be the most beautiful person in the room, I know it’s done wonders for her confidence. She is always breathtaking to me, but right now, she knows it too, and that assurance on her face is a beauty beyond description.
My heart swells with something a hell of a lot like pride.
“I can see that.” The smile I give her back is effortless. “What’s it of?”
She shrugs. “I don’t know yet. It’s a surprise.”
I offer a bemused expression, but she only laughs, brushing past me in the direction of her brothers and their wives. “Ready to go whenever you are, Augustus,” she chimes over her shoulder as her perfect ass sways with each step she takes.
I follow her, feeling somewhat like a dog—her leash around my goddamn soul.
“I’m hitching a ride home with Augustus,” Elena says as she reaches them.
Darby and Dahlia shoot me mischievous, knowing smiles. Leo smiles, too, but it’s softer. More hopeful, and a pang of guilt slams into me like a freight train. He thinks I’m taking care of his sister, reviving the friendship he knew us to have.
He and Everett are still in the dark when it comes to our many, many secrets. The old ones, and even worse, the new ones too. I doubt that Darby or Dahlia realize the depths of them either. If they did, they wouldn’t be grinning at me right now. They’d be disappointed in us both.
They all think that Elena and I are simply attempting the slow rebuild of a platonic connection we shared once upon a time. Darby knows more; I’ve disclosed my feelings for Elena to her, but never the true depths of them, or what she felt for me in return. Nobody knows what happened the day my brother died, or any of our final words to each other.
Elena and I are devious. We’re liars.
And while the bed she lies in at night, the hands that touch her body, are none of her brother’s concern, I know they see her as fragile. If they knew what was happening between us, understood how reckless I’m being with her when I can’t even understand it myself—they’d never forgive me.
We say our goodbyes, and that guilt slices deeper when Everett whispers, “Thank you” as he hugs me. I force a smile back at them all before I follow Elena out of the building.
My truck is in a garage across the street, so I keep my hand on the small of her back as we cross the busy road and lead her to where I’m parked. I set her painting in the back of my Bronco before opening the passenger door and holding her hand as she hauls herself inside of it.
It’s quiet as I drive out of the city and onto the interstate that will lead us back to Pacific Shores. The world around us is dark, highlighted only by the lights of the towns we drive through, and the low glow of my dashboard. I steal far too many glances in Elena’s direction, having my attention stolen by the urge to watch her rest her head at the window.
“Do you think we should feel guilty?” she whispers once we’re well on the road.
I suck in a sharp breath, wondering how she does such a damn good job at reading my thoughts. “Guilty for what?”
I take my eyes off the road for only a fraction of a second, catching her gaze as her head whips to the side. “It was a memorial event for him.” Her features are withdrawn, conflicted. “And what we did…” She trails off, sighing.
