Chapter Twenty-Six
Teagan
Present
I’m parked outside the restaurant where we’re supposed to meet. My nerves are out of control. Thank God Nina came over and picked out my clothes because I was completely lost.
What the hell do you wear to a date with a man you’ve loved your whole adult life?
Nothing looked right. I was trying too hard, not trying hard enough, or just plain frumpy.
Now, I’m here, in a deep purple dress and my hair curled in long waves—sitting in the car—like a chicken shit.
This is crazy. This is completely stupid and crazy. Derek can’t possibly want to date me, not really. He wants to figure out some weird thing in our past and see if it’s true. He must be just…going through some move-back-to-small-town-life crisis.
I start the car and then a knock causes me to jump. “Jesus.”
Derek is at the window, with a smile on his face. “Going somewhere?”
I close my eyes and let my head fall to the steering wheel. “God, I hate my life.”
“Were you running away?”
“Not very well.”
He chuckles and then opens the door. “No, but I give you a C for effort.”
“Just a C?” I ask as I turn my head to the side to catch a glimpse of him.
“I’m being generous too.”
Lucky me. “How long were you watching me?”
I have a feeling this is going to be the worst part. If he just happened upon me I won’t have to die from mortification, but if he was somehow skulking in the shadows and saw me sitting here for fifteen minutes, I’ll never live it down.
“Oh, since you pulled up.”
“Of course.”
“What were you doing? Convincing yourself it’s totally cool to bail on your date? I know you didn’t like being on the receiving end of it.”
“I wasn’t going to bail like he did. I planned to have a better reason,” I huff.
“How magnanimous of you.”
He leans over me, turning the engine off, and taking my keys.
“Hey!”
“We’re not eating in the car and really, you’ve lost the element of surprise.”
I glare at him as he grins. “Fine.”
“Just the way I like my dates to start off…”
I laugh and shake my head. “You haven’t been on a date in over thirteen years.”
Derek wraps his arm around my shoulder, pulling me to him. “Yes, and look how great this one is already going.”
We enter the restaurant and get to our table. I haven’t been to Pasta Palace since I was in high school. It’s a few towns over, which we thought was a good idea so we lessen the chances of running into anyone. Privacy is a commodity we don’t have an abundance of.
“You look great,” he says as we look over the menus.
“Thanks. You look good too.”
And he does. Derek has always been good-looking, but man, has he aged well. There’s a sexiness about him that I don’t remember when we were younger. He grew into himself. His body was a little disproportionate and he wasn’t quite sure what looked good or not. There is zero of that now.
Derek commands the space around him, forcing it to conform around him, making his presence felt everywhere.
It’s sexy.
Very sexy.
The waiter appears, takes our drink order, and informs us of the specials.
“Everyone knows you only order off the pasta section here,” I whisper conspiratorially. I would hate to see him end up with food poisoning.
“I didn’t know that.”
“Oh,” I say with dramatics. “It’s a thing. Last month, Nina ended up violently ill after she thought maybe the chicken was safe.”
“And you suggested here because?”
“Because we live on the island and our choices are limited.”
It’s not like we’re basking in options. In the winter, it’s slim pickings. We get what we get and eat in if we don’t like it.
“I forget sometimes what it’s like living here.”
“Yeah, South Carolina was a bit different, huh?”
“Much.”
“Do you miss it?”
Derek shrugs. “Not all of it. I miss my house and my practice.”
“It must’ve been hard to leave.”
“My dad needed me. He’s not as healthy as he’d like to believe and, honestly, I needed to be around family. I’m so out of my league with Everly, and my mother seems to connect with her. We were alone down there. I worked crazy hours, and leaving Everly home with the neighbor for hours wasn’t fair.”
“We do what we have to as single parents.”
He nods. “I didn’t have to stay there. I could’ve come back the day Meghan died. I worked because I needed to stay busy. I immersed myself in my practice so that I could avoid the questions and people who wanted to know how I was feeling. How do you tell people you’re upset but then there’s relief too?”
I wish I could answer that for him, but I don’t think he really wants that. He’s been holding this in, and for some reason, he trusts me enough to let it go. “I’m sorry.”
“That’s the thing, I’m not…at least not for me. I’m sorry for Everly. I’m sorry for Meghan’s parents, who are still devastated and can barely look at Everly now. I’m sorry that she had to go so soon because she didn’t deserve to die. But…”
“But?”
“I’m not sorry for me. And that is the most horrible fucking thing I can ever say.”
It feels wrong to offer words of comfort to him, but it also feels wrong to chastise him. Instead of doing either, I reach my hand across the table and hold his hand. I offer him no judgment, just friendship.
“You know, I was dreading moving back here. I fought against it so hard because I knew. I knew you’d be here and because…”
“…because?”
Our eyes meet and I don’t need him to finish the statement, I already know. As much as I’d like to be angry, I get it. I would’ve spent the rest of my life avoiding him too if I had the option. There’s a lot of things we’ve had to deal with and we’re not done
