by Ava Miles
“You’ve changed your tune,” he said bitterly. “Before, you didn’t trust her one bit.”
“I was impressed by the way she reached out to me,” Chase said, meeting his gaze. “Besides, I know women. I could tell from talking to Margie that she doesn’t have one calculating bone in her body.”
Evan scoffed. “You married Trisha, and she’s as calculating as they come.”
“I married Trisha partly because she’s calculating,” Chase said in an aggrieved tone. “I thought she’d make a good corporate wife. My mistake was to believe she’d only use her cunning nature for our mutual well-being.”
“This is still a pretty big change. You never change your opinion about anyone.”
It was Chase’s turn to scoff at him. “That’s not true. Okay, it is a little true, but let’s face it; I was more worried about your judgment than I was about Margie. Once you assured me you wouldn’t let her in the lab again, I felt better about things. And now that I’ve read that letter…”
“She hates the billionaire part of me,” he said, staring at the letters of the formula on the screen.
“She hates her past. Her parents are leeches, Evan. They could be best friends with Trisha.”
He didn’t like hearing that comparison, although he’d already concluded they were the lowest scum of the earth.
“Perhaps she just didn’t like your billionaire lifestyle,” Chase continued. “I didn’t.”
Glancing over, he couldn’t help but frown. “You didn’t leave me.”
“Cut her a break, will you?” Chase said. “She was scared of getting sucked back into a life that hurt her. She’d barely known you six weeks, and in that time, she’d only known you were a billionaire for…what? About a week? Give her time. If she’s worth it, you’ll make allowances.”
Hadn’t he rationalized the same thing over and over again? But it didn’t change the one equation he was afraid to compute. Would she ever be able to accept him?
“What if I talk to her…and give her another chance and she rejects me anyway?” It hurt to even utter the words.
“Then you move on with your life. Right now, you can’t even sleep in your own bed, Evan.”
He sighed. “I hate this.”
“Everyone who has ever had their heart broken hates it. And yet we all manage to put ourselves out there again.”
“You don’t love anyone.”
There was silence for a moment. “I love you. And now that you’ve made me say it, I’m leaving. When you come to DC, I want you to stay with me. My place is big enough for you to hole up in, but I insist you shower every day. I have an acute sense of smell.”
This was the first he’d heard of that peculiarity, but he was still processing those first words Chase had said to him.
He turned around as his friend reached the lab door. “I love you too, Chase.”
There was a small smile on Chase’s mouth when he looked over his shoulder at him. “I know you do, Evan. See you soon.”
He worked more after Chase left, but his stomach started roaring, and he suddenly realized he was hungry. When he walked into the kitchen, Margie’s letter was back in the original place he’d left it. Along with the engagement ring he’d given Margie. Apparently Chase even knew the combination to his safe.
“You’re an interfering son of bitch,” he said even though his friend was gone.
He hadn’t been able to get rid of the ring. He didn’t know what to do with it. Maybe he should throw it into the Seine. Maybe he should throw both the letter and the ring into the Seine. Like right now.
Rain was streaking the windows, so he grabbed his red umbrella from the closet and took off down the stairs. His feet seemed to know where they were going, and soon he was walking down the stairs off Pont Neuf Bridge to the little inlet where he and Margie had shared their first kiss and expressed their love.
A now-familiar darkness arose in him as he walked along the path to the willows. This was also where he’d told her he was a billionaire.
If only he’d kept that from her, everything would be the same.
But that wasn’t true, and he knew it. She would still have returned to Dare Valley to open her bakery, and he would have stayed in Paris to complete his invention. They’d known all along there was an expiration date for their romance.
He sank to the ground, holding the umbrella to keep the rain out, and let his feet dangle over the edge like he and Margie had done while eating her first croissants. Then he dug out the letter and the ring from his pocket with his free hand and looked down at them. The ruby winked at him even though there wasn’t a ray of sunshine in the sky. The gray skies seemed to bear down on him and the sky thundered and flashed lightning.
His hand extended to throw the ring and the letter into the Seine, but it wouldn’t open as it came forward. A powerful gust of wind rose up, and suddenly the willows wrapped around him. One of the branches brushed his cheek, and for a moment he closed his eyes, feeling like it was Margie tracing his face with her soft hand.
His heart thundered in his chest, and he bit his lip, fighting the pain inside him. And then he bowed over in place, clutching the letter and the ring to his chest. Something brushed his back, and while he knew it was only the willows again, it was a comfort. He released some of his sorrow, unable to hold it back anymore, and when he was spent, he let the umbrella fall to the side.
Rain soaked his head and streaked down his face as he tucked the letter and the ring back into his pocket. He couldn’t throw them in the Seine today. He wasn’t sure he ever could.
When he glanced down the river, the Eiffel Tower was visible in the distance. The sight of it only brought more pain.
He’d loved her so much. He’d never wanted anything more than to be with her, and he would have rearranged his whole life around her.
And then he remembered what Chase had said to him. The willows slapped him on the back this time, encouraging him to admit the truth to himself.
They both deserved a better ending to what they’d shared.
He pinched the bridge of his nose as the pain flared inside him again. But would it be an ending? Or a beginning?
His life in Paris wasn’t going to be the same anymore—not after being with her. He didn’t want to go to parties with loud, extravagant people he didn’t respect, people who only pretended to like him. Before, he hadn’t felt like he had much to offer except…well…Evan Michaels, the billionaire. Who else could he be to them? Not the geeky inventor.
But Margie had changed him.
Now he believed there might be other people who could like him as the inventor, the one who geeked out over creating anything from the Paint Prep Mistress to invisible paint. The makeover he’d received years ago had changed him physically for the better, but perhaps it was time for another one. This time his billionaire habits and lifestyle were what needed changing. A vision flashed in his mind, and he stared into the rushing river of the Seine as all the pieces unfolded in his mind. He suddenly knew exactly what to do.
And he knew just the man to help him.
He fished out his phone and called Chase. “I want to become an inventor philanthropist,” he said when his friend answered the phone.
“Wonderful! I was hoping you would come to that conclusion.”
“You were?” he asked, feeling the raindrops plop harder onto his already soaked clothes.
“You have a big heart, Evan.”
“I want to endow a university that will help young inventors,” he said as his mind spun with new ideas. “And create a seed fund for inventions. It can be hard to get the initial money until you have a proven concept—or a patent—and we both know that can take years. And I want to…oh, I’ll have to do more research. I have a lot of ideas.”
“Dare Valley has a wonderful liberal arts university, I recall,” Chase said. “I’m sure they would love to be involved.”
His stomach tightened. Margie lived in Dare Valley. Could he show her a new vers
ion of the wealthy lifestyle she’d experienced as a kid? He didn’t know, but he realized he needed to try. If not, he would always regret it.
“I’m at the airport,” Chase said. “We’re grounded until this storm passes. If you want to go to the US with me, you have a ride. You can drop me off in DC and then take the plane the rest of the way to Denver. You know your way from there.”
He stared at the Eiffel Tower. As always, it inspired him to reach for more—even when it seemed impossible he would succeed.
He had to go back to Dare Valley and talk to Margie. If he didn’t, he’d go back to his lab and likely never leave. And that’s not who he wanted to be.
“Hold the plane,” he said, standing up and leaving his wet umbrella on the ground. “I’m going back to Dare Valley.”
Chapter 2
Margie heard the knock on the front door and walked to the sink to clean the dough from her hands. She’d just put her newest creation in the oven to bake, and she couldn’t wait to try it. She had a feeling the sunflower bread was going to be another hit.
One would think she got in enough baking at Hot Cross Buns, but she didn’t have enough time to experiment with new recipes between making the bread on her current menu and filling her regular orders. Don’t Soy with Me and Brasserie Dare’s orders had kept her busy for the first couple of weeks after the grand opening of her bakery, but now that she was also supplying baguettes for Chef T, she didn’t have a moment to sit down.
She already needed to hire a new baker, and wasn’t that the most incredible mark of success? Thankfully, she’d posted an advertisement for the job in the appropriate places a few days ago. She was hoping to fill it soon.
When she reached the door, she opened it in time to see a man walking down the sidewalk away from the house. Her heart seemed to burst in her chest from joy and pain all at once.
“Evan!”
He stopped and slowly turned around. Seeing him clean-shaven was a shock. Pictures of him on the Internet floated up in her memory. He was wearing tan khakis and a navy T-shirt, and when he shoved his hands in his pockets, all she could think about was that he’d lost weight. And how he looked like he belonged in Paris. She wanted to take off his designer sunglasses so she could see his eyes.
“I thought you were out when you didn’t answer the door,” he said, his mouth twisting into a frown.
She understood what he was thinking, as easily as she had when they were together. She rushed down the stairs. “My hands were dirty. I was baking.” I wasn’t blowing you off, she wanted to say.
He stared at her as she halted in front of him in the sunshine. “I thought bakers only baked when it was dark outside.”
Her throat closed, and she felt a trembling rise up in her body. “I was trying out a new recipe. Will you…will you come inside and taste it with me?”
She wanted to touch the unfamiliar, smooth skin of his jaw, to make him laugh again, and to lean her head against his chest and go to pieces, all at the same time.
“All right,” he simply said, and together they walked side by side into her Victorian house.
He took off his sunglasses when they entered, but he still wouldn’t meet her eyes—and it hurt to know he was purposefully concealing the feelings he had once shared so freely.
As she shut the door, he ran his hand over the banister of the staircase, as though memories of the time he’d lived here as her tenant were flooding back to him. She took a deep breath, trying to get herself under control. It wouldn’t help either of them if she went to pieces right away. But he had come all this way to see her, to talk to her…
She was glad he hadn’t simply texted or called. Having him return like this seemed monumental, and her mind blanked for a minute, wondering what she was supposed to say. How could she make this better?
They entered the kitchen, and she busied herself making his favorite coffee. When she slid it across the counter to him, he simply said, “Thanks,” and then everything went quiet again.
She glanced at the timer. “Ah…the bread won’t be ready for a while.” And then she realized it needed to rest so it would cleanly cut. “How about I—”
“That’s fine, Margie,” he said, and even to her ears, her name sounded different coming from his lips, like it had been stripped of all the love and warmth with which he used to say it.
Her hands dropped to her sides, and she realized she was still wearing her apron. It was dirty, she had her hair up in a crappy ponytail, and there wasn’t a speck of makeup on her face. “It’s good to see you, Evan.”
His mouth twisted like he was trying to form a smile but couldn’t. “I drove by the bakery when I came into town. Your storefront is worthy of Paris. How is business?”
She thought of strolling the streets of Paris with him—how she’d dash off to one of the artistic storefronts that lined Boulevard Saint-Germain, giving him no choice but to follow her. “Business is terrific. So good, in fact, that I might be able to stop renting rooms out next semester.”
“I’m happy for you. Not that I’m surprised. I knew your bakery was going to be a hit the first time I tasted your cinnamon rolls. Your success was inevitable.”
There was a lull again.
“Chase told me you called him,” he said, still not meeting her eyes.
While she didn’t blame him for being distant, it only made her ache more. She turned to make herself an espresso because it was the only thing she could think to do to keep from crying outright. She had made a mess of everything, and her regret was just as bitter now as when she’d first returned to Dare Valley.
“Yes. It was probably a crazy thing to do. But I was worried about you. When you didn’t respond…”
“You know why I didn’t respond,” he said in a voice so low she barely heard it. “Why I couldn’t respond.”
There was no way she could go through the motions of making herself coffee now. She turned to face him, and those lakewater blue eyes she’d missed so much were finally staring at her, staring into her like they always had. The pain there stole her breath.
“I know,” she whispered, feeling the first tears trail down her cheeks. “And I’m sorry. I didn’t want to cry in front of you, but I can’t seem to help it. I hurt you, and that’s the last thing I wanted after everything we shared. Evan…”
Tears seemed to be gathering in his eyes too, but he blocked her view by pinching the bridge of his nose.
She crossed the room to him, wanting so much to put her hand on his arm, to touch him and reestablish that connection she had missed so much these last weeks. But she didn’t have the right. Not now.
“I wish…”
“I wish it too,” he finished for her, reading her mind again.
And then their eyes met and everything fell away. His pain seemed to coil around hers like two ribbons being braided. The first tears slipped from her eyes and slid down her face, but she couldn’t make herself brush them aside. She had to keep looking at him. She couldn’t stop herself.
“I was wrong to run away that night,” he said. “Wrong to draw this out and worry you.”
Hearing him say that made her bite her lip. “Oh, Evan. I was the one who was wrong. And I know I have no right to ask you, but I really want you to forgive me.” She sniffed and brushed away her tears. “You don’t have to do it now. Or ever. But I want to ask for your forgiveness just the same.”
The long breath he took seemed as though it crested over a large hill. “You forgave me when I didn’t tell you the truth about who I was in the beginning. It would be cruel of me to deny you that same understanding.” Until that moment, she’d never registered the fact that the word gave was in forgave. It seemed appropriate.
“Thank you. Thank you, Evan. You don’t know what that means to me.” Tears streamed down her face faster now.
He slid her the coffee she’d made him. “Actually I do. Why don’t you take a sip?”
Her hand was trembling so much she had to use the other one
to support the cup as she raised it to her lips. He walked over to the kitchen cabinet and pulled out two glasses and filled them with water. It felt so right for him to make himself at home like that, and it reminded her of the beautiful month they’d spent in this house together. It was like he belonged here, but then she reminded herself of the truth. His time in Dare Valley had only been a stopover then, rather like his visit to see her now.
“When are you heading back to Paris?” she asked with a hitch in her voice. God, she would have to say goodbye to him all over again. She wasn’t sure she could bear it.
He drank half the water in the glass before answering. “I don’t have any definite plans yet.”
Her eyes opened a bit wider at that. “But what do you mean?”
His shoulder lifted, and he looked away from her again. “I’m staying at The Grand Mountain Hotel for a while. I have some meetings with the president of the university here.”
Now she blinked. At least three times. “I don’t understand.”
He shrugged like he was releasing a bunch of pent-up nervous energy. “I’m creating a center at Emmits Merriam to help student inventors. I thought it might be fun to help other people like me.”
No one was just like him. “I…umm…I don’t understand. You’re staying? Here? In Dare Valley?” Why would he do that? His home was in Paris. He loved Paris.
“It depends,” he said, peering into her oven like he cared about the status of her bread.
“What does it depend on?” she asked, spanning the distance between them. “Evan.”
He stood up, and his lakewater blue eyes met hers again. And then she saw it. The love hiding there, almost like the sun hiding behind the clouds.
“Well, you, I suppose.”
She pressed her hand to her chest. “You can’t mean…”
“Chase told me to cut you a break. You barely had time to get to know me as a billionaire, and honestly, that guy needed as much of a makeover as the geeky inventor I used to be. So, I’m making him over. I’m not going back to that lifestyle. It’s time to start something new. Be something more.”