A Few Tables Away (Glenhaven #1)

by Deb Rotuno

  The drive back was comfortably quiet. Dani’s hand was in mine as I drove the roads back into town, and when I turned toward the library and not our apartment, Dani looked over at me.

  “I need to grab a book before class on Monday. You mind?”

  “No, not at all. I should probably return the one we finished.”

  We walked into the library and set our things down at our usual table. I knew we only had about thirty minutes before they closed, but it should work, and I was happy to see there was hardly a soul inside, except for the kid behind the counter and two girls who were packing up.

  “You want that other book we talked about?” Dani asked after dropping off the one we’d just finished reading together.

  Smirking, I shrugged a shoulder. “It’s your turn to pick, baby.”

  God, I loved that we’d never stopped reading to each other. Sometimes we’d read for class or for ourselves, but we always came back to reading to each other. I needed it and Dani seemed to live for it, so we kept going.

  “Okay,” she sang, spinning around to make her way to the fiction section.

  I waited until she was in the back before I pulled out my journal, setting it on top of her things. I left it just like I’d left it on her pillow the day I’d left for Montana—a bright purple flower sticking out as a bookmark. However, there was more inside than just a note to her. Before she could come back to the table, I stepped away. I did need a book for class, so I grabbed it quickly and checked it out, hiding behind the first bookcase to wait. She checked out a book and came to a stop at the table.

  Dani gazed around, probably looking for me, but she slowly reached out to pick up the journal as she sat down in the chair. I’d reread the note so many times, I had it memorized.

  To the girl who used to be a few tables away,

  I remember the first time I saw you, there were tears in your eyes. I remember thinking that the book you were reading had to be something else in order to bring you to that much emotion. I needed to know exactly what made you cry, so I read the same book. And yeah, it was heartbreaking, which told me that your heart was as beautiful as the rest of you. I remember the first time I heard your voice. It was soft and sweet but filled with protectiveness and bravery, but there was humor and laughter in it, as well, which only proved to me that you were smart and funny and honest.

  Dani, pretty girl, I remember everything about you from moment I first saw you. There’s not a thing I ever want to forget. The first time I trusted you to let you in, the first time you told me you weren’t going anywhere, and the first time our lips met. And my God, the first time you told me you loved me! All of it is stored away so I can remember it.

  What started out as a shy, quiet, invisible boy crushing on a pretty girl just a few feet away turned into the best thing to ever happen to me. You made me strong when I thought I was weak. You made me feel things I thought were only in books. You forced me to see myself through your beautiful eyes. You gave me family and courage and a shoulder to cry on when life became too much. But mostly, my beautiful Dani, you gave me you. You offered up yourself with love and happiness and the sweetest smile I’d ever had the honor of seeing.

  I’m a better man because of you. I told you once in this very journal that I know where I’m going in life, Dani. I know at the end of the day, it’s only you I need. Nothing about that has changed. No college graduation or book contracts or whatever life may bring our way will ever change the way I feel about you.

  My mother once told me I’d meet a girl who didn’t mind that I was shy, who wouldn’t mind if I couldn’t quite find the words. She told me the girl would love those things about me, that she’d wait until I found the words. She told me that once I found her, I needed to be honest at all times; I needed to cherish her, love her, take care of her.

  Well, I’ve found that girl, Dani. And all I want for the rest of my life is to love you. I want to spend the rest of my life with you.

  Will you marry me?

  Love, the boy who wants to always share your table…

  Evan

  I moved, sitting down in the chair next to hers, when my sweet girl sniffled. She picked up the red satin ribbon, which was the bookmark of the journal, but I’d used it to tie the ring to it. She pulled it off, finally meeting my gaze.

  “I meant every word, Dani,” I whispered, reaching up to gently wipe away the tears that were falling from her beautiful warm eyes. “I wanted to ask you here, in this place, because I never want to forget how we started.”

  She was up and out of her chair and in my lap before I could blink, which made me chuckle at her, but her lips met mine roughly.

  “Yes! The answer’s yes, Evan!” Her voice was a whisper, but there was an emotional edge to it too. “Oh, I’m glad there’s no one in here, baby, because I’m really going to kiss you stupid.”

  And she did. She kissed me with love and heat, and I could taste the salty tears she was still leaking. I couldn’t help but smile into it, and when I pulled back, I dropped my forehead to hers.

  “Here,” she said, holding out her hand, which was in a fist. When she opened it up, her ring was in her palm. “You do it.”

  The ring was simple and beautiful, just like Dani. And it fit, which I’d known it would, but that was a perk when I had a sneaky little sister who found out the size for me. Once it was on Dani’s finger, I brought it up to my lips, kissing it reverently.

  “Evan?” she asked softly.

  “Hmm?”

  “Can we go home?”

  Smiling, I nodded. “Yeah, pretty girl. Home.”

  Three years later…

  Dani

  Dull, winter morning light filtered in from the windows, and I cracked an eye open. Seeing unpacked boxes and everything I owned in complete disarray, not to mention a way-too-early time on the clock, I burrowed back down into my pillow. I didn’t want to get up. Getting up meant that I’d be putting my husband on a plane soon, and I couldn’t follow him for another four days.

  Getting up out of bed also meant I had to at least attempt to unpack into our new home. A deep breath brought with it the smell of ocean air, fresh paint, and something altogether irresistible—coffee. God bless the damn timer.

  However, none of that mattered when warm, strong arms pulled me back against bare skin and muscles. My whole body reacted to it. I simply couldn’t help it. After being married for going on three years, I was still hopelessly head over heels for the man currently pressed against every inch of me beneath the covers of our bed.

  “Evan,” I breathed, my voice raspy from just waking up.

  “Shh, pretty girl. Listen,” he whispered in my ear, but I could hear and feel the smile against the skin of my neck and then my bare shoulder as he started to move his hands. “All you can hear is the waves.”

  I chuckled, rolling in his arms to see the face I adored. He pulled me closer, and I could suddenly feel just what was causing all the attention from where it was now trapped between us. I hummed in approval. Reaching up, I ran my fingers through his hair. Sweet, loving eyes gazed back at me, and not for the first time since I met him did I wonder how I got so damned lucky.

  Evan was still the sweet, quiet-natured man I’d met in the library of Edgewater College. He was still the thoughtful, smart, unassuming thing he’d always been. It didn’t matter that we’d been together since our freshman year, that we’d lived and worked together, or that we’d just moved to the exclusive Glenhaven Bay area of Glenhaven, into a new house his brother had designed and built for us. He was still my Evan, even though he was now a successful author—his elf book series had exploded in popularity.

  No, staring at him now, I still saw the boy who looked at me like I was the best thing to ever happen to him, but he had that backwards.

  “Just the waves, Dani,” he reiterated against my lips, which made me smile, and it also made me reach out to touch.

  Smooth skin, broad shoulders, even his old scars—there wasn’t a thing
about him I didn’t love. At twenty-five, Evan was gorgeous. Women everywhere swooned over him. He’d lost a bit of that round, baby-face look he’d had in college and was all masculine beauty, with his sharp jaw, long eyelashes, and slight stubble. But nothing was as pretty as his smile. And he had so many versions of it—the polite one for the public; the slow, carnal one; the bright, happy one; the sweet, disbelieving one; and the knowing, crooked one. It was the latter I was receiving at the moment, like he knew exactly what he was doing when he pressed his hands to the small of my back, only to skim down to my bottom and squeeze, bringing me flush to him. No matter how handsome everyone told him he was, it was only me he saw—nothing about that had changed.

  “I’m gonna miss you,” I whispered, rolling onto my back, and he shifted with me.

  “It’s only a few days, and then we’ll meet at the airport. I’m picking you up myself.”

  I nodded, trying not to dwell on it. Instead, I focused on how fluid and easy it was between us. Evan braced a hand beside my head, his forehead falling to mine. His hips surged forward a bit, causing us both gasp a little at the feel.

  “Please, baby,” he begged in a whisper.

  I didn’t answer him with words but with my hands reaching for his face. Years of learning each other’s bodies allowed us to shift and pull and push just where we wanted, needed. There were kisses to lips, tangled legs, moans for more, and whispers to keep quiet.

  Once he slid deep inside me, my head fell back to the pillows. He took advantage, pressing kisses to my exposed throat as he whispered against my skin.

  “You feel so good, Dani,” he breathed as we started to find our rhythm, hips meeting over and over, but we kept it deep, slow, languid. “I couldn’t leave without this, beautiful. I just…I need…”

  He wanted it to last—both our lovemaking and our small, quiet bubble we’d just woken up in—but we knew it wouldn’t. Already the caws of seagulls started out on the beach, which meant the house would awaken soon, and the slow and steady had started to build into something faster with a purpose.

  “So close, so close,” I panted, my eyes rolling back when he pushed up on one hand and slipped the other between us to touch me where he knew I’d come completely unraveled.

  “Yes,” he hissed against my lips. “I love it when you come for me.”

  The shocks in my stomach crackled, causing everything within me to explode around him as I fell apart. Evan followed right behind, burying his face in my neck.

  “I love you,” he breathed heavily, dropping random, sloppy kisses to my neck and ear.

  “Love you,” I said, wrapping my arms all the way around his head and locking my legs around him. “Maybe I’ll just keep you.”

  He chuckled, rolling us to our sides. “I wish, but at least we have most of the morning. My flight’s not until this afternoon.” When I nodded sadly, his eyes warmed. “Just a couple days and you’ll meet me, Dani. It was the only way it could work—”

  “Mum, mum, mum…”

  We both grinned, glancing over to the baby monitor, where we saw movement on the small video screen.

  “Dada…Mum!”

  “Timing is everything,” Evan teased with a deep, soft laugh. “I’m all over this. I need it before I go. Go back to sleep if you want, baby.” He slipped out of bed, leaning back over me to drop a kiss to my forehead before pulling on a pair of jeans.

  “If you go outside…” I started, but I broke into a wide yawn.

  “I know. It’s chilly. I’ve got this.”

  I chuckled low as Evan left the room. When I rolled to my side, my gaze was drawn to the baby monitor’s screen again. I swallowed thickly at the emotions that seemed to overwhelm me when I watched my two very handsome boys. Robin Evan Shaw—though we called him Robbie—was fourteen months of chubby, happy, babbling goodness. He was everything perfect and healthy and loved. And he was probably way too spoiled, though I blamed aunts, uncles, and grandparents for that. Not to mention the man stepping into the room.

  “Hey, Robbie,” Evan crooned to his son, scooping him up out of the crib. “How messy are you this morning?”

  Giggling, I shook my head. To watch Evan now, it was almost impossible to remember the brutal and heartbreaking panic attack he had when I found out I was pregnant. We’d been married a little over a year and had even discussed a family. Evan’s book had taken off, and the second one was on its way. There had been talk of a TV show or movie, so it wasn’t about the money or providing for his family. The heartbreaking part was when Evan was terrified of becoming like his own father. My soul had shattered that day because despite the fact that Evan had become strong and had overcome so many things about his childhood, the fear that had graced his handsome face had been hard to witness.

  “Dani, I…” He glared at the stick in his hand, the two lines clear and bright and pink. “I…I…I don’t…” He trailed off, shaking his head over and over.

  Evan sat down hard on the end of the bed, his eyes barely leaving the stick in his hand, and my heart dropped to my stomach. Hardly a sound could be heard in our tiny apartment above the bookstore.

  “Evan, baby…I thought this was something we were together on,” I whispered, nervously shifting on my feet.

  He was so quiet, so still, and his face was a bit red. When he finally met my gaze, those beautiful dark eyes were filled with tears.

  “Dani, I’m…I’m gonna mess this up. I’m…I don’t…What if I’m like my dad?”

  The sob that ripped through me was loud and hurt my chest, and in a moment I was standing between his legs with his face cradled in my hands. “Not a fucking chance, Evan. Do you hear me?” I urged him to look me in the eye, and when he did, I pressed kisses to his forehead. “You are nothing like him, baby. The entire time I’ve known you, you’ve never once said a derogatory word against me, even if you were upset. If anyone on this fucking planet knows what harsh words can do, it’s you, sweetheart. And if anyone knows how to show love…Oh, Evan…that’s really you.”

  My tears were flowing freely now because this was so very real and very scary. I wanted and already loved the baby we’d created, and if Evan didn’t, or if he’d changed his mind, I would be in it all alone. I’d lose him, and that was terrifying because I loved him so much. That would never change.

  “Evan,” I pushed on, my vision blurry. “I need to kn-know if…If you don’t want…” When I couldn’t speak, something in Evan snapped, and I found myself in his arms and on his lap.

  “Shit, shit, shit,” he chanted, shifting us to the middle of our bed. His arms were shaking around me as he squeezed me almost too tightly. “Don’t let me fuck up, Dani. Don’t let me. I can’t…If I mess up, if I hurt him…or her…” His hands pulled my now heated, tear-covered face from the crook of his neck. “I don’t want to ruin our baby, Dani. I don’t want to turn into him.”

  Another sob escaped me, and I grabbed his face and kissed him. “You honestly think I’d let you?” I asked incredulously, sniffling when he froze for a moment. “Evan, no one loves as beautifully and selflessly as you do. In fact, the only way you’d ruin our child is if you spoiled the shit out of her…him…”

  “Our child,” he whispered, finally calming a bit. “We’re having a baby…”

  There it was. That stunning smile started to grow on his face, but it fell just as quickly as it started. “I’m sorry, baby. I just…For a second, I thought…what if, you know?” He swallowed nervously, but the tender touches to my face as he wiped away my tears told me he was calmer. “I’m scared, but…” He paused, his hand flattening on my stomach. His gaze was locked there as well. “I’m terrified, but we made this.” His tone was awe and wonder, and he was still scared, but again, the smile started to curl up on his face.

  “We did!” I giggled a little, sniffling at the same time. “We had fun doing it too,” I teased him.

  His laugh was loud and beautiful. “Yeah, we did,” he whispered, looking back down at his hand on my belly. �
��What do we do now, pretty girl?”

  Baby giggles brought me back to the present, and I smiled at Evan’s deep chuckle as he changed Robbie’s diaper, fought chubby legs to dress him, and tickled the bottoms of tiny toes. He was better at being a daddy than he ever gave himself credit for, because he loved with all his heart. And the very moment he’d held his son in his arms, he was a slave to our boy.

  Once Evan got Robbie dressed, he took him downstairs, which meant I lost my ability to eavesdrop.

  I had to have nodded back off, because I snapped awake with a quick inhale. Glancing over at the clock, I groaned at the hour I’d slept away, but I forced myself out of bed and into the bathroom. I had wanted to give Evan time with his son, not fall back asleep.

  I showered, dressed, preparing myself for the trip to the airport. Evan was flying out to California today for a few interviews and a book signing. He’d be making his way up the West Coast and then into Montana, and it was in Bozeman that he’d be picking Robbie and me up at the airport. My husband may have come a long way with his past, but being back in Montana was unnerving for him, so I wanted to be there with him.

  There had been no contact from William. Pastor Sean had tried to keep tabs on him, but after Evan’s dad had finished his sentence in the halfway house, he pretty much fell off the face of the earth. Sean assumed he’d moved to Missoula to be with the woman he’d been with for so long, or that she had moved to Bozeman, but no one was certain. My guess was that William fell in with the wrong people or he was just mean and disrespectful enough to offend someone somewhere and had gotten himself into even more trouble. It was a guess, but as long as that abusive bastard stayed away from Evan, Tyler, and Faith, I was perfectly fine. They were my family—Faith being truly family when she married Wes. Everyone had moved on, and they were happy and prospering—Tyler and Jasmine were even expecting their first baby in the spring. For William to come in and sully that would piss me off to no end.