“Oh no, you don’t. You get right back in that flashy red car and go home. I’m not talking to you anymore today.”
“Sir, you need to move your car. You can’t park it there,” a security guard said to Devon.
“Just one minute,” Devon said to him. “Darby, I’m sorry. Please can we go and talk somewhere?”
“No. Go away!”
The security guard said, “The lady doesn’t want to talk to you, sir, you need to move your car.”
Darby was still walking. “Darby, please. I’m begging you, if I’ve ever meant anything to you at all, please stop and let me talk to you.”
Darby stopped and turned. “If you ever meant anything to me? How dare you? You’ve meant more to me than the sun and the air I breathe and I’ve told you so hundreds, maybe thousands of times.”
“Ma’am, you’re not helping, he needs to move his car. He can’t park there.”
“I’m sorry, you’re right. Please, can’t we just talk about this?” Devon pleaded.
“Oh, you’ve said plenty but nothing at all.” Knowing that really didn’t make sense, but it had sounded so right when she was thinking it, she stomped her foot and dropped her bag in frustration.
“Sir, you need to move your car.”
“Fine. Tow it. I don’t care. I need to talk to her.” Devon turned his attention back to Darby. “Darby, I’ve been an idiot and I’ve been pushing you away. I know that now. I’m sorry. Please let me explain.”
“Why?”
“Sir, it’s really expensive to get your car towed and you know the tow truck drivers that come here, they don’t care if you have a nice car and well, I’d hate to see you get your car all banged up for nothing, when you could just move your car.”
They both looked at the security guard and started laughing. “You are very persistent, Mr…” Devon looked at his name tag. “…Howard.”
“Well, it’s my job sir. Keep things moving along, you know. Can’t just have any ‘Joe’ parking where he wants to. Got to get the passengers to their planes and what not.”
Devon looked at Darby, pleading, “Please, Darby. Come back with me. I need to explain some things to you.”
“Duh! Which you should have done when this all started!”
“So are you guys going to move the car? I mean, lady, he seems pretty sincere. Look at those puppy dog eyes he’s giving you.”
She looked at Mr. Howard and said, “So you think I should trust him, just because he’s giving me puppy dog eyes? You didn’t hear what he said to me this evening. Or how he’s been treating me since we got here or how he didn’t even visit me in the hospital.”
“Well, that does put a different slant on the puppy dog eyes. Got anything to say about that, Mister?”
Surprised to find himself responding to this complete stranger, Devon said, “Well, I don’t have an excuse for my rudeness. That is true. But I have seen myself through my uncle’s eyes this evening and it was not something I’m proud of. I think if I’m given the chance to explain, it would give Darby some insight as to why I acted the way I did. I’d like to make it up to her if she would allow me.”
“Yeah, I gotta say that sounds pretty sincere, Miss. And did you see how he came skidding up to the curb, sliding across the hood of the car, trying to impress you all James Bond style? I gotta say, I was impressed. I mean, look at him. He’s a good looking guy and he’s begging.”
“Would you like to date him, Mr. Howard?”
“Oh,” he chuckled, “No. Mrs. Howard wouldn’t like that. No. I’m just saying. It’s not easy to make that look good. I tried once. Not pretty. He made it look easy, but it’s not. Really. Mrs. Howard had to take me to the hospital. Broke my toe. I had to wear one of those booties for a while. Yeah, not pretty at all.”
“So you think I should go back to him because he’s good looking and does the James bond thing pretty well.”
“Well that and the puppy dog eyes thing…I mean might as well hear him out, then decide, but after you move the car.”
“Thank you, Mr. Howard.” Darby squeezed his hand, making him blush. “You may have just saved this relationship.”
“Well, I do take my job seriously you know. Now move it along. You can’t be parking here.”
Devon shook Mr. Howard’s hand and said, “Thanks.” He grabbed Darby’s bag and put it into the trunk of the red car and then opened the door for Darby.
“Ohhh. More James Bond. I’ll have to try that with Mrs. Howard, Definitely safer than the hood slide,” Mr. Howard said. Devon walked around and got into the car. Darby waved as they drove off.
“So, do you think we could do this right? I’d like to join the family for dinner and then take you down to the guest house and tell you everything.”
“It’s kind of late for dinner. I’m sure Dominic has already eaten.”
“Trust me, after the talk we had, I think he’s standing by the phone waiting to hear I’m bringing you back.”
“Well, I guess, but only if they haven’t eaten.”
“Trust me. They are waiting for us.”
“But I’m not really dressed for dinner.”
“We could wait for you to put something else on.”
“I don’t really have anything to wear. The dress you bought me has been sliced open and I really didn’t bring anything very special.”
“Don’t worry about it. Nobody cares what you’re wearing.”
“Fine, but only because Mr. Howard was right about that slide across the hood. It was pretty hot.”
“I aim to please.”
“Yeah, well don’t be so stupid next time, besides, you’re not in the clear yet.”
“I know, I’ll try. Maybe you should text Blake and Rowan and tell them you won’t be coming home. Blake’s been buzzing my shirt all night.”
“Excuse me?”
“You know. Texting me, calling me names I deserve, but don’t really appreciate. Maybe he will quit sending nasty texts so we can have a quiet evening with the family.”
“All right. Fine.” She pulled her cell phone out and turned it back on. There were about fifty texts from Rowan and Blake, even a couple from Dean.
She wrote:
I’m not coming home just yet. Devon has some things he wants to say before I decide if I’m coming home or not. Keep you posted.
“There. You’re not completely off the hook yet, but you have a reprieve.”
“Thank you, you won’t regret it.”
They pulled up to the house and Devon opened the door for her and grabbed her bag. Finally. He was acting like the old Devon. Dominic was at the door with a pleased smile.
“If you will excuse me, I will go upstairs and put something else on for dinner, if the offer still stands, Mr. Larsen.”
“Please, Darby, call me Dominic. I feel so old when you call me Mr. Larsen.”
“Dominic, I’ll meet you in the dining room, I’m just going to take her bags upstairs.”
“Good. That’s the gentleman I helped raise.” At the top of the stairs, Darby turned and smiled.
“Give me five minutes? I’ll be down. If you don’t want to wait, I will understand.”
Dominic and Devon both said, “We’ll wait.” As they turned from the stairs, Dominic put his hand on Devon’s shoulder. “And I’m sure it will be worth the wait. A woman as lovely as that always is, just like your aunt and your mother.”
Before Devon followed Darby up with her bags he asked Dominic, “If you don’t mind, I would like to take Darby down to the cottage for the evening. We need to clear the air.”
“By all means. Shall I have Bernard prepare things for you?
“I took the liberty of making some arrangements with Bernard on the phone on the way to the airport in the hope that she would return with me.”
“Good. Enjoy. It is so seldom used anymore. I will see you in the dining room.”
“Yes, we will be down in a few minutes,” Devon said, already halfway up the stairs. He m
ade his way to her room and deposited the bags on the little loveseat where they had been before. He looked around remembering the last time he had been in the room when his mother was alive.
Darby came out of the bathroom with her sweatshirt off and her hair put up with bobby pins. He could see her bloodied bandage on her ribs.
“Does it hurt?” he asked.
“No, not since Dr. Rowe put this salve on it this afternoon.” She peeled away the bandage to reveal four evenly spaced cuts about six inches in length diagonally across her lower ribs. She applied more salve and a clean patch, but it looked like it was well on its way to being healed. She hurried to her bag, looking for something in particular. She slipped on a black camisole over her black bra and then a black sheer blouse over it. “This will have to do, it’s the closest thing to dressy that I brought.”
“It’s perfect,” he said, smiling and watching her.
“Okay, let’s go,” she said.
He took her hand, set it in the crook of his arm, and led her out of the room, down the stairs, and to the dining room. As they entered, Dominic stood and so did Anton. Devon led her to a chair across from Anton and then seated himself as the other gentlemen sat.
Anton said, “It’s about time you treated her as if she were your date, Devon. I was about to make a move for her myself.”
Darby was flattered, Dominic was uncomfortable, and Devon was furious once again. Closing her mind to the room she thought, Anton definitely is a button pusher. He’s gotten more reaction out of Devon than I have in weeks. She chuckled to herself; Dominic caught her glance and smiled as if he had heard her comment.
Dinner was as before, cordial but strained. Devon and Anton were two forces to be reckoned with. She could see how they were similar and very different at the same time. The most notable commonalities they shared were their stubbornness and good looks.
Aside from the tension during their meal, Dominic was enjoying having family around him. He told stories of growing up with Abby. He talked a lot about Blake, obviously missing him. If one ignored the tension between the brooding young men, the evening would have been very nice indeed. Anton was the first to excuse himself from the dining room.
A few glasses of wine and Dominic was feeling his recent lack of sleep from staying with Darby at the hospital. “Well, I think I will bid you a good night.” He walked over to Darby, holding his hand out to take hers. “Darby?” She happily obliged him and he kissed it as she rose from her seat. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small velvet box. “I’ve been meaning to give this to you since you got home from the hospital.”
Darby opened the box to find a round silver charm, no bigger than a large pearl. It had intricate designs around its edges and looked like it might open.
“I’m sure you will find me superstitious, but I’d like you to wear it. I think it will protect you from being injured again. My grandmother was a bit of a herbologist and she dabbled in this and that. Back then of course, they would have called her a witch, but little did they know she was a vampire.”
“It’s beautiful, Dominic. I love it. Thank you. Will you help me put it on?” She turned, holding the necklace above her head and he opened the clasp and closed it around her neck. She turned back, holding the pretty charm on her chest.
“It suits you,” Dominic said. She stood on her tiptoes and kissed his cheek. He smiled and started towards the door.
“Devon? Have a pleasant evening.” He nodded and retreated out the room and up the stairs. Bernard came to clear dishes away and Darby thanked him for a lovely meal, apologizing for keeping it so late.
“Think nothing of it, Miss. It’s a joy to have you back.”
“Thank you, Bernard,” she said.
Chapter 8
They headed for the foyer. Devon grabbed his overcoat and wrapped it around Darby’s shoulders. “Thank you,” she said.
He swiftly lifted her, cradling her in his arms as he walked down to the already lit cottage. “What are you doing?” she asked.
“Well, you were just discharged from the hospital, so I’m carrying you,” he answered.
“You can put me down, I’m perfectly capable of walking,” she said.
“Okay, so I’m sucking up a bit. It’s not like carrying you down to the cottage is going to get me out of the doghouse, but it’s a start.”
“Since you put it that way, let the ‘sucking up’ begin,” she said as she clung to him.
Devon set her down on the porch and opened the door. A fire roared in the fireplace and it was nice and warm inside. A bottle of champagne waited for them on the coffee table in front of the fireplace.
“Would you like some?”
“Sure, a little bit.” He poured them each a glass and offered one to her. “Thanks. So out with it. You’ve got some explaining to do.”
“You’re not going to let me off the hook easily, are you?”
“Not on your life.” He slipped off her shoes and put a blanket across her. “So…you’re already stalling. Is it so hard for you to talk to me, Devon? We’ve been through so much, just talk to me.”
“I’m sorry, Darby, it’s just not my forte. I want to talk to you, but a voice inside always talks me out of it.”
“Why? What does the voice say? You can trust me with your life, with your brother’s life, but you can’t tell me a secret? Do you think I’ll laugh? Do you think I’m untrustworthy?”
“No, none of those things. The best way to describe it, that you might understand, is how sometimes you don’t always let on all your concerns or fears to Rowan. Why do you do that?”
“Because I’m protecting her, or maybe I don’t want to worry her.”
“Exactly, it’s like that. I don’t want to worry you, or cause you anguish.”
“So you totally shut me out? That’s anguish, Devon, way more anguish than telling me something that may or may not hurt or worry me.”
“I guess you have a point there. All right, very well. A very long time ago, I met and fell in love with an art student named Libby Walsh. We had dated for a short while when I decided I wanted to introduce her to my family.”
“You were going to ask her to marry you, weren’t you?”
“Yes, I was going to ask her to marry me. Not that night, but soon. My parents were already gone at that time and my only family was Blake, Anton, and Dominic. I brought her to dinner one night and well…”
“Anton hit on her?”
“Not exactly, but there was definitely some flirting going on between the two.”
“You’re kidding! She was flirting with your cousin in front of you?”
“It seemed so, yes. A few weeks went by and I had finally gotten up enough courage to ask her to marry me. That evening I planned to surprise her at her house for a short moonlit walk, but when I got there Anton was there with her. I was angry. Very angry. A few days later they eloped.”
“What? He married her right out from under you? That’s horrible! It’s one thing to have a friend steal a loved one, but a family member, that’s cruel! How close were you and Anton before this?”
“Close, like brothers, at least I thought we were. I mean, all three of us grew up together, but as we got older it was more and more strained. Anton can be very competitive and I guess maybe he felt he had to compete for Dominic’s attention. I’m not really sure.”
“So you and Anton have never talked about what happened with Libby?”
“Oh, God, no. After I found out about the elopement I almost killed him. Do you remember a while back when we were dealing with Sally and Rachel and we got on the subject about killing out of anger? We were talking about how Blake acted when he killed Terrence Paine and then turned his focus on you for a moment. We talked about killing in anger and I pulled away from you and didn’t want to talk about something that had happened to me. This is the incident I was referring to when we talked that night. I wanted to kill him. I’d never been so angry in all my life.”
“
Ah, yes, I remember. When you turned cold as ice and went to stare out the window in the front room.”
“Yeah, then,” he smiled, embarrassed.
“So don’t you think you should hear his side of the story? Maybe Libby had something to do with this and the blame may not all lie with Anton. Believe me; I’ve met some women that would do just about anything to get the man they want.”
“No, Libby wasn’t like that.”
“But, Devon, you said she flirted with him in front of you.”
“No. Libby would never do anything like that.”
“Fine, fine, Libby’s an angel, sorry.”
“No, I’m sorry; I didn’t mean to be so defensive.”
She took a sip of champagne, not really believing him. “Hmmm. So are they still married?”
“I believe so; Dominic would never allow a divorce in the family.”
“Why, is he Catholic?” She thought that was funny, a Catholic vampire. Isn’t that an oxymoron?
“He is, in fact. We all are.”
She started to laugh, but when she saw he wasn’t, she stopped and said, “Oh, come on. You don’t see the humor in that? I mean, what kind of Hail Mary’s do you have to say, to be forgiven for biting people?”
“That’s not funny.”
“Okay, fine, it’s not funny. Anyway. So angel Libby is still around somewhere then?”
“Yes.”
“Well, maybe she would be a good place to start. She knows Anton better than anyone, including his father. Maybe we should talk to her when she comes and see if she knows why Anton is deteriorating.”
“No, I can’t do that.”
“Why?”
“I just can’t.”
“Are you still in love with her, Devon?”
“Don’t be absurd. That was forty years ago.”
“I’m not being absurd. Forty years or not, you still have feelings for this woman. Maybe not love, but definitely something.”
“How can you say that?”
“How can you not see it? She can still do no wrong in your eyes, and you’re defensive if I say anything against her. It’s been forty years and you still won’t talk to your cousin. Yeah, I’d say you were carrying a pretty big torch for her. So tell me, if she were divorced and had no ties to Anton and she came to you begging you to forgive her, of course, not that she did anything wrong, and take her back, would you? Would you consider it?”
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