Total pages in book: 103
Estimated words: 96850 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 484(@200wpm)___ 387(@250wpm)___ 323(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 96850 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 484(@200wpm)___ 387(@250wpm)___ 323(@300wpm)
Here he was now, though, searching for her among the partygoers in the tent.
Heart in his fucking throat.
Madden yanked at the starched collar of his dress shirt. Ironic that he’d be wearing the same damn suit as the last time he’d seen Eve. Almost like no time had passed at all.
But when he saw her arrive a moment later in a white strapless dress and gold sandals, her hair in a long tumble down to the middle of her back, it became obvious that time had passed. Eve looked older. Like an adult. A young woman who might walk into one of the parties thrown by his teammates over the years. Every head in the room would turn.
That image made his eye tick.
Aye. He’d been right to stay away.
Madden watched Eve hesitate at the entrance to the tent. She turned like she might leave, giving herself what looked to be a silent pep talk. Shifted in her sandals, turning the small purse over in her hands.
He was up and striding in her direction before a conscious decision was made.
“Eve,” he said, as soon as he was close enough to be heard. He wanted that indecision gone from her face. However, nothing could have prepared him for the knockout blow to his chest when that wide, amber gaze landed on him, her soft mouth parting on a gasp. Elation. It slipped along her features like a golden ray of sunshine, before she locked that reaction down tight, leaving her guarded. Like the Eve he remembered.
Only, her beauty was amplified now, perhaps because he was allowing himself to fully notice it for the first time. He couldn’t stop himself from noticing. It ate him alive, her beauty. The supple glow of her skin, that fluid slope of neck into shoulder, the maturity of her posture, her unique style of clothing, that lifted chin he remembered so well.
Found you.
Finally.
“Madden.” Eve took an audible breath, braced in an almost indetectable way, then went up on her toes to kiss his cheek. Back down onto the flats of her feet, just as quickly. “Hi. You’re in Cumberland. I didn’t know.”
The urge to pull her into a hug dominated him, as it always had, but there were other layers to the impulse now. He’d only caught a hint of her scent. He wanted more. And damn, Madden wanted to hold her tight and apologize for the day of the funeral. He would if he didn’t think it might hurt her pride. Or cause her to disappear again.
Complicated was this girl’s middle name.
They had that in common.
“Congratulations,” he said, sliding his hands into his pockets, before she could see they were unsteady. “You graduated this week, as well.”
“I did.” She looked up at the tent, then down to the ground. “End of an era. I can’t say I’m sad to see it go.”
Madden swallowed the twinge in his throat. “The worst of the eejits graduated with me, didn’t they?”
“Yeah.” She cleared her throat. “Most of them did.”
But not all her bullies left the same year as Madden, it seemed. The guarded shadows in her gaze made that obvious. “Eve, I . . .”
Eve looked up. “Yes?”
I checked in with the younger lads on the baseball team after I graduated to make sure you weren’t being hassled. I tasked them with shutting down any bullshit.
I didn’t forget about you.
“Never mind,” he said, tipping his head toward the entrance. “Do you want to walk in together?”
“In a minute.” Eve exhaled, her gaze straying to Madden’s lower abdomen. “How are you feeling? Is your new kidney still up and running?”
“Last time I checked,” he returned dryly. “It’s been over two years since the surgery. If my body was going to reject it, I’d be toast by now.” He winked at her. “Must have gotten a good one.” His flippancy about his kidney replacement was meant to keep the mood light, but she didn’t laugh. Not Eve. She’d taken his kidney disease more seriously than anyone, when he’d been diagnosed during high school. More seriously than he did, he’d often thought. Although perhaps they took it seriously for different reasons.
Eve worried, while Madden simply wanted to know who’d anonymously saved his life.
“No luck finding out the identity of my donor,” he said, frowning into the tent. “I’ll keep trying, though. They have to come out of the woodwork eventually.”
She nodded for a handful of seconds. “I’m ready to go in now.”
Slowly, they turned in tandem to face the opening, Madden nodding for her to precede him, then following close behind, rejuvenating the part of him that had always needed to be her protector. Standing at her back.
Eve and Madden stopped on the quiet side of the tent where everyone had left half-eaten food and empty champagne glasses behind to converge on the dance floor. They stood quietly, their sides warmed by each other, watching Elton dance and eat a gigantic slice of cake at the same time Skylar dutifully moved from group to group, accepting well wishes.