LITMIR.BIZ

       Chapter Three

      Evan followed Juliet down the stairs and out into the crisply cool and brightly sunny Texas afternoon.

      He followed Juliet.

      Juliet Grayson was here.

      He’d kissed her, and everything was still there. Everything that he hadn’t known how to handle at twenty-one. Everything he’d recognized too late at twenty-seven. Everything he’d tried to bury at twenty-nine. Everything he’d thought he’d never have in this lifetime.

       Because I don’t deserve to have her.

      He shoved the guilt deep down, where it had been locked away with his memories of Juliet. Now he could allow the memories of Juliet, but he wanted to keep the guilt buried deep. Maybe he’d inadvertently pushed the wrong man her way, but he’d done the right thing and stayed out of their life once he’d heard Rob Jones had gotten her to the altar. Evan hadn’t had anything to do with their divorce.

      She’d gotten divorced anyway. She was free. Single. And she’d come to remind him of their marriage pact on the very day the conditions of that pact had come into play.

      She’d come to do more than remind him.

      You should meet my son first, she’d said, and he hadn’t been able to contain his smile. First. Before the actual ceremony, she’d meant, as if it were a foregone conclusion that they would be married. She had come not to say hello, not to reminisce, but to fulfill the pact they’d made the night before their graduation.

      He needed to touch her again, to feel her skin so he’d know this wasn’t a miraculous mirage dredged up from subconscious dreams. He wanted to give her hand a squeeze of excitement or reassurance or something.

      He could not. It would break regulations. There was no hand-holding between soldiers in the US Army, not even if they wore one another’s wedding rings. If Evan were wearing the more formal blue service uniform and if it were after dark and if they were attending a social function, then he would be allowed to offer her his arm to escort her through the parking lot.

      That wasn’t the situation now. He was the battalion commander, being saluted by every single person they passed. She was being saluted as well, of course, since they were the same rank. He loved the way they both raised their right arms in sync and briefly touched the right corners of their brims to return the salutes. He loved the sound of her high heels on the concrete sidewalk. He loved the cool but sunny Texas winter weather. He loved every frigging thing about the whole frigging universe.

      Juliet Grayson was here.

      She stopped beside his vehicle. Since it was parked in a spot marked Battalion Commander, it was no surprise that she guessed which vehicle was his.

      “A Corvette,” she said with a little laugh.

      The memory was so clear, it was incredible that he’d forgotten it until this second. He laughed, too, and imitated the frustrated lament of a college-age Juliet. “Why is such a sexy car always driven by somebody old enough to be my grandfather?”

      She shrugged a shoulder as she traced one metal curve, but her lips twitched with mischief. “I was right, you know. When I saw this car on my way into the building, I had a moment of worry that you were ready to retire to Florida.”

      “Not yet. Nor for a long while.” He watched her feminine fingers sliding along his sports car. “We can enjoy this while we’re still young.”

      Her fingers paused. That brief, familiar flash of Juliet’s teasing smile disappeared, leaving something more polite, more distant. “Unfortunately, they haven’t invented a Corvette with more than two seats. We’ll have to use my car when we go anywhere together. Party of three, not two.”

      “Makes sense.” But he would take her for a long drive, just the two of them, top down, engine purring. Soon.

      “School lets out in forty-five minutes,” she said.

      He checked his watch, a simple reflex. The second hand swept in its circle. The minute hand had moved just a quarter of an hour since he’d last checked the time. Juliet had walked into his office fifteen minutes ago. It hit him hard: his life was never going to be the same from this moment on. In less than a quarter of an hour, everything had changed.

      Was it possible for life to take a turn for the better so suddenly?

      God knew it could turn bad in less time than that. A car accident could alter the course of a life in the second it took tires to screech and metal to crunch. An explosion could shatter the monotony of a base camp overseas. One minute, life was fine, and in the next, it would never be the same. He’d seen it happen enough times to enough people. They could pinpoint the exact moment their life had abruptly been set on a new path. Whether one of nightmares or prosthetic limbs, regrets or rehab, they hadn’t been ready for the sharp turn. No one was ever ready.

      Evan hadn’t expected his life to take a sharp turn today for better or for worse. But as Juliet stood by his Corvette and told him about school schedules—spring sports teams had started practicing, but games didn’t start for two weeks—he knew his life would never be the same again. He’d been a confirmed bachelor fifteen minutes ago; Juliet Grayson had set a silver insignia on his desk, and now he was going to be a husband and a father—or rather, a stepfather. A family man.

      Finally.

      The euphoria took him utterly by surprise.

      “Juliet.” Damn it—were his hands shaking? He clasped them behind his back, a soldier’s stance, parade rest.

      Juliet had fallen silent at the way he’d said her name.

      He forced himself to relax. At ease.

      She was waiting for him to say something else. How many times had he seen her look at him just like this? Waiting for him to help her haul somebody’s parents’ used couch up a flight of stairs. Waiting for him to pour some rum they were too young to have into her can of Coke at a party that wasn’t supposed to be held in the dorm. Waiting for him to dance with her by a fountain on the green.

      “What, Evan?”

       I feel like I’ve been waiting my entire life for this minute.

      He couldn’t say that. He couldn’t say anything. He could only look at her—he couldn’t look away from her, a vibrant, vital woman who was about to become a vibrant, vital part of his life, a life that had just changed radically.

      He forced himself to speak, even if emotion made his voice a little too rough, a little too low. “I forgot... I’d forgotten how you looked.” I forced myself not to think about it.

      “Oh.”

      “I’m saying this wrong. I didn’t forget what you looked like,” he admitted to her. To himself. “I forgot how it was. How good it was to have you as my friend. How good it is to have you here, standing right here. To watch your face as you talk. To hear your voice. It’s—”

      “I know what you mean. It’s really different to see you in 3-D after so many years of only having those old photos from college.”

      She’d looked at photos of him, for years.

      He could not touch her. Not here. Not now. But soon.

      She’d come to get him at his own office, a very Juliet move. When she wanted something, she’d always gone out and gotten it. And now she wanted him.

      She could have him.

      “I’m overwhelmed.”

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