She grimaced, knowing she was committing herself to spending most of her free time the next few days with Evan. It was tempting, but dangerous. “It won’t be all about sex,” she warned him. Hell, she loved the sex as much as he did, but it wasn’t all there was to being happy and content.
His face fell, and Randi bit her lip to keep from smiling. Jesus, it felt good to have a man want her that much, but it wasn’t enough for Evan. He needed to learn that he wasn’t going to find what he was looking for by working every waking hour of the day. There was obviously little levity in what he did, or the people he worked with on a day-to-day basis.
“Okay,” he agreed, sounding reluctant.
“It won’t hurt a bit. I promise,” she assured him with a smile, her heart aching that Evan trusted her enough to let down his arrogant guard with her.
“Then show me.” He leaned forward and put his lips to her forehead.
His willingness to put his vulnerability into her hands had been her downfall. Randi was going to show Evan that there was more to life than just work and duty if it killed her . . . and judging by the sensual, hot look in his eyes, she decided that she just might not make it out of the whole experiment unscathed.
Dear M.,
What’s your favorite flower?
Randi looked at the short email from her pen pal, wondering what prompted him to ask that question. They threw out weird questions to each other, but it was usually relevant to something they’d been discussing at one time or another. This one was totally random.
Shaking her head at her laptop, she replied.
Dear S.,
I love calla lilies. My foster mother used to plant some of the huge, white variety down by the creek on her property every spring. Calla lilies in general don’t do well in the Maine climate, so she dug them up every year and preserved them inside for the winter so she could replant them in the spring.
Randi had named her dog after the flowers, because their center was actually the same gold color as Lily’s coat.
She had a momentary stabbing pain in her chest remembering that there would be no giant, white calla lilies by the creek this year. Joan had been too sick to preserve them, and Randi had never learned how.
It will be sad not to see the giant white flowers by the creek this year.
Randi added the sentence to her previous message before S. could reply.
Dear M.,
Still hurting?
Randi answered honestly.
Dear S.,
I think I’ll miss her and my foster father for the rest of my life. It’s been way over a month now since she passed, but it still hurts so much sometimes that I can hardly breathe. I know I was lucky to have them in my life at all, but our time was too short.
Randi pressed “Send,” already knowing that her friend would understand. He always did.
Dear M.,
I wish I had the words to make everything right, but I think time will help. I can’t say I’ve ever been standing in your shoes. I can only imagine how much it would hurt to lose someone I loved that much.
Randi sighed. S. always made her feel better somehow, maybe because he had an uncanny ability to empathize.
Dear S.,
I guess you’ll just have to put up with my sulking for a while.
She’d been pouring out her heart to him since her foster mother died.
Dear M.,
You’re not sulking, you’re grieving right now. Is it helping to have a guy in your life?
Randi thought about his question for a moment. Evan wasn’t really what she’d call the man in her life, but they’d shared more deeply buried secrets with each other than they had with anyone else. She’d never shared her secrets with a man she cared about except S., and he was a fantasy. He didn’t know her background, and Randi had no idea what her email friend was like in person.
She was willing to bet Evan shared very little with anyone.
Dear S.,
I think it does help, even though it’s nothing permanent. It takes my mind off my own sorrow.
Thinking of the challenges Evan had been through made her determined to teach him how to be content and live in the moment for just a little while. Her mission did help to lessen her grief.
Dear M.,
It could become permanent. You never know.
She wrote two words back quickly.
Dear S.,
It won’t.
He typed back one word.
Dear M.,
Why?
There were a lot of reasons, but the fact that Evan was leaving was the biggest one.
Dear S.,
He won’t be around long. We’ll spend some time together this week and then he’ll be gone.
How are things with the new woman in your life? I think I’m a little bit jealous.
It was winter in Amesport, not the best time to be showing Evan how to have fun. But she’d manage something.
Dear M.,
Don’t be jealous. I had you first, and I think I really like her because she’s a lot like you.
Randi was slightly taken aback by his words. S. didn’t really know her, yet he did. She’d shared so much of her thoughts, feelings, and emotions with him, even though they’d never met in person. In some ways she was envious of the unknown woman. If S. liked this female, he’d pursue her. If he went after her, he’d get her. Randi had never met him, but someone as intelligent, thoughtful, and insightful was undoubtedly a great guy. He’d never run away from her, and that was saying something since she’d done nothing but pour her heart out to him since Joan’s passing.
Dear S.,
I’m happy for you. She’s a lucky woman.
The two of them signed off after a few more exchanges.
She wandered into the kitchen, wondering what to cook. Too tired to really fuss with anything, she emptied food into Lily’s bowl and nuked herself a huge bowl of nacho cheese and took out the chips. Chuckling as she stood at her kitchen counter, she could only imagine what Evan would say about her dinner.
Evan.
What in the world had possessed her to accept his challenge to help him know happiness? What in the world did she know about being an upbeat person right now, anyway? She was a mess, a woman who was still in mourning with a piece of her soul missing.
I’ve been happy. I just need to remember how it was before I lost the last person who would love me like a daughter forever.
Maybe if she was very lucky, she and Evan could help heal each other. She could get her joy back, and Evan could find it for the first time.
She didn’t regret reaffirming that she’d go to Hope’s party with him, when she’d seen him earlier at the Center while tutoring Matt. It would be the last night she’d spend with him before he climbed into his expensive airplane and flew halfway across the world for another possible business deal.
Don’t think about him leaving. Just think about tomorrow. Live for now.
She ate a few more chips, dunking them in the massive bowl of warm, creamy nacho cheese.
Since she had no choice but to live for the moment, she wasn’t going to fight it. Thinking about the fact that Evan was leaving soon wasn’t going to ruin her chance of making him see that life was about so much more than work.
If anyone deserved a little bit of happiness, it was Evan Sinclair.
Pushing her negative thoughts from her mind, Randi contemplated exactly how to teach a man who knew nothing but work how to be happy.