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“What do you imagine, Caroline?” he asked.
“I imagine this is our garden—that you’re just inside filling up the watering can, and you’ll be with me shortly. I think of how nice it would be to have breakfast with you before I leave for work or give you a kiss on the head before I leave for the office—to listen to you tell me about your day when I came home.” I lowered my voice and my eyes, feeling a sudden tightness in my throat. “I imagine I was never a fool who followed her head instead of her heart.”
Enzo lifted two fingers to my chin, then stroked my cheek with a calloused, gentle thumb. He was shorter than me by a few inches, so I had to bend my neck to kiss him, but his lips were as soft and sweet as I’d always imagined.
Then I heard two gasps from the nearby bushes and sudden movement. Enzo and I both looked toward the sound but couldn’t see anything in the darkness.
With a gentle but firm touch, I pulled his face back toward me and kissed him again.
I searched my thoughts and found I suddenly cared very, very little for what would please my husband in his cell. All the stressful legal preparations I’d been distracted by over the past months felt like an afterthought. A nuisance. I smiled between kisses when I realized what I was going to do tomorrow. I was going to order the lawyers to toss everything. Throw out the entire case. I’d tell them they needed to start drafting my divorce papers, instead.
36
TRAVIS
“How romantic,” I whispered.
Elizabeth was too busy scurrying around the outside of Mrs. Glass’ cabin to respond. A few moments ago, we had just seen my beautiful plan come to fruition in the gardens.
We stopped in the driveway by the cars. “Wow,” Elizabeth gasped. We were both a little breathless from our hurried escape after Mrs. Glass and Enzo heard us.
“That was beautiful, wasn’t it?” I asked.
“Yeah. Your plan might actually work.”
“First of all, why does everyone always seem so surprised when that happens? And second of all, I wasn’t talking about the plan. I was talking about that lovely geriatric love we just watched blossom back there.”
“Geriatric love?”
I grinned. “Those two may be past their prime, but I hope Mrs. Glass’ bed frame is sturdy. I consider myself an expert, and that was a one thing leads to another kind of kiss.”
Elizabeth winced. “I wish you wouldn’t put that image in my head.”
“Well,” I dusted my hands. “I’d say everything is just about perfectly resolved, wouldn’t you?”
“Actually…” Elizabeth dug in her purse, then pulled out the thumb drive Noah had given me. “I have a confession. I thought I wasn’t willing to sacrifice my career for all of this. For you,” she added, correcting herself. “But when I realized there was a chance Enzo might not show up tonight, I couldn’t kid myself anymore. I don’t know if there’s anything I wouldn’t do to see where this goes between us. Even if it meant restarting my career aspirations from the ground up somewhere else.”
I squinted. “As much as this is all touching me, I feel like you’re about to tell me you did something ill-advised.”
“I put this in Mrs. Glass’ computer, uploaded the contents, and emailed them directly to Adrian.” She flashed a please don’t kill me kind of smile.
I had an image of Adrian with a pair of horns and a devil’s trident in his hand at that moment, cackling as he drafted up some maniacal plan to destroy Mrs. Glass’ life and company with whatever he found on there. “Okay. First, I need to do this—” I pulled her close and kissed her deeply, but briefly. When we pulled back, I smiled. “That’s for your grand act of sacrifice that will ultimately and hopefully be unnecessary. It was the thought that counted, but we’re going to get to Adrian before he has a chance to do anything rash with that information, because I won’t forgive myself if my mess screws up Glass Design for you.”
“I would forgive you,” she said.
“That’s because you’re a sweet, sweet woman. But come on, we need to get on the road.”
We got in the car, and I sped off toward Adrian’s place.
“Can’t we go any faster?” Elizabeth demanded once we were on the highway. “Or maybe call Adrian?”
“I never speed,” I said. “Have you ever done the math on how little time it actually saves you? Imagine a thirty mile drive. One driver goes sixty and the other goes seventy. You know how much time the speeder saves?”
“I don’t see how—”
“No, I am actually asking. I haven’t done the math, but I feel like it doesn’t make that big of a difference.”
She sighed. “Can we call him?”
