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He sank down onto the table and put his head into his hands. “I’ll clean that up,” he muttered.
“Don’t worry about it,” Derek said. He shot me a beseeching look and then headed into the kitchen to find something to sweep up the broken glass.
I didn’t know how to handle this situation, but I couldn’t leave him all alone when he was hurting. This was a magnitude more terrible than when he’d come to me in New York, broken. How would he recover from this?
Still, I stepped forward and sank into the couch in front of him. “Hey.”
He lifted his head to meet my gaze. His eyes were red. “Are you going to tell me you told me so?”
“No,” I said softly. “No, I’d never say that. I didn’t want this for you.”
“Didn’t you?”
“Of course not. I never wanted you to be hurt, Ash. I wanted to be wrong about her. I wanted you two to live happily ever after. I might have had feelings for you, but that had nothing to do with me wanting you to be happy.”
He nodded once. I wasn’t sure he believed me. But as much as I disliked them together, I wouldn’t have wished this on anyone. Definitely not someone like Ash with such a big, open heart. What was this going to do to him? Fuck.
“You’re the only one who told me,” he said, clasping his hands together in front of him, his elbows on his knees. “You’re the only one who warned me.”
“I’m the asshole, Ash. You didn’t want to hear it.”
“That doesn’t make you wrong.”
“I’m sorry,” I repeated.
“Thanks for showing up … even though you didn’t have to.”
“You’re one of my best friends. If you’d told me to come to the wedding, I would have done that too.”
“I didn’t want you to be uncomfortable,” he admitted.
Ah, that big heart of his.
“I’ll always be here.”
He nodded as tears came to his eyes. My heart broke all over again for him. He leaned forward and wrapped his arms around my middle. I held him like that as his pain ebbed and flowed. There was nothing sexual, none of my feelings attached to the moment. I wasn’t here for him as I always had been before. I just wanted my friend to stop hurting. I wanted to help him get better. And I’d be here as long as he needed me.
15
Charleston
Present
The wind whipped through my hair as Ash turned off of Highway 17 toward Charleston. We’d made good time in his Range Rover. Truthfully, I was glad that I hadn’t had to drive. I’d never gotten over my years in New York City. I hated driving. Anything longer than to work and Ash’s and back was too much. Why didn’t we have high-speed trains for all of this?
“Your hair is wild,” Ash mused as the speeds lowered and we pulled into the city.
“It’s always like this in Charleston. We were feral children.”
He laughed. “Oh, I remember. You and Marina would run around, screaming like banshees.”
I arched an eyebrow. “So, how is that different than now?”
“Guess we’ll see when we get there.”
He reached across the console and took my hand in his. I swooned all over again.
The last three weeks with Ash had been … everything I’d ever wanted it to be. We had lunch almost every day during the week and spent all weekend together. Despite all of that time together, we were taking it slow. At least physically. I might have wanted to go faster and further, but I knew it wasn’t a good idea. Not with our messed up history.
When I’d invited him to come to Charleston with me, he’d picked me up and swung me in a circle. As if that whole time, he’d been afraid I’d drive off into the sunset and never look back. It was hard to even consider that when the man of my literal dreams was pursuing me with single-minded determination.
Ash parked on the street in front of the house Marina had rented downtown. “I’ll get the bags. You go say hi.”
And then I was out of the SUV, dashing up the sidewalk and to my cousin’s house. She opened the door before I got there, as if she’d been waiting for me all this time. She threw her arms around me.
“Mia!”
“Rina!”
She laughed. “It’s been too long. I can’t wait until you move here.”
“Don’t get ahead of yourself. I don’t even have the proposal approved through the company.”
“Whatever. You’re brilliant. Your company is brilliant. You’ll do great.” She winked at me. “Now, let me see this hunk of a boyfriend.”
Boyfriend.
The word sent a shiver through me. Ash Talmadge was my boyfriend.
Ash had a duffel thrown over his shoulder and my suitcase in one hand. He waved at Marina with the other. “Hey, Marina.”
“Ash Talmadge, I have never seen you look so good.”
