Chapter 3
LINDA
Buddy had no qualms about showing his excitement. He sprinted up to Darius with his tail whipping wildly and barked a happy greeting. Darius crouched slightly and scratched the retriever behind the ears.
"Hello, Buddy," Darius greeted the dog.
Buddy thumped his tail furiously against Darius's leg.
“Hi,” Linda greeted. She tried to calm her thudding heart and chase away the butterflies in her stomach.
“Hi,” Darius greeted back with a big, warm smile. “I see you’re walking alone tonight.”
"Yes, I’m hardly noticed at home anymore,” Linda gave a nervous laugh. “The kids all have friends and big plans for their summer with those friends, which are now more important than going for a walk with their grandmother.”
"Karma, my sister would say,” Darius told her. “I’m sure at some point in our young lives we did the exact same thing to our parents and grandparents.”
“True,” Linda agreed. “But as long as they’re happy.” Her smile widened. “And besides, it’s kind of nice to have some alone time.”
“I can’t argue there,” Darius nodded. “Penny and Isabel have taken the car into town. I couldn’t sit much longer behind my desk and desperately needed to stretch my legs.”
“Ah, so you're working here as well?” Linda picked up on the ‘behind the desk’ part and translated it.
“Don’t tell my sister and Penny,” Darius laughed. “I promised them it’s just a few routine calls to the office.”
“So you’re a work-a-holic?” Linda looked at him curiously.
Darius sighed. “I’ve been running the family business since I was young,” he admitted. “I was looking after Isabel and balancing my studies and the company.” He shrugged. “I guess after that, working became a habit.”
“Have you ever been married?” The question popped out of Linda’s mouth before she could stop it. She felt her cheeks heat. “Sorry, that was rather personal.”
“No.” Darius shook his head. “I don’t mind.”
They walked together as they spoke. Linda turned, and they headed back toward the hotel.
“I’ve been married twice,” Darius admitted. “No children.” He glanced out at the sea. “My first wife ran off with her high-school sweetheart. My second wife, whom I’m still good friends with, fell in love.”
“Fell in love?” Linda looked at him, confused.
“Ava and I had known each other for years,” Darius explained.
“We loved each other dearly…” He looked at Linda.
“But it was more of a friends type of love.” He smiled.
“She met a pilot on a trip to China, they fell in love, and now they’re happily married.
” He gave a soft laugh. “I walked her down the aisle, and I’m their twins' Godfather.”
“Oh!” Linda said, impressed. “I wish my ex-husband and I had the same type of relationship.”
“May I ask about your marriage?” Darius enquired, looking at her curiously.
“Well, I think I owe you as you told me your story,” Linda pointed out with a nervous laugh. “We’ve been divorced for a year, but were separated for four months before that.”
“How long were you married for?” Darius asked.
“Thirty-nine years,” Linda answered. “Only to find out he’d been cheating on me with his secretary for the last three of them.”
“I’m sorry, Linda,” Darius said, his voice soft and filled with compassion. “Some men are complete idiots. I apologize for my species.” He bowed gallantly. “But, we’re not all like your ex-husband or my first ex-wife.”
“I know,” Linda assured him with a warm smile, and because he was so easy to talk to, she found herself blurting out the rest of her tragic collapse of her marriage and life.
“As the divorce was about to be finalized, I found out just how deeply in debt my ex-husband was. To the point where he’d nearly drained my personal savings account when his went dry.
” She shook her head, her jaw clenching.
“A savings account I’d built from my years of working at the Miami Museum. ”
“He drained your accounts to pay off his debt?” Darius asked, his brows raised.
“Yes,” Linda nodded, feeling a little awkward having just blurted out her life story to a man she hardly knew.
“Sounds like my first ex-wife,” Darius countered. “She basically stole a lot of money from me. Sold off art, silverware, and jewelry I’d given her to fund her new lifestyle with her first love.”
“Stole?” Linda’s eyes widened. “She should be in jail.”
Darius sighed. “I just wrote it off as part of the divorce settlement, and because she didn’t want me to lay charges, she didn’t push for anything else.”
“That was nice of you,” Linda said, knowing she’d never have been that kind.
She’d very nearly laid charges against her ex-husband, especially when he’d taken out loans in her name.
But she understood just wanting to move on as well.
Even if it left you with half of what you thought you’d be able to retire on.
“I’m sorry about your first ex-wife.” She stopped and frowned.
“While I don’t know her, your second ex-wife sounds like she was nice. ”
“She is nice,” Darius told her. “But what I learned from both of my marriages is that I don’t think I’ve ever had this big love my sister, Penny, and my second ex-wife talk about.” His frown deepened. “I guess even my first ex-wife had a big love.”
“Thinking about my marriage now,” Linda admitted. “I’m not sure my ex was ever a big love like that.” She swallowed. “It was more a comfortable love that we grew into.”
“My first two marriages felt exactly like that,” Darius told her.
“Yet my sister and her late husband were giddy in love. When he… when he passed away, she was devastated. It was like something inside her broke. She told me that part of her had died with him.” His eyes darkened with emotion.
“A year before that, they had lost their only son and daughter-in-law in an accident.”
“Oh no!” Linda’s heart squeezed. “How awful.”
“Emma had barely gotten over her parents being gone, and then the grandfather she adored passed away.” Darius looked down at the sand.
“They came to live with me, and I watched Isabel function purely because of Emma.” He pinched the bridge of his nose as if trying to keep his emotions under control, and that endeared him to her even more.
“If it wasn’t for Emma.” His jaw clenched.
“I think my sister would’ve just faded away after her husband died. ”
“My friend Maggie’s also lost her son and daughter-in-law, much like Isabel,” Linda told him, her voice soft and filled with compassion.
“She, too, raised her grandson, Toby. Her son was her world, and like Isabel, I don’t think she would’ve pulled through without Toby.
That’s why she stayed here in Sweet Blossom Bay.
She wanted Toby to grow up in a supportive community like we did. ”
They walked in silence for a while. Both of them lost in their own thoughts as they watched Buddy blissfully unaware of the deep emotions surging through each of them. The dog played in the surf and chased seabirds having their final wade in the water for the night.
"I hope Emma is behaving," Darius said, breaking the silence and steering the conversation in another direction.
"Emma is an angel," Linda assured him. "I think she's had a wonderful day. Especially as my great-niece Lily arrived from Miami this afternoon with my brother. The three girls have been thick as thieves since the moment she was introduced to Lily."
Something flickered across Darius's face.
It was the same small thing Linda had seen on the beach the first day, when she’d introduced herself. It was the same small thing she had seen at the bakery when she had mentioned that Michael was on his way. It was a flicker, no more, but it was there, and Linda's instinct caught it.
"Your brother," Darius repeated, his voice carefully even.
"Michael, yes," Linda confirmed. "We were supposed to go to the lake cabin for the summer. But since my uncle’s fall, we’re all spending it here."
"Your uncle must be pleased,” Darius said, but something in his tone had changed slightly. “To have his family home.”
Linda glanced at him. The light was beginning to fade as they reached the small inlet stream that ran out of the bayside reserve into the gulf. Darius stopped walking. Linda stopped beside him.
“Yes, he is,” Linda confirmed, still a little confused about his sudden change in attitude.
"What does your brother do?" Darius asked, turning to look at her.
"He's an attorney," Linda answered. "He is a partner in a firm in Miami."
Something flickered across Darius's face for the third time. Before he gave a slight nod and then turned back toward the open strip of land, he was about to say something when her phone dinged in her pocket.
Linda pulled it out. The message was from Michael.
Linda, where are you? We need to talk!
Linda frowned at the message before catching Darius's curious eyes.
"I have to go," Linda told him.
"Of course," Darius replied.
"Thank you for the company, Darius," Linda said. “It was nice talking to you.”
"I enjoyed it too," Darius answered. “We should do it again.” He paused for a moment. “Would you have dinner with me tomorrow night?”
Her brows rose, her heart stuttered, and the butterflies in her stomach she’d just managed to tame went wild once again.
“I…” Linda swallowed and then, before she could stop herself or think it over, her tongue seemed to take over and blurt, “Yes. I’d like that.”
“Great,” Darius said. “I’ll pick you up at six-thirty?”
“Okay,” Linda said, nodding, and couldn’t stop the stupid big smile that spread across her lips. “I’ll see you tomorrow at six-thirty.”
She called Buddy. The retriever came bounding up.
"Goodnight, Linda," Darius called after her.
"Goodnight," Linda called back with a small wave.
She turned and walked back along the wet sand toward Heart House.
About ten yards along, Linda glanced back over her shoulder. Darius had not moved. He stood exactly where they had stopped, staring at the strip of land. His posture had changed. The easy looseness was gone. He looked like a man carefully measuring something in his mind.
A chill slid up her spine. He was not admiring the view or noticing the heron at the edge of the reeds. He was assessing.
She froze when Darius turned, as if he felt her gaze. Their eyes met. For half a second the assessing look held. Then it shifted, and the warm, easy smile returned to his face. He lifted his hand to wave.
Linda waved back and spun around, her pace quickening as her mind spun with it.
She was being paranoid, she told herself.
The Wayne Group letters had her jumping at shadows.
A lot of people stopped to look at that overgrown land, and she'd simply projected her worries onto a man enjoying the last of the evening light.
By the time she reached the back gate, she had almost convinced herself.
Almost.
She forced the thought away and held on instead to the one bright thing the evening had given her. She had just accepted her first date since her divorce.