Chapter 35
FINN
Irap my knuckles on Darcy's apartment door again, and get the same silence on the other side.
I've been standing here knocking long enough to know the difference between a door that isn't being answered and a door with no one behind it. I cup my hands against her front window and look in. Dark kitchen. Dark hallway. Her small living room, empty.
Damn it. She's not here.
It lands in my gut like a missed stair. The whole drive into town I rehearsed what I want to say to her, then tore it down, tried to build it better.
The whole time being uncertain she was going to want to hear it, or if she'll even give me the chance to say anything at all.
Now, her place is empty and I'm standing here with my heart in my hands and nowhere to put it.
Last night she pulled me through this door by my collar and held on like she never wanted to let me go. Tonight I can't even get a light to come on.
I rest my forehead against the door. "Fuck."
I reach into my jacket pocket where I've stashed my backup plan.
As far as contingencies go, this one sucks because it means I've given up.
The letter I wrote to her before I left the vineyard lays out my feelings for her and everything I hoped we could have together, but leaving it for her and walking away in defeat isn't something I'm ready to do yet.
I'm not ready to give up and walk away. Not even when it feels like she already has.
Darcy's got at least a dozen places she can go where I can't reach her.
She could be anywhere. Her mother's. Annie's.
Jules's place, or Cathy's. Or driving back roads with the radio up so she doesn't have to hear me or her own head.
The small town I grew up in suddenly feels enormous, every dark street in it hiding her from me.
And one place where maybe I can.
The library.
Yes. That's exactly where she'd go. Nobody has to tell me, and that's the part that steadies my hands on the railing as I turn around and start taking the steps down two at a time. Two weeks of paying attention to this woman, and some of what I learned is in my bones now.
Darcy hurting doesn't run to people. She runs to the one place that has never once made her feel small.
The hope hits harder than the letdown did. But I don't trust it yet. I can't trust anything until I see her for myself. Until I'm standing in front of her telling her everything she means to me.
The library is a few blocks away. Close enough that I can run there. I leap off the last step, leaving the Jeep at her curb. Then I pour every ounce of speed I have into racing the handful of blocks to get my girl.
Hoping like hell she'll have me.
The building takes shape at the end of the street, redbrick and lit only by the streetlights, the oak doors closed and dark. For a second it looks shut down for the night, as empty as her apartment, and the drop in my stomach starts all over again.
I run along the front sidewalk, heading for the steps leading to the front entrance. Then I see it. A lamp is on inside. Low and gold, deep in the dark behind the glass. One lamp burning against all of the quiet.
I can see her from outside, seated at one of the tables.
She's here. Thank God, she's here.
Seated alone in a small pool of light, bent over a stack of papers, red pen in her hand. Her brown hair is loose, soft waves falling forward past her cheek. She pushes it back without looking up, a small automatic motion I've watched her make a hundred times and could watch for the rest of my life.
For a moment I just stand there, watching.
Memorizing, just in case this is the last time I see her.
The line of her neck, the curve of her shoulder, the lamplight warm on her skin.
Every part of me points at her like a compass.
My hands know exactly how she fits against me, and every inch of that knowledge is on the wrong side of this glass.
It takes real effort not to knock on the window right now.
She doesn't notice me yet. She doesn't know that nothing I own, nothing I've built, nothing on any map means a damn thing to me if she's not in my life. She doesn't know, because I've never said it, and every hour I've spent not saying it helped build the hurt she's hiding from right now.
She's going to know before she leaves this building. All of it. Whether she forgives me or not.
I climb the steps to the big oak doors and reach for the handle. It's unlocked.
I push the door open and step inside.