Chapter 1 Clover
Clover
SEVENTY-TWO HOURS PRIOR
Three years ago. That was the last time I spoke to Bennett Andrew Graves.
I’m on my lunch break during one of my last shifts at Driftwood Diner. I’ve hardly eaten since cooking up this ludicrous plan, but I ordered a cup of chowder because for some delusional reason I think it makes me look less desperate.
Marianne delivers my cup with an encouraging smile and I resign myself to nibbling on oyster crackers because I feel like I could puke.
I rehearse the speech in my head again, and it takes shape, building logic and reason where there is none.
The air leaves my lungs as the wind chimes above the door jingle softly.
He wears a loose V-necked sweater with the sleeves pushed up to his elbows and the front French tucked into dark tan chinos that are rolled at the cuff in a near haphazard way that feels like the type of carefree look only money can buy.
His black Adidas Sambas are a change from the Italian loafers he wore to school most days at Calvin Prep.
At least that’s what he wore before Mom removed me from the most elite private school on the coast because my tuition was one of the many benefits we lost when Bennett’s mother fired mine.
Public school, however, was the exact right price at free ninety-nine.
Bennett points toward me when Marianne, my beloved work wife and single mother to a nine-year-old girl named Penelope and a high-needs Chihuahua, tries to seat him.
She gives him a dizzy smile the moment he flashes his dimples.
Marianne’s an easy target, but they are also objectively very good dimples.
He slides into the booth across from me, and without even looking up to greet me or take off his sunglasses, he peruses the menu until Marianne approaches with her pen and pad.
Before he looks up, she gives me a wink.
She has been the firsthand witness to my sheer panic over the last few weeks and is the only person who knows about my potential solution.
“Tuna and chips,” he tells her, and I’m not prepared for how his voice has deepened in the years since I’ve seen him.
“Extra tartar sauce. And some of that banana pie.” He blesses her with his dimples again and she pockets her notebook without writing down his order because Marianne never writes down orders.
The notepad is just there for emotional support—more for diners than for herself.
“You got it,” she says, and makes a show of reaching across the table, her breasts hanging between us like two (admittedly very nice) buoys. She looks down at me, her head facing away from Bennett, and mouths hot.
Bennett removes his matte black aviator Ray-Bans and places them on the table next to his key fob.
He studies me with what seems like amusement, the blue of his eyes piercing and intrigued.
The only sign that he is even the least bit anxious is the brief twitch along the sharp line of his stubbled jaw.
“Clover Rowan Walsh,” he finally says.
“Bennett.”
“Come on now.” There are those fucking dimples again. “You’ve got me burning with curiosity.”
“Is that all it took for you to remember that I exist? A bit of curiosity? How simple of you, Bennett. Did you get permission from Mommy to come out and play today?”
At the mention of his mother, he briefly grimaces.
I take a deep breath, filling my diaphragm. I hate this. I hate the fact that I have to even talk to him again, let alone ask him for something.
“I got an academic scholarship at Wexley.”
His eyes widen slightly, but his features remain, otherwise, neutral. “Congratulations, Clover.”
“Yeah.” I clear my throat and crinkle the plastic of my cracker package between my fingers.
“I got a full ride.” I was nine years old the first time I visited Wexley and since then I have never been able to imagine a future for myself that didn’t involve that lush, bluff-side campus crawling with fog that always seemed to look right at home amid the late-1800s Gothic architecture.
“Your mom must be proud. How is she?” he asks, his voice teetering on genuine before he clears his throat. “So, I guess you wanted to meet up and split custody of the campus.”
I don’t look up, because I know that if he’s nice to me—hell, even just cordial—I’ll warm back up to him, and if I warm up to him, I’ll fall for his charm. Bennett’s charisma is powerful but rationed, and when he rewards you with it, it feels like the sun.
“No, actually, the family who finances my housing scholarship pulled funding after one of their grandkids was put on academic probation.”
“That’s shitty. I bet the kid’s a prick.” He cards a hand through his chestnut waves. “But aren’t first-years required to live on campus?”
I nod my head as I prepare myself to be humbled, my heart racing. “Yeah, the only exception is for residents of Wexley-on-the-Sea, and we live in Cannon Beach.”
It all comes down to numbers. A few years ago, I couldn’t remember even looking at a price tag, but now all I see anywhere I look is numbers. And my first semester at Wexley is racking up.
Tuition … covered (Thank fuck.)
Housing … $6,400/semester
Textbooks … $874
Meal Plan … $671/month
Now, with the question on the tip of my tongue, I realize that the hard part won’t be the ask at all. It will be the answer.
“Bennett, will you marry me?”
The pause is the longest of my life. At least ten breaths long. Maybe twenty or even a hundred.
Then … he laughs. The smug motherfucker laughs. Bennett nearly chokes, he’s laughing so hard. He downs his glass of water and Marianne refills it as an excuse to eavesdrop. Her brows raised at me as Bennett chugs his freshly refilled glass, and I give her a short shake of the head.
She refills him once more, and then finally his knuckles wipe the tears from his eyes as he takes in the one hundred percent serious expression on my face.
“If you’re finished, I can explain.”
Marianne returns with his food, and he holds a hand out for me to go on, like I am his own personal entertainment, as he bites into a few fries at once.
“There’s no way I can go to school without living on campus.
I live outside of the waiver radius. And even if I were to get a fake address, I share a car with my mom.
She needs transportation for work. When my housing fell through, I thought I was cooked.
But then I read that newsletter that the housing office sent out last week.
” I give him a moment to confirm he knows which one I’m talking about.
He shakes his head, a smirk curled on his lips. “Sorry, you’ll have to clarify. The last time I checked my email was April when I signed up for a VPN to access a Danish website that deals in … artistic films.”
“I don’t want to know about your weird Danish porn habits.”
“Of course it’s weird,” he says. “It’s Danish. And I wouldn’t be surprised if less than six people open the newsletters from the housing office.”
He is giving me an actual headache. I can’t believe there was a time in my life when I saw him every day and didn’t feel like splitting my brain open. “Excuse me for being invested in my future college career.”
That elicits an eye roll on his part.
“Anyway, the newsletter you did not read was about a new initiative to integrate nontraditional students into the more traditional aspects of campus culture. Greek life. Sports. Student government. And … housing.”
“How charitable,” he says. “And you are a nontraditional student how?”
“We aren’t,” I tell him. “Not yet. But as of this semester, married couples can sign up to live in traditional gender-neutral dorms.”
He leans back against the booth with his arms draped across. “I’m crushed, Clo. You mean to tell me that this marriage proposal isn’t from the heart?”
He’s needling me. Pushing for a reaction.
But if I’m going to humble myself to this extent, then I’m not going to blow this opportunity on my short temper.
Wexley is an exclusive school with an unusual history and quirky traditions, but it is one of the most prestigious schools in the country.
In fact, it is often referred to as the Ivy of the Pacific Northwest or the Gray Ivy.
My dreams of being a Wexley Bear rival some little girls’ dreams about their wedding day. (Ironic, I know.)
“My heart is in attending Wexley, the school I have worked my ass off to get into. Listen, you’re the only other person I know who’s going to Wexley in the fall.
I just need this one semester and I’ll have something figured out by the spring.
Trust me when I say that if I had any other options, I wouldn’t be sitting across from you. ”
He flinches, and then turns rigid as he reaches into his back pocket and begins thumbing through his wallet. “Well, I wouldn’t want you to settle, Clover.”
In one swift motion, he slides out of the booth and stands, slapping two twenties on the table before he storms out.
Panic rises in my chest like water in a sinking car. Fuck, fuck, fuck.
Marianne’s eyes widen as she frantically waves me after him.
“Shit,” I mutter as I shimmy out of the booth with much less grace than he did. “I can’t believe I’m chasing after that twat,” I whisper to Marianne.
She glances down to the table I just left. “Well, that twat is a great tipper.”
“And a rich boy piece of shit,” I call over my shoulder as I run out into the constant Pacific Northwest drizzle.
“Can you just wait?” I yell after him and his stupid long legs that are already halfway down the block where his vintage Toyota Land Cruiser is parked.
He doesn’t respond.
“Bennett!” I try again. “Just let me finish.” He’s reaching his car now, and I run across the street, darting out in front of a passing vehicle that responds with their horn.
That gets his attention, and he yanks me toward him as the back tire hits a puddle and splashes across the hem of my jeans. “Are you trying to get yourself killed?” he asks as I backpedal until I’m pressed against his driver’s side door.
The rainwater from the car is seeping into my thin T-shirt and the back of my bra.
With his rearview mirror on one side and his fist braced against the doorframe on my other side, I’m hemmed in, and I think he’s gotten even taller since the last time I saw him. He’s hunched over so that even the rain can’t find me.
“Why me?” he asks. “Why does it have to be me? You could ask any random person on campus.”
A single rain droplet rolls off a rebellious curl above his ear and down the sharp line of his jaw until it disappears somewhere along the vein trailing the side of his throat.
He’s not just the haughty spoiled boy anymore.
No, in this moment, he’s absolutely predatory, and as he leans further over me, my head inadvertently tilts back to accommodate him.
“B-because you’re the only person I know at Wexley.”
His lips are less than an inch from mine, his gaze pinning me in place and then flickering down to my mouth. My silly little brain wants to know what would happen if I just closed the gap. If I let him kiss me.
But I can’t. I’m willing to humble myself enough to ask him for help, but I won’t stoop so low as to kiss him and let this potential marriage begin as anything more than what it is.
I shrink back against the car door as much as I can. I need space between us and I say the one thing I know will work. “Because you fucking owe me, Bennett Andrew Graves.”
His jaw twitches and space exhales between us as he steps back. With one little wave of his hand, he shoos me out of the way and then gets in his car.
“You can meet me at the courthouse tomorrow morning for the marriage license,” I tell him. “Ten o’clock. And if you’re not there, I guess I’ll have your answer.”
With his gaze trained on the road ahead, he nods once and then shuts his door, leaving me in the rain.