her face in the mirror by the front door.
Verity and her best friend, Elaine, had always taken their makeup seriously, practicing looks they found in magazines and watching tutorials on YouTube, but she had to admit that even Elaine would have been impressed with the job she’d done tonight. She’d evened her base and tanned her face with bronzer, then given herself smoky eyes and lips the exact color of her belt. She’d washed and blow-dried her long blonde hair until it lay shiny, straight, and long down her back. Not that she’d ever left Georgia, but she felt confident that she’d captured a genuine California-girl look: blonde, tan, sexy, and breezy. And she hoped that she looked a little less girl next door and a little more sex kitten because she really, really wanted Colton to make a move on her tonight.
She walked through the living room, into the kitchen, tilting her head to look out the back door, which led down three steps to the patio. Her eyes widened, and she smiled with wonder. Were those twinkle lights roped over the picnic table? Since when did the back patio have twinkle lights?
Crossing the kitchen, she opened the storm door and stepped out onto the landing, gasping softly as she looked up at the white lights over her head and the beautiful, elegant table waiting below.
The table was crisp and white, set with the pink-flowered plates she used for breakfast every morning, and shiny wineglasses she’d never seen before. There was a vase of fresh flowers between the plates in the same powder pink as the flower crown she’d looked at in the gift shop earlier today. And by her plate was the little black box that held the Yggdrasil necklace. The information card inside the little box identified the tree as the crossroad of heaven and earth in Norse mythology—the tree was bound to the earth through its roots and stretched into the heavens through its branches.
She sighed softly, her breath catching at how carefully he’d arranged everything for her, and she felt her crush slip away a little because, in that moment, it started changing from something superficial into something more substantial. From something merely wishful into something . . . possible.
She raised her eyes to the lawn, looking for Colton, and found him with his back to her, one hand rubbing his forehead in what appeared to be consternation, the other holding his phone up to his ear.
Although she wasn’t positive, she thought he looked upset, and his choice to take the call on the grass with his back to the patio indicated that it was probably a private conversation. The right thing to do would be to go back in the house and wait for him to finish the call, then come outside like she’d never seen him talking.
But her curiosity got the best of her. Walking to the edge of the patio, she stood a few feet behind him, straining her neck to catch snippets of his conversation:
“Tell her I love her, tell her I’m sorry, tell her—”
He rubbed the back of his neck.
“But I can come now. I can drop everything right now and be there in twenty minutes. Please, just—”
There was a long pause as he listened to whatever the other person was saying.
“Right,” he said, his voice softer and defeated. “Yeah, I know.”
“No,” he said. “Don’t do that. I just . . . I’m so fucking sorry I—”
He inhaled and sighed, nodding at whatever the other person was saying.
“Okay. Yeah.” He paused for just a moment, starting to lower the phone, then pressed it back to his ear. “Hey! Wait! If she wakes up, tell her I’ll be there tomorrow. I’ll leave here at dawn and slip into her bedroom and be the first thing she sees when she opens her eyes, okay? Yeah. Bye.”
And suddenly Verity wished that she hadn’t been listening.
She had no idea who “she” was, but she obviously meant a lot to Colton. Not only had he offered to “drop everything” and run to her side, but he planned to go and see her first thing in the morning. No, not just see her, but “slip into her bedroom.”
Who was she? And why did Verity feel like busting into tears?
“Fuck,” muttered Colton, turning around to find Verity standing behind him on the patio.
She raised her hand limply in greeting. “Hi.”
His eyes combed her body, but he didn’t smile, as she’d imagined he would. He took a deep