Love on Lexington Avenue - Lauren Layne Page 0,75
confess something to someone and a little surprised that she wanted it to be him. “Scott.”
His head snapped up.
“I didn’t burn everything.”
“No?”
“I kept my wedding ring.”
His gaze dropped to her left hand.
“I’m not wearing it,” she said. “I’m not that messed up. But yesterday morning I took it to get appraised, thinking maybe I’d trade it and get a bracelet or something new, and I . . . just couldn’t. I guess it’s the one part of my marriage I want to keep with me. Even knowing how things worked out, I can’t deny that on my wedding day, I loved Brayden, and I’m pretty sure he loved me. The ring symbolizes all that. Is that lame?”
Scott shook his head.
“The weirdest part is I don’t even like the ring. I’ve never said that out loud. Who doesn’t like their wedding ring? But I never did.”
“Let me guess. Ostentatious as hell?”
“No!” she exclaimed. “That’s just it. When he gave it to me, he made this pretty speech about how he wanted something classic and timeless and elegant, just like me. And it was all those things, but . . .”
Scott gave a crooked smile. “You wanted ostentatious.”
“Maybe.” She burst out with a laugh, grateful she could finally say it. “Okay, yes, I wanted gaudy, damn it. I wanted a guy to put a huge tacky rock on my finger because he wanted everyone to know I was his.” Claire shrugged. “Maybe that’s the problem. I was never his any more than he was mine. Damn, that fire felt good.”
“It was a hell of a thing to watch,” he said, tilting his head in the direction of the beach. “All of you were in your element, but you, in particular, you were . . . you were . . .” He swallowed but couldn’t finish the sentence.
“It was euphoric,” she admitted, putting one bare foot on top of the other and looking down. “I knew I was mad, but I didn’t realize how much I’d been holding on to it, letting it fuel me. And my decisions.”
“Anger can be a good distraction from pain.”
Claire looked up again. “Speaking from experience?”
He opened his mouth, and for one hopeful moment she thought he was going to let her in, but instead he shrugged.
So that’s how it’s going to be. She’d let him in, but obviously it was destined to be a one-way street. And the new Claire, the one she’d just found, deserved better than this. Better than someone who wouldn’t even meet her halfway.
“It’s late,” she said softly.
He nodded, and she saw from the resignation in his eyes that he recognized the dismissal.
Still, his presence here tonight, this weekend, wasn’t nothing. He cared about her, even if he didn’t know what the hell to do with it, or what to call it. On that front at least she understood. She didn’t know what to call what she felt for him, either.
“Thanks for checking on me,” she said. “You’ve become a close friend in a short amount of time, and it really . . . it means a lot.”
“A friend,” he repeated softly.
“Who hooked up that one time,” she said, smiling in an attempt to cut the tension that seemed to increase every time their eyes met.
He smiled back, his eyes crinkling at the corners. “Right. The one time.”
The silence stretched on for another minute, until he finally nodded. “Good night, Claire.”
“Good night.”
He headed toward the door, but stopped when they were shoulder to shoulder and slowly reached down until his fingers brushed hers in a whisper of a touch.
Scott shuddered out a long breath, then taking her hand in his, he lifted it, his other hand unfurling her fingers to expose a palm. He placed his lips to the center of her palm without meeting her eyes before walking away.
Chapter Twenty-Six
TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 17
A little more than a week after the weekend at the beach, Claire hit Send on her email, waited impatiently for it to move from her outbox to her sent folder.
The second it did, she closed her laptop and let out a little squeal, hardly believing the moment was real. It was happening! She was in business. Well, sort of. Booking one client did not a career make.
But still, she was intensely proud of herself. Sylvia Zepada had just booked Claire to do the calligraphy on her daughter’s wedding invitations.
With an invite list of over four hundred people, it would be a beast of a task, and though she’d been terrified