Object: Silk-Fringed Scarf
Dating and boys had never been high on Bella's to-do list.
She was the daughter of two loving parents who had always been better friends than lovers. They were so different—her steadfast father and her flighty mother—but it was one thing they agreed on, one thing they drilled into her head.
The person you were in high school wasn't the person you would be in another ten years. Why get wrapped up in another person, move forward as a unit, when there was so much else to discover about yourself?
And really. The drama.
As her parents had promised, college was a revelation. She hit her twenties already miles different from the girl she'd been in her go-nowhere, do-nothing town. She had things to prove and dues to pay. Boys? They were fun. For a night—a release of tension and energy as she came into her own as a woman. But dating?
Who had time? There were papers to finish, scholarships to keep, and jobs to run to between classes.
And graduate school was a hundred times worse.
That was when he came along. Arrogant and beautiful, he was the CEO's son at her internship. Not Bella's type if she had been looking, and she hadn't been. She'd been working. And he was a nuisance. She'd told him repeatedly to go away—she had things to do—but did he listen? Of course not. The man never listened to anyone.
And he amused her. A little. Enough.
Enough that he was able to pry little bits and pieces of information from her. He'd be appalled at the idea she'd never been on a date. He wanted to rectify the situation immediately, but she'd heard that line before. So, he'd poked carefully until he'd pried one or two romantic notions out of her head.
Yes, she'd admitted. She liked the idea of prim opulence. Just once, for a few hours, she wanted to be pretentious. She wanted ball gowns and elegant up-dos. She wanted pomp and circumstance. She wanted an old society gala. Not a prom. Not a party. A legitimate to-do in the classic style.
"Easy," he'd said. He whispered promises, and she'd agreed. After all, dating was fun. No harm trying it once. Just to say she did.
She'd been out with her mother—her whimsical, charming mother, when she saw it in the window of an antique store, hung just so around a mannequin's neck. A scarf. Silken with hand-stitched embroidery. A work of art in hues of blue and green with fringe. The kind of scarf that was almost a shawl.
Perfect for the occasion, her mother had said. And it matched her dress. "It's fate," her mother said with a sigh, running her fingers down the soft fabric.
"It's silly," Bella had said, frowning at the price tag. "It's just a date."
"Your first date. And anyway, wasn't that the whole point? Dress up. Get a little fancy. It's what people do. It's part of the fun of it. You go out and buy a new outfit for your date."
"That's actually a tick in the negative column for dating, Mom." Bella had rolled her eyes, but she'd also bought the scarf.
And here she was. On her date. Alone.
He'd painted such a pretty picture for her. A gala on a luxury yacht headed out to sea just before the sun set. They would watch the sun sparkle over the water as waiters buzzed around them, never letting their wine glass empty and tempting them with fancy hors d'oeuvres. He'd asked her to wait for him at a restaurant near the pier. It was one of those places so upscale, Bella typically tried not to even look in its direction lest the balance on her Mastercard increase.
The sun dipped ever closer to the water's edge. The last ice cube in the drink she'd been nursing had long melted to water. The yacht had completed boarding, and still Bella sat, obviously stood up.
Mother trucking bastard.
Disgusted with him and herself, Bella handed over her Mastercard, trying not to see the total. She didn't want to do the automatic math telling her how many hours she'd worked for that single drink.
Hey, at least it hadn't been watered down. That was something.
All dressed up with nowhere to go, Bella headed down the boardwalk. She kicked off her ridiculous heels and set off into the sand, away from concreate and up to where the waves teased the ground near her feet.
In her fury and embarrassment, she hardly noticed where she was until she had power-walked to a quieter stretch of beach, where there were cliffs on one side of her instead of boardwalk and city. Her hair had come out of its trappings. The chill in the air sent a shiver down her spine.
She cut a whole different type of romantic figure then, she thought with a wry smile on her lips. A lone figure on the beach at dusk, gown billowing, hair whipping in the wind all around her. She was exactly where those myths of ghostly gray ladies came from.
A particularly strong gust of wind cut against her skin and ripped her scarf from her loose grasp. She swung around with a gasp, reaching out into the air, but it was too late. The scarf was airborne in the strong gust. Bella dropped her shoes, picked up the trails of her dress and ran.
She was startled again and came up short when she saw a figure sprinting in her direction. A masculine figure. Her heart skipped a beat, her existence as a female having long ago learned that a male running at her, particularly when she was alone, was a danger. But the stranger's eyes weren't focused on her. No, rather he and his lithe, long legs caught up with the dancing scarf and plucked it easily from the air.
Swallowing down her moment of panic, Bella and the stranger approached each other cautiously. He was, she realized, wearing a uniform that looked familiar because she'd been staring at ones just like it for the last hour and a half.
"Thank you," she said, accepting the scarf from him. "You work at the restaurant, don't you?"
"Uh. Yeah." A smile quirked at his lips and the wind tousled his messy-pretty hair. "Got off about a half hour ago."
"Hey, man. What you do in your spare time is none of my business." She bit the inside of her cheek, struggling to maintain a straight face. There was no way something so risqué should have slipped out of her mouth with this stranger.
For a split second, he looked confused. Then, as realization dawned, his eyebrows shot up and his cheeks turned pink.
"Sorry," she said, her smile apologetic.
"No." He shook his head, ruffling his hair. "It's…. If I say it's good, that'll only make things worse."
She held his gaze for a beat, and they both chuckled, ducking their heads.
"I saw you," he said. "At the restaurant. I was working a different section, but I saw you. You looked like you were waiting for someone."
She scoffed. "Yeah, well. Fuck him."
His grin widened and then turned soft. "I'm Edward."
His hand was warm as she shook briefly. "I'm Bella."