As always, I do not own anything associated with anything. If you want to sue me for something, you might get a toothbrush or crockpot. Better to try someone else like Angelina Jolie or Denzel Washington.
The people in this story are not mine, they are borrowed with name changes but the ideas of theatricality in my head are not. Much love!
~Selene Grace~
After a seeming eternity, Darien made an impatient sound and shoved his heavy dark hair away from his sun-bronzed face. He pitched his shirt into the hamper, moving past her. "For God's sake, Serena. You know that's not what I meant."
"Do I?" She made herself speak matter-of-factly but it took a huge effort and even then she wasn't sure she succeeded. "We wouldn't be here right now if it weren't for…for—"
"For the fact that my half-brother left you alone and pregnant seven years ago? No, I guess we wouldn't have married."
Though it was true, having him state it in such an unemotional way hurt. Deeply. His eyes, so dark a blue they sometimes looked nearly black, watched her intently. As if he were waiting for something. But what? She knew that Darien hadn't married her because he'd loved her. He'd married her because of his overwhelming sense of family responsibility.
She may have been foolish enough to fall in love with her own spouse along the way, but that didn't mean he'd done the same. "Darien, I…" she trailed off. She didn't know what to say.
"He'll probably stay in Gillette. If he stays at all." Again, Darien seemed to be watching. Waiting.
"That'll please Lenora," Serena managed despite the knot in her throat. Before Diamond took off all those years ago, Lenora had doted on her son to the exclusion of everyone else, though she was admittedly fond of Darien. And she'd detested Serena on sight. Lenora hadn't changed much in the years since. "Perhaps you should go there to see him." The suggestion came out, surprising even her.
"Why would I want to do that?"
"I don't know!" She struggled to control her voice. "To see what he's doing back in Wyoming since when he left he made it clear he never intended to return. To keep him from coming here, maybe. You can't possibly want him to see Mattie."
"Do you want him to?"
"Of course not!"
"Then there's nothing to be concerned about." He reached into the tiled shower and flipped on the water with one hand even as he unfastened his leather belt with the other. With an ease that still managed to dry Serena's throat, he shucked the rest of his clothes and stepped under the water.
On any other night, he might have hooked a long arm around her and pulled her—part protesting, part giggling, all delighted—under the water with him. But not tonight. Not tonight when they both knew his brother—half-brother—had returned after a seven-year absence.
But Diamond wasn't only Darien's younger half-brother.
He'd been Serena's first love.
And before he took off, leaving her life in tatters, he'd unknowingly fathered the precious girl who slept in the bedroom at the end of the hall. The little girl who called Darien "Daddy."
Serena closed the cupboard door on the towels she'd finally succeeded at fitting inside, and picked up her husband's discarded clothing. She slowly pushed them into the hamper atop his shirt. Through the textured glass of the shower door, she could see his tall blurred form standing beneath the pounding water that was already sending curls of steam over the door.
Darien didn't think Diamond would even want to see him unless it was to clean up one of his messes. Serena couldn't say whether Darien's estimation of his half-brother was correct, or not. All she knew was that just the news of it seemed to have put a wall between her and Darien that had not existed even 10 minutes earlier. So she couldn't help the suspicion that Diamond's return would change their lives, yet again.
"Mommy? Who's that man?"
Serena transferred the last sack of groceries from the cart to the trunk of her car. "What man?"
"Him."
She followed Mattie's pointing finger and felt her stomach drop through the snow-dusted earth beneath her boots. She wanted to turn tail and hustle Mattie back inside the grocery store but it was already too late. He'd spotted her, flashed a smile and headed straight in her direction.
Nothing to be concerned about?
Diamond Shields was as different from his older half-brother, Darien, as spring was from fall. At twenty-two he'd been all platinum blonde hair, and vivid gray eyes. At twenty-nine, he was…even more so.
Serena swallowed down a jolt of nausea and nudged Mattie toward the car. "Get inside the car, sweetheart. The wind is getting really cold."
"But who's the man waving at us?"
"Nobody." She practically frog-jumped her toward the passenger door and yanked it open. "Come on, kiddo. In you go. I don't want your cold coming back again." She pointed at the package sitting on the middle of the seat that her best friend, Raye Sorenson, had given her earlier that day. "You can open that now, if you like. It's a new video game from Raye." Raye's husband, Justin Sorenson, among other things also designed video games. His new company, GameZone, had just opened an office right in Weaver. "I think she said it's the one that will be released next year."
Thankfully, Mattie dove for the package with fiendish glee. She loved getting an advance crack at the games that had become exceedingly popular. She was definitely a child who wanted to explore everything from dolls to games to toy trucks and horses. Not that Serena was surprised. She herself had been that way as a child- wanting to put her touch on everything she could find.
She pushed the car door shut just as she heard the scrape of a boot behind her. Bracing herself, she turned and came face-to-face with Diamond's blinding white smile.
"I would recognize those blond curls of yours anywhere," he said cheerfully, and before Serena could guess his intentions, he'd put his hands on her hips and lifted her right off the ground to swing her in a half circle.
Pure shock held her silent for a long moment. Then she grabbed for his shoulders. "Put me down!"
He laughed and set her on her feet, but her relief was short-lived when he leaned over and kissed her full on the lips. "You're as sweet as ripe peaches, Serena Collins. Just the way I remember you."
Serena couldn't have said a word to save her soul.
"Well? Don't you have a smile for an old friend?"
"Old friend?" She parroted.
He grinned, as seemingly oblivious to her discomfort at the arms he still had looped loosely around her as he was to the snowflakes that had begun to fall. "Well, Serena girl, we did have some good times, didn't we?" His gaze flicked toward the car. "But you're probably an old married lady by now, if the looks of that boy is anything to go by. So who's the lucky guy?"
"I am," a grim voice said behind them, startling them both. "And I'd appreciate it if you'd stop necking out here on the middle of Main Street."
Serena stared, dismayed, at Darien who'd appeared out of nowhere. She was faintly aware of Diamond's arms dropping away and his astonished "You?" even as her knees went weak and her vision blurred.
It was her every nightmare come to life, she thought faintly as the world around her faded to an odd, wavy gray. "Darien," she whispered…and everything went black.