was expected of him—and more.
He did all that only to end up here, sitting in an Austin restaurant, watching the door and praying each time it opened that it was Lila coming in and walking back into his life.
But each time, it wasn’t Lila who walked in.
Until it was.
Everett felt his pulse leap up with a jolt the second he saw her. All these years and she had only gotten more beautiful.
He immediately rose in his seat, waving to catch her attention. He had to stop himself from calling out her name, instinctively knowing that would embarrass her. They weren’t teenagers anymore.
* * *
Lila had almost turned around at the door just before she opened it. It was only the fact that she would have been severely disappointed in herself for acting like such a coward that forced her to come inside.
The second she did, she immediately saw Everett and then it was too late to run for cover. Too late to change her mind.
The game was moving forward.
She forced a smile to her lips despite the fact that her stomach was tied in a knot so tight she could hardly breathe. It was the sort of smile that strangers gave one another in an attempt to break the ice. Except that there was no breaking the ice that she felt in her soul as she looked at Everett.
All the old heartache came rushing back to her in spades.
“I’m sorry,” she murmured to Everett when she finally reached the table. “Am I late?”
“No,” he quickly assured her. “I’m early. I didn’t know if there was going to be a lot of traffic, or if I’d have trouble finding this place, so I left the hotel early.” A sheepish smile curved his lips. “As it turned out, there was no traffic and the restaurant was easy enough to find.”
“That’s good,” she responded, already feeling at a loss as to what to say next.
She was about to sit down and Everett quickly came around the table to hold out her chair for her.
“Thank you,” she murmured, feeling even more awkward as she took her seat.
Having pushed her chair in for her, Everett circled back to his own and sat down opposite her. He could feel his heart swelling just to look at her.
“You look really great,” Everett told her with enthusiasm.
Again she forced a quick smile to her lips. “Thank you,” she murmured.
At least all that time she’d spent this morning fussing with her makeup and searching for the right thing to wear had paid off, she thought. Looking good, she had once heard, was the best revenge. She wanted Everett to be aware of what he’d given up. She wanted him to feel at least a little pang over having so carelessly lost her.
The years had been kind to him, as well, she reluctantly admitted. His six-foot frame had filled in well, though he was still taut and lean, and his dark hair framed a handsome, manly face and highlighted his dark-blue eyes. Eyes that seemed to be studying her.
“But you do seem a little...different somehow,” Everett said quietly a moment later.
She wasn’t sure what he meant by that and it marred her triumph just a little. Was that a veiled criticism, she wondered.
“Well, it has been thirteen years,” she reminded Everett stiffly. “We knew each other a long time ago. That is,” she qualified, “if we ever really knew each other at all.”
He looked at her, wondering if that was a dig or if he was just being extremely touchy.
It seemed there were four of them at the table. The people they were now and the ghosts of the people they had been thirteen years ago.
The moment stretched out, becoming more uncomfortable. “What’s that supposed to mean?” Everett asked her.
“Just an observation,” Lila answered casually. “Who really knows who they are at that young an age?” she asked philosophically. “I know that I didn’t.”
He sincerely doubted that. “Oh, I think you did,” Everett told her.
Seeing the server approaching, she held her reply. When the server asked if he could start them out with a drink, Lila ordered a glass of sparkling water rather than anything alcoholic. Everett followed her example and asked for the same.
“And if you don’t mind, I’d like to order now,” Lila told the young server. “I have to be getting back to the office soon,” she explained.
“Of course.”
After he took their orders and left, Everett picked up the thread of their conversation. “I think you knew just what you wanted years ago,” he told her. “I’m the one who got it all wrong.”
Was he saying that out of pity for her, she wondered, feeling her temper beginning to rise as her stomach churned.
“On the contrary,” Lila responded. “You were the only kid who was serious when he said he wanted to play ‘doctor.’ If you ask me, ‘Dr. Fortunado’ achieved everything he ever dreamed about as a kid.”
Everett’s eyes met hers. Longing and sadness for all the lost years filled him. For the time being, he disregarded the note of bitterness he thought he detected in her voice.
“Not everything,” he told her.
This was an act. She wasn’t going to fall for it, Lila thought, grateful that the server picked that moment to return with their drinks and their orders. Everett wasn’t fooling her. He was just saying that so that she would forget about the past. Forget her pain.
As if that were remotely possible.
Silence stretched out between them. Everett shifted uncomfortably.
“So, tell me about you,” he finally urged. “What are you doing these days?”
Lila pushed around the lettuce in her salad as if the fate of the world depended on just the right placement. She kept her eyes on her plate as she spoke, deliberately avoiding making any further eye contact with him. She had always loved Everett’s dark blue eyes. When they’d been together, she felt she could easily get lost in those eyes of his and happily drown.
Now she couldn’t bear to look into them.
“I’m a manager of one of the departments at the Fortune Foundation. My work involves health outreach programs for the poorer families living in the Austin area.”
That sounded just like her, Everett thought. Lila was always trying to help others.
But something else she’d said caught his attention. “Did you say the Fortune Foundation?”
“Yes,” she answered. Suspicion entered her voice as she eyed him closely and asked, “Why?”
“Well, it just seems funny that you should mention the Fortunes. My family just recently found out
