“Mm.” He drank the rest of his wine. “Did you ever find your scarf, by the way?”
“No. Did—did it turn up around here?” she asked with a guilty gulp.
He snickered. “Nope. Sure didn’t. Guess I’ll keep looking.”
“Just forget the scarf.” She was in a hurry to change the conversation. “Don’t you care about what I’m telling you?”
“I do. I care a lot.”
“So why don’t you do something?”
“What exactly am I supposed to do, Austen? Everyone I talk to about it ends up getting cold feet and walking away. Or they write a different story and drag me through the mud. You got any better ideas?”
She sighed. “I don’t know. I can’t think of anything.”
He topped off her wine and gestured to his back door. “Why don’t you come out back with me?”
“Why?” She looked out the windows, which were blackened by the night. “What’s out there?”
“It’s where I relax after a shitty day.” He grabbed the bottle of wine and headed for the back door. “And if you’re telling the truth, which I believe you are, then today qualifies as a shitty day for us both.”
She didn’t follow. She stayed standing at the center island, feet firmly planted and arms crossed.
Dane stood in the open doorway and waited. “You coming?”
Chapter 21
Austen
DeHardt stood in the open doorway. He waited for Austen with a cocky smile, as if he knew she would follow him like some pitiful puppy.
Just leave,Austen pleaded to herself.You’ve already told him what you came here to tell him. The rest is up to him to figure out, not you.
She wanted to hate him. He looked so smug and arrogant with those perfect piano key teeth—what was up with that, anyway? Weren’t hockey players supposed to be missing teeth?
But she couldn’t hate him.
It would’ve been easier if the Devil hated her guts—and truthfully, maybe she wanted him to. She felt she deserved it for bringing this whole mess on him, whether she’d intended it or not.
But no, he didn’t hate her, either. He wasn’t even surprised by the hitpiece. He’d seen it coming. She hadn’t. Like it or not, there was more to Dane DeHardt than she’d realized.
“Ugh,fine,” she groaned. “But I’ll only stay for a bit.”
He took her to his back patio. The moonless sky was pitch-black. The air was humid and wet, and Austen could hear the gentle sloshing of rippling waves.
“Is this your pool? I can’t see a thing.” She blindly reached for the athlete’s arm, but he’d left her side. Cautiously, she toed at the ground beneath her feet. It was smooth, but cobbled.
“One sec,” he said.
DeHardt flipped a switch. Twenty feet away, orange flames jetted high into the air, bursting from an enormous stone fire pit that was encircled by lounge chairs.
He flipped a series of switches, and the dark body of water became a brilliant, glowing azure. She could see now that it wasn’t quite an outdoor pool—the pool was sheltered by a glass enclosure. Glints of light, reflecting off the waves, danced and played on the window panes all around.
At one end of the pool, red slate slabs were neatly stacked to form a natural-looking alcove. A small stream of water trickled from the boulders above, covering the entrance of the den like a beaded curtain.
“This is pretty nice, Dane,” she said with a faint sigh.
It wasbeyondnice, actually. It was like the Garden of Eden. She couldn’t begin to fathom what it would cost to build a personal paradise like this.
