Otherwise Engaged (16 page)

By the time
they returned to the office with their food and had settled into Daphne’s
office again, she had relayed the whole sad story to him.

“So why didn’t
you answer his call earlier?” Arlen asked.

“I want to be
done with him. I don’t want to want him anymore.” Daphne buried her face in her
hands.

“Are you sure
you want to completely cut him out of your life?”

“I think that’s
the only way I can deal.” She took her hands away from her face. “Pathetic,
right?” Daphne twirled her water bottle around on her desk while she waited for
Arlen’s answer.

“No,” Arlen
said.

She looked up
at him. “Huh?”

“You don’t give
yourself enough credit. Daphne, you finally put yourself out there for him. So
it didn’t work out. That doesn’t change the fact that what you did is huge.
That it’s brave.
And I can already see the start of a change
in you. A good change.” Arlen reached over the desk and grabbed her hand. “We
can’t always control who we develop feelings for. But what we can control is
how we choose to deal with those feelings.”

“This still
feels shitty.” And had she really resolved anything? All she’d done was run
away from Rain first and then later let him run away from her. She hadn’t even
told him how she’d felt about him for all those years. He’d had to
have guessed
it after the time they spent together in Puerto
Rico after the wedding, though. Wouldn’t he have?

“Do you regret doing
anything you did?” Arlen asked.

She couldn’t
really say she did. “No.”

“Growing,
figuring out who you are and what you want, is a life-long process. And it
isn’t always pretty, and it’s sometimes painful.”

“Got that
right.” Daphne sighed. “Just tell me there’ll come a day when I don’t think
about him anymore.”

Arlen sat forward
in his chair and grinned. “So you want me to lie to you?”

Daphne laughed.
“Sure.”

“Okay. Unicorns
exist, clouds are made of cotton candy, and there’ll come a day when you barely
even remember his name.”

Daphne laughed
harder. “Thanks.”

Arlen reached
for his sandwich. “Any time.”

Chapter Twenty-One

By some
accounts, Rain’s trip to California could be considered a success. He’d made several
new business contacts, he was learning about some new technology that would
come in handy for the business his uncle wanted him to play an active role in,
and he and Skylar had discussed details about Bevyx developing a platform for the
phone that would be built around Rain’s uncle’s idea.

Skylar was
really excited about the opportunity, and his brain started firing off a mile a
minute as if he’d been the ideas man. Well, somebody had to now that Rain, the
former ideas man and people person, had left Bevyx. It was up to Skylar’s other
partner—the last one he had left—to be the people person, though.
That had never been Skylar’s strong suit. Rain didn’t see that changing.

Rain felt like
he was keeping up a decent front for Skylar and the others, but inside, he was
miserable. He’d finally decided to give Daphne a call. He’d tried several times
over the past few days. She wouldn’t pick up the phone. He kept leaving
voicemails, but she never returned them. He couldn’t apologize over text
message or email. That just wouldn’t be right.

“…Rain? Rain?”
Skylar waved his hand in front of Rain’s face.

“Oh. Sorry.
What was that?” Rain asked, blinking, trying to remember what they’d been
talking about. He tapped his fingers against the coffee cup that sat before him
on the table on the patio by the pool as he tried to regroup.

“You’re zoning
out again,” Skylar said. “We’re going to take a day trip to Palo Alto. Want to
come along?”

“I don’t know.
I think I’ll stay here. Get some work done.” He patted the top of his laptop,
which was nearby on the table. They were staying at the house of one of
Skylar’s friends who lived in San Jose, the heart of Silicon Valley.

Skylar rolled
his eyes. “That’s what you keep saying. You’re always getting some work done.
You’ve been lame this entire trip.” Skylar shook his head in a disapproving
manner and a frowned formed below his Aviators.

“I’ve been all
over the map lately. I think I owe it to my partners to make sure I stay on top
of my share of the work.” Rain leaned forward until his chest pressed into the
edge of the table and stared into his coffee cup. Black. Daphne took hers with
cream but no sugar.

“You’re more
than staying on top. You’re out here drumming up new business in the place
where it all happens. After the past few months, those partners of yours should
be groveling before your feet.”

Rain shrugged.
“Well, it takes more than making a few business contacts to keep a company
running.”

“I know that.
You know I know that. I also know you haven’t done one single fun thing while
we’ve been here. And we’ve been here over a week. Not like you at all. This
trip is supposed to be both work
and
play,
remember?”

“Not true. I
went to that pool party the other night,” Rain said.

“At which you
were sober. And looking
all sullen
and emo and pissed
off about something. Girls were afraid to even go near you by the end of the
night.”

“I wasn’t
pissed off. I was…deep in thought.”

“About?” Skylar
asked, smirking.

He knew what
would happen if he told Skylar about Daphne.
A lot of
ridiculing and then Skylar telling him to forget it.
He knew because
those were the same things he would have been saying to himself ordinarily.
Should have been saying to himself. No, there was no way he could tell Skylar
about the war he’d been fighting with himself about that woman since before
he’d left Thailand.

“Look, I’ll go
to that party on Saturday, and I promise not to mope, “Rain said. “It’ll be a
good time. Just let me stay here and work today. I’m over Palo Alto. You guys
go. Have a good time. I’ll be here when you get back.” Rain gestured toward the
glass doors that led into the house.

“You really
promise not to mope Saturday?”

“Yes, yes. Go,
go.”

“I have your
word on that, right?”

“Yes. Just go.”

Skylar walked toward
the house, his flip-flops slapping the soles of his feet as he went. He opened
the doors leading into the living room and stood in the doorway. “Scout’s
honor?”

“Whatever you
want. Now go.
Move
your
ass
,” Rain said.

When Skylar was
finally gone, Rain leaned back in his chair with a sigh. Bringing his coffee
cup to his lips, he asked himself one simple question. Just what in the hell
had Daphne Moore done to him?

He couldn’t
stop thinking about her—even when he tried. Her laugh. The way she made
him laugh. How easy it was to talk to her. How it felt to wrap her in his arms.
Things had just been so easy for those few days. He’d slipped into life with
her. He was stupefied to realize he’d liked it and horrified to realize he
missed it.

Just lying in
bed with her, holding her close, kissing her had been nice. And there was the
way she wasn’t afraid to say exactly what was on her mind. He’d admired that
about her since college. He’d had such a good time with her at the reception.
He was miserable with missing her. He’d been stupid. For so many reasons, she
had to let him apologize. She’d given him so much, and he’d been a total jerk
in return. He at least needed a chance to give his side of the story.

He picked up
his phone again and tried to call her. Unsurprisingly, he went to voicemail. He
hesitated for a moment before saying, “Hey. It’s me again. For, I
dunno
, maybe the hundredth time? I don’t even know if you’re
listening to these anymore, or if you’ve listened to any of them. But if you
have, or you are listening, I really need to talk to you. I know I’ve been a
jerk. I have a lot of things to say that you really need to hear.”

He tossed the
phone aside and rubbed his hands through his hair a few times. Then he brought
his fists down over his forehead before grinding them into his eyes. He’d
messed up really good this time. Lost one of the best friends he’d ever had.
One of the best people he’d ever known.
All because he
couldn’t keep his hands to himself.
It couldn’t end this way. He
couldn’t let her last memory of him be
him
being an
ass. But he had no idea what to do to get her to listen.

Even if he got
her on the phone, what would he say? Nothing she’d ever believe. She’d probably
think he was still thinking he was in love with Carolina. She’d assume he was
the same Rain he’d always been. But he wasn’t. He’d changed. He didn’t know how
or how much, but he did know something was different. And Daphne was the reason
for that. What he didn’t know was how to convince her of that. He’d like to at
least start with an apology.

If I were her, I probably wouldn’t believe
me, either
, he thought. Heaving a sigh, he pulled his laptop closer and
stared at the closed lid. There was so much he needed to get done, but even something
a small as turning on the laptop seemed a daunting task at the moment.

#

Daphne sat at a
table with her blind date, talking over Bettina to tell a story about one of
the childhood Christmases they’d spent together because Bettina wasn’t telling it
right. Bettina had convinced her to come on a semi-blind double date—Bettina
was on her second date, and Daphne was on her first, so only Daphne’s was blind.
Telling herself it was part of her new outlook on her life, and being open to
all opportunities, she went.

Daphne’s phone
buzzed with a new text message, and she dropped out of the conversation and let
Bettina take over. She held her phone under the table and read the message. The
text was from Two-Faced Liar, and it read:
Please.
Answer.
Your.
Phone. I really have to talk to you. I’m
going to keep calling until you answer or change the number.

Hm. So he’d
decided to start texting her now. Slipping her phone into her purse, she looked
up and smiled at the others like nothing was wrong. She felt a lot better after
her talk with Arlen, and she wasn’t going to regress. She promised herself she
would forget him. Out of sight, out of mind. She’d already made a big enough fool
out of herself when it came to Rain. She wasn’t about to continue that trend.

Gary, her date,
said, “So Bettina here tells me you like to ski.” Gary worked as a paralegal at
the law firm where Bettina worked. He’d told Daphne he was saving up money to
go to law school.

“I do,” Daphne
said. “I only learned a few seasons ago, but I really like it.”

“You two should
go skiing sometime. Daphne’s
always going
up to
Wintergreen. She thinks it’s her second home,” Bettina said. She sat next to
Bobby, some guy she’d met at a flea market. He’d been trying to sell her a
counterfeit purse. He hadn’t gotten a sale out of her, but he had gotten a
date. He’d made it all the way to the second date, too. That was tough to do
with Bettina.
Especially if you didn’t have a six-figure
income.

She glanced at
Bettina, and Bettina gave her what she probably thought was a helpful smile.
The you-can-thank-me-later kind.
Yeah Daphne would thank her
all right. Bettina was still pushing. Apparently, Daphne hadn’t come far enough
out of her swearing off guys funk for Bettina. However, Daphne had come out
plenty far for herself.

“That sounds
like a great idea,” Gary said. He draped an arm over the back of Daphne’s
chair.

“Yeah,” Daphne
said. “Great.” Then she added, “Maybe the four of us can make a weekend out of
it.” She wasn’t getting dragged into this alone.

Bettina clapped
her hands together. “Oh yes! But we’ll have to do it soon. It’s almost March,
and the season will end soon.”

When Gary
walked her to her car that night, he said, “So I had a great time tonight.”
Gary was about her height, average in looks, dark hair. He was a nice guy but
nothing memorable.

“Me, too,”
Daphne said. And she had.
For the most part.
Whenever
certain people weren’t texting her and certain cousins weren’t trying to take
control of her love life.

“We should do
it again sometime. Soon. I won’t hold you to that ski trip, though,” Gary said
with a smile.
A nice guy with a nice smile.

“Okay,” Daphne
said. He hugged her goodnight and gave her a kiss on the cheek. He really
seemed like an okay guy. There was no spark, but maybe it was better that way.
Definitely safer.

She started up
her car. While she was waiting for the engine to warm up, she checked her
phone. She hadn’t pulled it out of her purse since the text message. Troy had
tried to call her. She listened to his voicemail: “Hey, pretty lady. I’m sorry
I haven’t been in touch lately. I’ve been pulling a lot of extra shifts in the
E.R. We should try to get together soon. Call me when you have a chance.”

Hm. She’d
almost forgotten about him. Maybe she should give him a call. She had so many
options. She smiled to herself as she pulled her car away from the curb. She
was starting to like this dating thing. Why hadn’t she tried it more often
before? Why had she always been so quick to either jump into long-term
relationships or not be bothered with men at all? She didn’t know, but she
could get used to this new her. She felt so much freer. As if she was truly
living life instead of watching it pass her by or listening to Bettina tell her
all about her adventures with men.

Yeah, she was
all about new opportunities. The past was behind her. She was going to learn
what she could from it and most
importantly,
she was
going to keep moving forward.