Page 83 of Clued in to Love
“Our tip came from Parker.” Hilary felt like he had a right to know, and she didn’t owe Parker anything. In fact, Hilary had visited the winery to speak with Parker in person. She wantedto make sure that she had all the facts before she eliminated a team from the hunt. Parker had said the right things, claiming she felt her “duty” to come forward in the name of honesty and competition, especially during the holiday season. Nothing about Parker had seemed genuine to Hilary.
Hilary sensed that Parker had come forward for one person—herself. She had seen William and Marissa together, and despite the pitiful state of her love life, she knew jealousy when she saw it, and William and Marissa were clearly falling for each other. She suspected Parker also knew it and had used the information to sabotage them. She couldn’t help agreeing it was pretty unfair.
Parker was not the kind of friend she wanted in her life.
“Parkerturned us in?” William stared at her in disbelief. “Why?”
Hilary shrugged. “No idea. You’ll have to ask her yourself.” She wouldn’t want to be Parker. William looked like he was ready to fight and out for blood.
“Thanks for letting me know. You’re sure there’s nothing else I can do to keep Marissa in the game?”
Hilary shook her head.
“How close were we?”
“Close,” Hilary answered truthfully, her gaze drifting to the floor when Marissa had tossed her paper crown. “Depending on how many points you would have been awarded tonight, you had a good chance of taking home the cash.”
“Damn.” William let out a whistle under his breath.
“Sorry. Maybe I shouldn’t have said anything.”
“No. It’s better knowing, thank you.” William sighed. “You don’t happen to have any upcoming catering gigs that need cheese boards, do you?”
Hilary thought for a moment. An idea started to take shape. “The Chamber’s events are already booked through the end of the year, but I might have a personal catering project.”
“She’s so good,” William gushed. “Let me show you her work. She’s amazing.”
He proceeded to pull up Marissa’s social media profiles. Hilary didn’t need any extra convincing. She needed to do something big to prove to Ben that she would fully invest in their marriage. For a man who loved food, maybe cheese was the best way to show him.
FORTY-SEVEN
DARBY
Darby stood in the corner of the ballroom. This was silly. Why had she come? She had made up her mind not to come, and then something pushed her forward. She couldn’t come up with a reasonnotto show. Samesh’s heartfelt explanation had lingered with her. She couldn’t stop thinking about it. What did she have to lose? She had already lost one love.
Before reconnecting with Samesh, she would have said she was okay being alone. She would have (and did) tell people who asked she was content to remain single. Why risk it again when her first relationship had been so good and solid and easy? She would have claimed she had nothing left to give someone new.
Those were the stories she told herself late at night when the house was filled with nothing other than pervasive silence and the occasional sound of snow falling from the roof. Every year, she taught a lesson on trusting narrators in literature, showing her students examples of untrustworthy narrators, which always produced lively discussions about the storyteller who lives in each of our heads.
She had been her own unreliable narrator about her grief. It wasn’t simply that she had cocooned herself in after Jim’s death. Sure, she needed that at first, but grief had become her crutch,her way of denying herself happiness. For what? As a penance for Jim getting sick? Or was it that she was afraid?
If she loved again, she would have to accept that she might lose again.
It had been easier to lie than to accept that hard truth.
But Samesh had changed that. She had seen the pain, the regret, the longing in his eyes like he was holding up a mirror for her. It was time for her to make a choice. She could either continue to remain buried under her blanket of grief, or she could wrap her grief around her shoulders and wear it like a cape.
The vision made her laugh. Jim would have told her that her blanket of grief was her cape—her superpower. She had loved long and hard, and she could love again.
Samesh caught her eye from across the ballroom. He was dressed for the occasion in a tailored three-piece, light gray suit, made of subtly texturized fabric. A forest green tie added a pop of color. His dark hair was slicked with a touch of polish to highlight the sharp angles of his jaw and his well-trimmed beard.
They locked on to each other.
He moved toward her with an effortlessness and yearning that made her feel slightly dizzy.
Darby’s heart fluttered like it hadn’t in years. She could feel the perspiration of desire beading on the back of her neck. Everything moved in slow motion, the dancers circling the floor, the violinists’ bows, the snowflakes cascading from the ceiling.
Darby placed her hand over her heart as Samesh cut straight through the crowd. “You came. I didn’t think you would come.” His voice was breathless.
