He led me to his SUV and again opened the door for me. I watched him walk around the front of the car and slide into the seat next to me.
"I thought we'd go to this park I take the kids to sometimes. There's a pond in the middle with a nice path that leads around it." He looked to me as if he were waiting until I agreed to start the car.
"Sounds good, although parks usually close at sundown." I looked out the window to see the sun was waning in the sky, the blue taking on a more orangey-purple hue.
"I'm willing to live on the wild side for one night if you are," he said, his smile returning and causing my stomach to flip.
"Let's go, then."
By the time we made it to the park the sun was even lower in the sky, but looking through the windshield at the sight before me, I couldn't care less.
The park was pretty massive, at least compared to what I'd envisioned in my mind. Sure, there was a playground, but there was also a picnic area, six separate basketball courts, and a soccer field. In the middle of it all was a pond with a fountain, spouting water up at least twenty feet. The path around the pond was lit with lights, as was the water shooting up from the fountain.
"This is beautiful," I said, still trying to take in all the beauty of the water and blooming flowers around it.
"Shall we?"
I pushed open my door and joined Devon in the damp, warm air of the evening, glad I'd gotten an iced drink. I followed his lead and we walked to the path, taking leisurely steps at a slow and relaxed pace.
"So, besides the second job, have any plans for the summer?" Devon asked, breaking the comfortable silence of the three minutes it took for us to make it to the path.
"Not really. I've got a lot of books I want to read, but that's about it."
He chuckled, then said, "That sounds amazing."
"I imagine you don't get a lot of free time, being a single parent."
"Tons," he said with more soft laughter. "The hour between them going to bed and me passing out is just enough time to accomplish exactly nothing." His laughter died, and then he continued. "Olivia used to be really great at planning things for the summer. Swimming lessons, soccer camps, play dates. I was pretty oblivious. I just went to work, came home, and went where she told me on weekends. It never occurred to me that keeping kids active and occupied in the summer was a full-time job."
"Sounds like she was a great mother."
I caught him nodding in my periphery. "Definitely." He was quiet for a moment-we both were. I didn't know what to say next, but he continued. "Can I tell you about her? This is strange for me-a first. I haven't met anyone I wanted to spend time with, but it feels wrong to be with you and not get it all out. Does that make sense?"
It did and it didn't; I wanted to spend time with him too, and I wanted to know about his marriage and his wife, but it didn't feel like any of my business. So I told him the truth. "I'll listen to anything you want to tell me."
He was quiet for a moment, but then he spoke and had all my attention.
"I met Olivia my junior year of college. She showed up at a party and seemed to be one of those typical freshman girls who went to frat parties to get drunk and hook up. The instant I saw her, there was something about her that pulled me to her, but she was with one of my frat brothers. I tried to brush the thoughts away, but all night I watched as she got progressively drunker and my brother got progressively handsier.
"At the end of the night I saw them going up the stairs and he was practically carrying her, she was so drunk. He looked buzzed, but definitely wasn't as gone as she was. It made me sick, so I intervened. I pretty much wrestled her away from him and she was so drunk she didn't even notice. He was pissed, called me a cock-block, and I knew my whole frat would be angry with me, but I didn't care. I took her in my room, laid her in my bed, and slept on the floor."
He paused, taking a sip of his coffee, and continued slowly on the path.
"When she woke up the next morning, she assumed we'd slept together and was treating me the way she probably treated all the guys she woke up with the next morning. She tried to brush me off, tried to act as though it wasn't a big deal, but when I explained to her what had really happened-that my fraternity brother was going to practically rape her-she just broke down on my bed. I sat with her, all day, and listened to her story. Turns out, she'd dated a guy all through high school and during her junior year he actually had raped her."
"Oh, God," I said automatically, my hand coming up to cover my mouth as I gasped. "That's terrible."
"Yeah," he agreed sullenly. "It was one of those situations where she'd said yes before, so he didn't think her screaming ‘no' meant anything."
I closed my eyes and tried to push the images my mind conjured up aside. I'd never been sexually assaulted, but I could imagine the fear and anger and helplessness that came along with it.
"It went on for a couple of months before she could end the relationship, and when she left for college, all the anger she felt toward him turned into an effort to reclaim her body. She slept with guys, said yes to anyone, because saying yes was her right and she wanted to use it." He let out a large sigh and I couldn't help but feel bad for him; he was obviously upset about what she'd gone through. I wanted to comfort him in some way, but didn't know how. "Of course, that particular day we didn't work through all that. That information came in the following years. But that day, the day she woke up in my room, was the first day of us, and we were together from that day forward. I felt this need to protect her, to show her that guys could be decent, that we weren't all assholes."
It seemed fitting, the thought of Devon on a white horse, wanting to rescue a damsel in distress. His goodness was something I'd been attracted to since the very first time I met him.
"It was hard in the beginning. She tested our relationship a lot. She obviously thought, somewhere inside, I'd treat her just like all the others, that one day I'd leave her if she pushed me away hard enough, but I couldn't. I loved her because she was broken, but I also loved her because she was strong enough to take care of herself. She didn't need me, but she wanted me more than she could admit, and that made me love her even more."
I never would have thought listening to a man describe his love for someone else would make me fall for him, but I was. Hearing the way he described her, how he cared for her, how he wanted happiness for her, it went a long way to endear him to me. I wanted, so desperately, for someone to care for me that way, with that much intensity and love.
"It wasn't until Ruby was born that Olivia seemed to accept that I wasn't going anywhere, that I wanted her-flaws and all-and that she wasn't getting rid of me."
"She was lucky to have you," I said softly, saying words truer than I'd ever spoken. I didn't know Olivia, but I knew she was lucky to have Devon behind her and beside her.
He let out a loud sigh. "I know it must seem that way to you, hearing all this, but really I am the lucky one. Breaking through her boundaries was hard, but what I got in return was incredible." He smiled at me and I knew he was thinking about his children. And suddenly, before I could even try to rein it in, I was tearing up. All I could imagine was Devon and a woman who looked like an older version of Ruby, so incredibly happy, and then having it all ripped out from underneath them. How unfair it was to be given the love of a lifetime, only to have it taken away. I pictured the Devon I'd first met three years ago-the broken, sobbing, destroyed man who was in the midst of mourning.
"Devon," I whispered, a tear escaping down one cheek. "I'm so sorry."
"Hey," he said, turning to me and noticing my tears. "Come here." He wrapped his arms around me and I curled into him, keeping the hand with my coffee at his side. "No crying. I'll never get you to go out on a real date with me if I make you cry," he said, joking, rubbing his free hand up and down my back. "Don't be sad," he finally whispered right next to my ear.
"I just can't imagine," I said, pulling away and wiping under my eyes. "I'm sorry, I just remember you that night outside the school, and how upset you were."
"Yeah," he said, half groaning. "That was a dumb idea. I should never have gone that night." I nodded, agreeing. "But," he said as he dipped down, making himself eye level with me, "we might not have ever met if I didn't."
The intensity of his eyes made a ball of warmth form inside me, and I couldn't help but blush. He stood and we started walking around the pond again.
"Do you believe in fate?" he asked, his voice softer and almost wistful.
I thought about my life, of all the circumstances that had brought me to where I was in that particular moment, and the idea that it had all been predetermined was pretty depressing. I wanted it to be random, to not have to think about walking along a path that was so broken and jagged without any hope of maybe finding an alternate route.
"I don't know," I answered as honestly as I could.
"Believing that Olivia and I met for a reason, and that there's a purpose past her death, is the only thing that got me through it. I had to believe that there was more waiting for me and Ruby and Jax."