Page 128 of The Best Thing He Never Wanted

Bea blinked. “Now?”

“Leave it there overnight. Tomorrow, we come in together in the Vitara. And after I…” He paused, and she saw his jaw tighten before he continued. “Your car will be there waiting for you to drive home.”

She looked down at the new keys in her hand. Mostly to avoid thinking about what he hadn’t said. It was a sensible idea, and more importantly, it meant that tomorrow they could make their final drive together in their car. “Yes,” she said. “Let’s do that.”

After Manolis had done everything he needed to so that she could drive her new car legally, she drove her new blue Ignis toward the airport, sticking close as she followed Blane in the battered white Vitara. She expected the drive to feel triumphant. This was exactly the sort of thing she’d come to Crete to do. She wanted to make decisions for herself, to build a life that belonged to her, buy a car simply because she liked it and knew it suited her. And she was pleased. She was proud of herself, too. But every time she looked at the white Vitara ahead of her, her throat tightened.

At the airport, Blane drove straight past all the short-term and long-term parking signs. He didn’t stop until they reached the little parking area she remembered from when they’d arrived. As she looked at the row of Mercedes parked there, she guessed that this must be parking for the private plane part of the airport.

When she parked, Blane came over and waited while she locked up and checked the doors twice.

“All good?”

She nodded. “All good. Although do we need to tell someone why it’s here?”

“I talked to Cash on the way over, he’s letting the FBO know they need to keep an eye on it overnight.”

He held out his hand. She looked at it, then at the Vitara waiting a few spaces away. Tomorrow, she would have to come back to this spot and drive away alone in the little blue car she’d chosen for herself. But not yet.

She slipped her hand into his. “Take me home.”

Blane closed his fingers around hers. “Yeah, darlin’.”

They walked back to their car together.

~

They hadn’t talked much on the drive home. Blane had held her hand again, and she’d done her best not to cling to his too tightly. She’d even suggested that perhaps they could go out for dinner, although she hadn’t wanted to, and of course Blane, the wonderful, blunt man that he was, had told her no quite plainly. When she’d said she wanted to at least make him a final dinner he would enjoy, he’d gone straight to the fridge and taken out the leftover moussaka, and she had understood immediately.

After yesterday—making it together, laughing over the garlic grater, making love while it baked—she suspected moussaka would forever be one of her favorite things.

Now, they moved around the kitchen together in that easy way that had somehow come to them without either of them ever having to learn it. From his first day here, Blane had found where everything lived without ever seeming to try. He knew which drawer held the spoons, that the good olive oil was the tin without the fancy label, and that the oven tended to run hot. Bea swallowed and turned away. Tomorrow he wouldn’t need to know any of it.

Her gaze landed on his bag, standing by the front door where he’d left it. She’d watched him pack it with the same unhurried competence he brought to everything, until eventually she’d had to leave the room.

They ate on the terrace because the evening was warm and the rain was long gone. The sun was going down behind the mountains, casting gold across the olive groves; jasmine drifted on the breeze, and the cicadas provided the same familiar soundtrack they had every other evening. And Bea knew she was being ridiculous in trying to somehow make their last dinner together perfect.

She set down her fork. No matter how beautiful the setting was, there was no way to make tonight perfect. Tomorrow, Blane was leaving.

He looked across at her and reached over the table. She placed her hand in his and gave it a squeeze. She’d promised herself she’d be good tonight. She’d been good all day. She’d made it through the shock of his news this morning and managed to focus on the fun they could find in going to Chania, even in the ridiculous business of folding him into her tiny new car. She’d kept things light and kept them both laughing, because falling apart wouldn’t buy her a single extra minute with him and would only spoil the ones she had left. She could fall apart tomorrow. She’d have all the time in the world to fall apart tomorrow.

“Bea.”

She looked up.

He’d put his fork down too and was watching her with that steady gray gaze, and it felt as though he could see straight through every bright thing she’d been building around them all day.

“You don’t have to do that,” he said quietly.

“Do what?”

“Make it all right.”

And there it was. Everything she’d been holding in since he’d come downstairs this morning and told her about Cash came rushing up through her chest faster than she could get hold of it. Her eyes filled before she could tell them not to.

“I don’t know how to do anything else,” she managed.

He was out of his chair and crouched in front of her before the first tear had gone very far, his warm hands covering hers where they were clasped tightly together in her lap.