Still the One

  Love, AJ.

  What was with the Love, AJ?

  She stared at the two words once again scrawled in his usual messy block writing and told herself for the second time that it was nothing more than a figure of speech.

  She believed he felt a great deal for her. And she felt a great deal for him as well. It didn’t matter whether she was hurting or scared or just in general losing her collective shit, it was AJ she yearned for. AJ’s arms around her. AJ’s low voice in her ear, steadying her. AJ’s belief in her.

  He always seemed to just accept her as she was. He wasn’t going to ever try to change her. Or send her away when she didn’t react as he wanted. He wasn’t going to turn his back on her.

  Reject her.

  It was both wondrous and empowering knowing that he stood at her back no matter what.

  Smiling, she tossed back the covers and—in her mind—she leapt to her feet. In reality, she got out of bed like an old lady and carefully stretched to avoid a cramp. “Really over that,” she said.

  She gave herself three minutes in the hot water with AJ’s soap.

  She could’ve taken an hour.

  Especially if he’d been in here with her. He had a way of making her feel like the most beautiful woman in the world, exquisitely female and desirable and … beautiful. With nothing more than a look or a few words, he could take away all her self-doubt in her mind and make her feel good about herself.

  But there was something more going on here, something far bigger. For as long as she could remember she’d traveled around experiencing things most people never got to. It had been great, but she’d never really felt entirely secure or particularly safe, not like she did here. With AJ. She hadn’t even realized she’d needed to feel either of those things.

  “You’ve got it bad,” she muttered, and dried off with his towel, getting another thrill because it was still damp from his body.

  The rain had stopped when she walked into the wellness center.

  Ariana stood behind the desk looking over her schedule for the day. She glanced over at Darcy, went still for a beat, and then nodded.

  “What?”

  “It agrees with you.”

  “What does?”

  “Love.”

  Darcy waited for the panic to hit, but it didn’t. “Where is he?”

  “In his office. He’s—”

  “Getting ready for a meeting,” Darcy said, heading down the hallway. “I know, thanks.” She wanted to catch him alone for a minute before Trent and Summer arrived. Well, okay, she wanted to throw herself at him and kiss him. And then she wanted to tell him that she loved him, too. And then … She glanced at her phone, wondering if they had time to pull an Adam and Holly and steal a few moments in a closet—

  “So where’s your lovely girlfriend?” a woman’s voice asked from inside AJ’s office. “Or maybe you’ve made Darcy your fiancée by now?”

  Summer, Darcy realized. She and Trent must’ve already arrived. She couldn’t see through the big glass window that opened from AJ’s office to the gym because his shutters were closed.

  “Trust me.” This was Trent. “Making that woman your wife would be the best thing you could ever do for yourself.”

  Darcy felt the warmth of pleasure at his words. They thought she’d be good for AJ. And she was, she told herself. She wasn’t like Kayla. She wasn’t lost in her own head, unable to love. Not anymore. She made him laugh, made him happy. And damn, that realization felt good. So good.

  Summer hummed her agreement with Trent. “That’s because I’m the best thing that ever happened to you,” she said.

  “You absolutely are,” Trent agreed. “AJ, we’ve had many talks about you. And Darcy, too. You should know, it was mostly your lovely other half that actually sealed the deal for you. It’s one thing to know that you’re a great physical therapist and philanthropist, but it’s another to learn you’re a good enough man to catch and hold on to a woman like that. I hope she’s around today, I’d like to see her after we get our financial details handled. I want to thank her again for talking to Summer, for being such an important part of our decision.”

  Darcy glowed a little bit more and took a step to make her presence known but just then AJ spoke and she stopped short.

  “I’m glad you were so impressed by her,” he said. “She impresses the hell out of me daily. But I’ve got to be honest with you. We’re not a couple, at least not how you think.”

  Darcy couldn’t move. She was rooted to the spot.

  “I didn’t realize your decision hinged on her,” AJ went on. “The truth is, when you saw us in Boise, Darcy was there as a job, as a favor to me.”

  There was a beat of shocked silence, both in the office and in Darcy’s heart.

  “But, AJ, I saw you two,” Summer said. “I saw how you looked at each other. It was so natural, like it was meant to be.”

  “I’m sorry,” AJ said. “The truth is she wasn’t even the patient I wanted you to meet.”

  Darcy staggered back a step on that one, like he’d slapped her in the face. And though he was simply telling the truth, it felt like a shocking, slicing rejection, the second in as many days. And she actually looked down at herself, because surely with this much pain she was bleeding out all over the floor.

  Nope. No blood. She wasn’t dying. Yay.

  So many things burst through her. Anger. Sadness. Humiliation. All of them racing for the lead.

  Anger won.

  Before she’d even realized she’d moved, she was on the go, practically running back down the hallway to the front.

  Ariana looked up and frowned. “You okay?”

  No. No, she wasn’t even in the vicinity of okay. She swiped at her eyes, startled to realize she was crying.

  You hurt everyone you claim to love, Xander had said.

  It’s not what you think between us, AJ had said. She was there as a job … She wasn’t even the patient I wanted you to meet …

  Darcy wanted to curl into a ball. She wanted to throw something. “I’m …” Her phone rang and she reached for it without thinking.

  “Got a dog situation,” Johnny said in her ear.

  She swiped the last of the tears from her face. That was it, she was not going to shed another single one. She’d been disappointed before, hurt before. She knew how to pick herself up and keep going, it was what she did.

  She’d simply do it again.

  No one would ever see how AJ’s words had affected her. Especially AJ himself. She covered the mouthpiece on her phone and said to Ariana, “I don’t feel well.” Understatement of the year. “I need a minute and some fresh air.”

  “Take all the time you need,” Ariana said. “I can cover your shift if you need.”

  That she was being so nice only brought Darcy closer to the brink. “Thanks,” she managed and walked outside.

  “Define situation,” she said to Johnny.

  “Four-year-old yellow Lab service dog,” he said. “His owner went senile and they removed the dog from the home. Two attempts at reassigning him have failed. He’s outta here unless you want him.”

  “Yes,” she said immediately, her heart breaking, although she didn’t know if it was for herself or for the dog. The fact was that some dogs just couldn’t be reassigned as a full-fledged service dog. But she’d bet her last dollar that the Lab would still make a most excellent companion. And if not, she’d find a home for him anyway. “I can come after work—”

  “Now or never, sweetheart.”

  “I can’t get a ride out there until after work,” she said, knowing everyone in her world was also working today.

  “Not my problem,” Johnny said. “I’ll be here for another forty minutes. If you don’t get here before I leave, he’s going to the pound.”

  “You’re such an asshole.”

  “Of course I am. What does that have to do with anything?”

  She shook her head. “I have to work, Johnny.”

  “Well, tell
them you’re going to be late. The dog’s a purebred. He’s four hundred bucks.”

  She grounded her back teeth to powder. “One hundred.”

  “Three. And that’s final,” he said, voice hard and cold. “Forty minutes, Darcy.”

  And then he disconnected.

  “Dammit!” Zoe was on a flight. Wyatt was at work, and at this time of day he’d be in surgeries.

  God, she missed Xander, and not just because he might have driven her but because she missed him. But hell if she’d beg him to want her in his life.

  She tried Adam but he was off the grid.

  Crap. Okay, first thing’s first. She texted Ariana:

  Sorry but I’m going to take you up on your offer if that’s okay. Not feeling well. Will be back in a few hours, promise.

  Then she got into her car and headed out. She made it all the way to the turnoff to get onto the highway and … stopped.

  Stared at the onramp.

  “You’ve got this,” she whispered. “You’re going to make like a Nike commercial and just do it.” She put her foot to the accelerator and … drove right past the onramp.

  She turned around and tried again.

  Twice.

  On the third pass she slowed to a crawl, her heart pounding in her throat. Do it, just do it—

  Beepbeepbeep came the horn of some crazy person up on her tail. They whipped around, came up even with her and flipped her off, and roared onto the highway.

  “Hey!” she yelled after him, sticking her head out the window to return the gesture.

  “Excuse me, miss, are you having trouble?”

  Darcy turned her head and found an ancient, beat-up truck at her side, windows down, the driver somewhere between ninety and infinity, smiling at her kindly.

  “No,” she said. “I’m fine.”

  “Don’t let anyone rush you, Sweet Cheeks,” he said, and then got onto the highway going maybe twenty-five miles an hour.

  She laughed at herself—which was better than crying—and made one last attempt. She was sweating buckets and her heart was pounding so loud in her ears she couldn’t hear the radio, but she made the turn and got on the damn highway.

  “Oh shit.” She gulped air. “Okay. Well, I’m on. I’m on the highway.”

  She had no idea who she was talking to. In any case, she was shaking, and because she was going twenty miles an hour below the speed limit, she also got herself honked at a few more times.

  “It’s the skinny pedal on the right,” some asshole in a Lexus yelled at her.

  She would have flipped him off, too, but needed both hands to white-knuckle the wheel. Sucking in a breath, she told herself to think of the dog she was saving. That was the goal. She was a big girl and it had been eleven months and she could do this. It wasn’t nighttime and it wasn’t storming. The rain hadn’t started up again. Everything was entirely different than that night, she assured herself.

  Over and over.

  And then a semitruck came up on her left to pass. Note to self: If a semi can pass you, you’re going too slow.

  She didn’t care. She couldn’t bring herself to speed up. And it was too late anyway. The trucker was hauling a load of live turkeys, and while she stared at them, he honked his displeasure of her speed. She took her eyes off the turkeys to glance at him and her car seemed to catch in his draft.

  She tried to steer out of it but she couldn’t. In panic, she jerked the wheel to the right.

  Her two right tires got caught in a rut on the side of the road and for a single, terrifying second, she wasn’t in control of the car. She heard a horrified cry—her own, she realized—and hit the brakes. But it was too late, her car hydroplaned on the still-wet highway.

  “Steer into the swerve!” she yelled at herself. “Steer into the swerve!”

  So she steered into the swerve. And right into the ditch, where her front end nose-dived and hit the embankment hard.

  The airbag deployed and punched her in the face.

  She came to fighting the now deflating airbag. When she managed to get out of the car, she shook her head. Her vision was blurry and when she tried to blink past that, she realized her face was wet. Oh hell no. She was not crying again. But when she swiped an arm over her face, she realized that was true. She wasn’t crying.

  She was bleeding.

  Call for help. That’s what she needed to do.

  Her head hurt as she staggered around her car to the passenger side to look for her purse. She found it on the floor, contents scattered. She shuffled through a dog leash, a bottle of aspirin, another of her prescription meds that she still hadn’t touched, a tampon, her favorite berry lip gloss—There. There was her phone, way beneath the seat, and by the time she straightened, little black dots danced across her vision.

  Sitting down hard, blinking past the dots, she stared at her car. Worried about all the movies she’d seen where cars exploded after impact, she moved to what she thought might be a safe distance and sat on a rock to catch her breath.

  Very few cars went by. None stopped. Just as well, as she’d also seen a lot of movies where the lone girl on the side of the road meets up with a psycho dude with a machete.

  Second note to self: Stop watching scary movies.

  She needed to call for roadside assistance in a minute and get towed out of the ditch.

  And maybe the guy would also tow her straight to a new life …

  Twenty-seven

  AJ was still talking with Trent and Summer about the terms of their partnership when Ariana texted:

  Can you come up here a minute?

  AJ stood up from his desk. “Excuse me, I’ll be right back.”

  Trent looked at his watch. “We’ve got a lunch meeting with some business associates who might be interested in giving grants as well. Time is money, AJ.”

  “I realize that. I only need a minute.” He went out to the front desk and found Ariana looking harried. She was on the phone and the computer, and two people were waiting to talk to her. “Where’s Darcy?” he asked.

  She covered the mouthpiece on the phone. “Sick.”

  AJ helped the two people waiting at the counter and then waited for Ariana to get off the phone. “She’s sick?”

  She shrugged. “She was here for a few minutes. She went down the hall and then came back looking ill, saying she needed a minute. I offered to take her shift and she said she’d be back in a few hours. You screw something up?”

  “I didn’t even see her.”

  “Well, she definitely went down there.”

  AJ turned and looked at the hallway as if that was going to help him.

  Ariana sighed. “The two of you are driving me to chocolate.” She yanked open a drawer and pulled out a candy bar. “You see this? I stole it from Darcy’s stash. Like, seriously, stole it. And I think it’s messing with my karma, so you need to get this right with her so I can get back to my zen.”

  Trent strode up, looking pissed. “AJ, we need to talk.”

  “Yes, in a minute.” Unable to set aside his bad feeling on this, AJ pulled out his cell and called Darcy. She picked up on the