“I thought you’d be pleased. All that was a long time ago, Ev.”
“Don’t you dare undermine what happened,” I said, voice tight. “You cannot even imagine—”
“Yes, I can. I was there with you, cried with you for endless nights.”
I held up a hand. “Look, I’m not doing this right now. I’ll talk to you later. Maybe then you’ll realise I’m right.”
I walked away from her and stalked into my bedroom, slamming the door behind me like a moody teen. The funny thing was, I’d never actually been a troublesome teenager. In fact, I was much easier to get along with then than I was now.
I procrastinated in my room all day: dicking around on Facebook, plucking my eyebrows, experimenting with nail polish. I didn’t want to face Yvonne. I hated fighting with her, but she just didn’t understand how seeing Dylan again affected me, how it tossed my heart in a blender and smushed it right up.
How it made me want things I had no business wanting.
No business at all.
Chapter 2
Later that night, I walked into FEST still feeling frazzled. Once tensions simmered down between Yvonne and me, I planned to quiz her on everything she spoke about with Dylan. It was foolish, but I had to know.
It took me a minute to stash my things in the locker room and then I was at the bar, taking endless drinks orders.
“You get up to much today?” Danni asked as she mixed a margarita.
I saw the love of my life for the first time in eight years.
“Nope, not much.”
“Yeah, me neither. I stayed in bed and watched a marathon of Jersey Shore.”
“A highly productive day, then,” I joked.
She grinned. “Oh, yah.”
“Can I get a pint of lager? Whatever’s best here,” came a voice and an unwelcome, pleasurable shudder ran through me. That voice. He could read the phonebook aloud, and I’d be a captive audience of one.
“Still drinking lager?” I asked. “Some things don’t change.” My outward demeanour was cucumber cool, while on the inside I was flustered, too hot, like I’d bitten down on a chili pepper.
“A lot of things don’t change,” Dylan said as he reached up to loosen his tie. Danni mistook him for just another customer, and went to serve someone else. I studied Dylan and again, wondered why he was here.
“So, Yvonne told you where I work,” I guessed as I pulled his pint. “You two must’ve had quite the cosy convo over lunch.”
“You missed a lovely meal,” Dylan replied.
“I was under the weather.”
“And you go jogging when you’re ill now? That’s new,” he went on, the left side of his mouth lifting in amusement. There was a charming lilt to his voice that drew a smile out of me.
“Yep. A good vigorous jog drives out all the pathogens,” I replied and handed him his drink. “Ten dollars, please.”
Dylan pulled out a flashy black credit card, and I took it without comment. “Runaway” by Kanye West came on and it was funny, because half of me wanted to run away from this whole encounter. The other half was glued to the spot, eyes wide and waiting for Dylan to reveal his intentions.
The lyrics were oddly reminiscent of our teenage years. Dylan had always been good at finding things wrong with the world. His true talent expressing what he didn’t like. Maybe I should’ve run away from him back then, that way I might never have caught his illness. He never would’ve taught me to be dissatisfied with my lot.
I handed him his card and a moment of quiet passed in the loud bar.
His eyes wandered to my top. “Did Yvonne pick the uniforms here? I’ll have to send her my thanks.”
I shook my head at him just as a customer asked me for a rum and Coke. “No, I think that was someone higher up,” I replied as I made the drink.
“Probably a man,” Dylan said.
“Probably,” I agreed. The uniform at FEST consisted of a black top with a sweetheart neckline, and tight black jeans. The male members of staff wore similarly black fitted shirts and jeans.
“So, do you ever talk to Conor and Amy these days?” I asked. They were Dylan’s two closest friends when we were growing up. I used to think of the three of them as a gaggle of misfits in a place where it was safer to be just another sheep in the herd.
“Amy’s living in London now. She’s married with kids, working in film. And Conor’s actually the COO of my company,” Dylan replied, and the news surprised me. I didn’t think he’d keep in touch with anyone from the old days. I knew I didn’t. I certainly didn’t think he’d make his old friend Chief Operating Officer of his business.
“Well, Amy always was obsessed with that little camcorder of hers. And Conor has a good head on his shoulders. To think he might’ve become a boring old accountant,” I said.
“Conor’s business sense is half the reason for Dylan’s success. He’s the strategies, I’m the ideas.”
“Right. And how are things over at Dylan HQ these days?” I asked.
That was the name of his perfume brand. I thought it was pretty savvy to name a women’s perfume after a man they’d probably drop their knickers for in a heartbeat. At the same time, it was pretentious as fuck. Well, it would be if I didn’t know Dylan so well. My guess was the name choice was somebody else’s idea. Probably Conor’s.
“We just opened our new store in New York and things are going well. Yvonne told you that’s where she found me, right? She stumbled into the shop last week.”
“Yeah, she said.”
“You should come by tomorrow if you’re free. I’d love to show you around.”
“Perfume’s not really my thing.”
Dylan raised a disbelieving eyebrow. “You mean to tell me you’re not gardening up a storm on some rooftop here in New York?”
I frowned, the weight of the world sinking a hole in my gut. “I don’t do that anymore,” I said, subdued.
Now his brows drew together in perplexity. “You don’t garden?”
I huffed a breath. “What’s the point? Everything you grow just ends up dying.”
With that I walked to the other end of the bar and tended to some customers. Dylan remained seated, sipping on his lager while he watched me work. I found it disconcerting, especially how he brought up the whole gardening thing. You could say I was the one who first introduced Dylan to flowers, and the ways you could combine them to create pretty scents.
His signature and most popular perfume was called E.V. Sometimes I’d catch sight of it in a shop window and wonder if he’d named it after me, since everybody called me Ev. Then I’d think better of the foolish notion and continue on my way.
Besides, it probably stood for something pretentious and nonsensical, like Evocative Vision or Eclipse Voyeur. His other scents had names like Synaesthesia and Limerence, so it wasn’t a huge stretch.
When there was a lull in customers, I pulled myself together and returned to Dylan. His glass was almost empty.
“Want another?”
“Sure.”
I quietly took his old glass and replaced it with a new one. “Let’s just . . . not talk about gardening. It’s sort of a sore subject for me.”
“No, I understand,” Dylan replied. He’d obviously done some thinking over the last half hour and come to the realisation of why I no longer grew things.
I didn’t know what to say, so I busied myself wiping clean the bar top.
“I used to be the pessimistic one,” he said. “Feels like we switched roles.”
“You’ve left your fatalistic ways behind?” I asked, curious.
“Guess I’ve realised life’s not so bad.”
I shot him a smirk. “Few bob in your pocket will do that.”
He gave a self-deprecating smile. “Maybe.”
“And what do you do nowadays in your spare time? I mean, if ranting about the injustice of the world no longer does it for you, you must have a good sixteen hours spare in the day for other stuff.”
 
; Dylan laughed, the sound like water to the desert of my heart. “Mostly, I work. I try to develop new perfumes, figure out ways to make people want to buy them. Doesn’t leave a lot of room for much else.”
“So,” I hedged, glancing briefly at his bare ring finger. “No wife?”
He gave a faint smile, eyes wandering in the direction mine had gone. “Why, you interested?”
I rolled my eyes. “Oh, yeah. Sign me up.”
“The job’s yours. When can you start?”
I pursed my lips and tried not to smile, but I couldn’t help it. Dylan had always been a sly flirt. You thought you were having a regular conversation and then bam, you were in the middle of a full-on seduction fest.
“Who’s to say I don’t have a husband?”
His grin was knowing. “Yvonne said you’re single.”
Damn my aunt and her big mouth. I narrowed my gaze at him playfully. “I have to get back to work now.”
“Go ahead. I’ll just sit here and enjoy myself.”
“You do that.”
Two hours later, Dylan was still at the bar. He alternated between watching me work and replying to texts on his phone. I wondered if it was business or personal. Probably business, since he mentioned that’s all he had time for these days. And there was no wife in the picture. I couldn’t help being pleased by that fact.
Although, that didn’t mean there wasn’t a girlfriend.
When my shift ended, I took my time balancing my till and cleaning up the bar, thinking Dylan would get bored and leave, but he didn’t.
“Don’t you have a bed to get to?” I asked as I buttoned up my coat.
Dylan followed me out and opened the door for me, all chivalrous. I suspected he might be after an old-time’s-sake shag, but then he said, “Let me buy you breakfast.”
“It’s three a.m.”
“And we’re in New York. You can get breakfast here any time you want.”
“The land of miracles,” I deadpanned, but I was charmed. Very charmed. And too easily.
“Come on,” he said and offered his arm. “I’m in the mood for blueberry pancakes.”
I gave a sigh and linked my arm through his. “Fine, but you’re buying.”
“What kind of gentleman would I be if I didn’t?”
“I don’t know why people think being a gentleman is a good thing. When I think of the word all I see is some snobbish eighteenth-century fop in a Jane Austen novel.”
“You’re right. I’m more of a working-class hero.”
I pointed a finger at what he was wearing. “Not in that suit.”
“I have to dress this way for work,” he said, seeming pleased with our banter. “If I didn’t, nobody would take me seriously.”
“Well, it doesn’t need to be Gucci. You could don some Dunnes Finest and still look the part.”
His laugh made me feel all shimmery inside, like I was a teenager all over again. “I don’t think they have Dunnes Stores over here, Ev.”
“A pity, they do some nice stuff. Affordable, too.”
He shook his head, and we stopped in front of a small diner. “Here we are.”
The place looked a little grotty, but it had a cosy charm. “Is this one of those hidden gems? Did you find it on TripAdvisor?”
“Nope. I spotted it from down the street and thought it looked decent,” he replied.
“What kind of self-respecting millennial are you? You didn’t even read a review first.”
“Food’s food, Ev. Now get your arse inside.” He placed his hand to the small of my back to usher me in. It was the first time he’d touched me in years, and I had all kinds of feelings. Feelings it’d take me a bottle of wine and a quiet evening to unravel.
We got a booth, the leather worn from overuse. I sat on one side and Dylan sat on the other. He clasped his hands together and gazed at me, like he couldn’t believe his luck that we were sitting across a table from one another. I picked up the menu and busied myself studying each item, a tad nervous. There was something about the one-on-one time that ramped up my anxiety. At least back at the bar I had work to focus on.
As it happened, they did serve pancakes, but I opted for some scrambled eggs on toast. Dylan told the waiter he’d have the same.
“You changed my mind,” he said and closed over the menu to study me. “How long have you been living here?”
“A little over two months. Yvonne’s been here years though. She probably told you. I finally decided to join her.”
“What made you change your mind?”
I looked away, eyes downcast as I answered, “Gran died last Christmas. She got pneumonia after an operation, and her immune system couldn’t fight it.”
Immediately, Dylan reached out and took my hand. His palm felt nice, warm and dry, and I savoured the quiet moment of empathy.
“I’m sorry,” he murmured. “I always liked her.”
“And she liked you. The way her face used to light up when you’d come with me to visit . . . it was something else.”
“I visited her on my own once,” Dylan confessed and my eyes widened in surprise.
“You did?”
“Towards the end, right before I left the Villas, I needed someone to talk to,” he replied. “And she always gave the best advice.”
I leaned forward, interested. “What did you ask her?”
Dylan let go of my hand and sat back, his expression sincere. “I asked her how to convince you to come away with me.”
My breath caught. Gran never told me Dylan went to see her. Maybe she thought it was for the best. “And what did she say?”
He exhaled and leaned forward to rest both elbows on the table. His eyes flickered between mine when he replied, “She said I needed to let you make your own decisions. That if I pushed you, we’d both only end up regretting it.”
I fiddled with my napkin, smoothed my finger down its folded edge and muttered quietly, “She was a wise lady.”
“That she was,” Dylan agreed.
The server came with our food, and we both tucked in. I was still eating when Dylan finished, but he simply sat back, sipped his coffee and watched me.
“What?” I asked.
“You’re so much older.”
“Jeez, thanks.”
“I didn’t mean you look old. It’s different. It’s like you’ve grown into your face.”
“You don’t half know how to dig yourself a hole.”
His expression was amiable. “Believe me, Ev. This is a compliment.”
“Well, you’re older, too. You’re all . . . businessman-ish.” Hot businessman-ish.
He chuckled. “Okay, that one you’re gonna have to explain.”
I swished my finger in the air and dabbed my mouth with a napkin. “For starters, there’s the suit. Boys from the Villas only wore a suit for three reasons: wedding, funeral, court. And sometimes not even then.”
“Okay, what else?”
“The way you carry yourself. It’s like you know you’re important. You know people depend on you. It’s a world away from the Dylan I knew.”
“I’m still exactly the same person, Evelyn. I just grew up. We both did.”
“Hmm,” I said. I was locked in his dark blue gaze when his phone lit up with a text. He’d placed it right on the table, so I saw the message flash across the screen.
Laura: You up, hon? xoxo
Well, I knew what a ‘you up?’ message meant when I saw one, especially when the question was followed by kisses. Dylan had been booty called, or more specifically, booty texted. Given that it was almost four in the morning, this Laura person must’ve been eager. Or suffering from insomnia. Or knew if she texted he’d come.
Saying that, the text didn’t really surprise me. He might not have a wife, but a man as successful and handsome as Dylan had to have lady acquaintances. I bet he was fighting them off with a stick.
He quickly pressed a button and the screen went blank. He wasn’t fast enough though, and he knew it. r />
“That was just—”
“A lady?”
His mouth twitched. “Yeah, a lady.”
I gestured to his phone. “Well? Aren’t you going to reply? She wants to know if you’re up and you are, so . . .”
“True, but I’m busy having breakfast with an old friend.”
“And we’re just about finished, so go on, knock yourself out. Text her back.”
“Ev.”
“What?”
He was about to say something when he shook his head and seemed to think better of it. He slipped his phone in his pocket and stood from the table, coming around to help me out of my seat. I went to put my coat on, but he got there first. I sucked in a breath when he draped it over my shoulders and buttoned it up as I slid my arms in.
“There,” he said, voice soft.
“I think I’ll get a taxi home. I’m too tired for the subway.”
“Come on. I’ll help you hail one.”
A few minutes later, I was in the back of a yellow taxi. Dylan handed the driver a few bills to pay for the journey, which I thought was kind of him. He leaned down to the window to talk to me before the driver pulled away.
“So, I’ll see you tomorrow at twelve, yeah?”
I furrowed my brow. “What’s tomorrow?”
“You’re coming to see my shop,” he said and then he was too far away for me to respond. The taxi joined traffic, and I flopped back into the seat, emitting a long breath.
A couple of days ago I would’ve sworn we’d never cross paths again, but I’d just had breakfast at three in the morning with Dylan O’Dea and tomorrow he wanted me to visit his perfume shop.
The most surprising thing though? I actually wanted to go. After so many years following his career from afar, I wanted to see what his life was like up close. So yeah, even though I knew it was probably a terrible idea, I was going to take Dylan up on his invite.
I was going to see what all the fuss was about.
Chapter 3
Dylan was on Sixth Avenue.
The shopfront consisted of a large, floor-to-ceiling window, framed by what appeared to be black marble. It gave a sleek and expensive impression, just like the perfumes contained within. I stood outside in my five-year-old jeans, navy parka, and scuffed Doc Martens, wondering what on earth I was doing there.