Page 67 of By the Time You Read This

Chapter Twenty

Delaney

Day Five

Roan, of the Carolina mountains, was waiting for Delaney by the empty pool.

“You drink?” Roan asked, holding out an open bottle of cab sav despite the fact that it couldn’t be much past 1:00 p.m. It looked like a generic brand but Delaney wasn’t about to be picky.

“Only on good days,” she said, plopping down next to him and letting her legs dangle over the edge. She took the proffered bottle and swallowed a decent amount before passing it back.

“Today was a good day? It’s not even over yet.”

“Today was a not-bad day. Or, this morning was a not-bad morning,” Delaney said, amused with herself. “So in my life that counts.”

“Oh yeah?” Roan asked, with an easy smile, waggling the bottle to get her to take it once more. “Did someone nice share their wine with you?”

Delaney grinned. “Among other things.”

“Do tell.”

“No, I don’t think I will,” Delaney said, holding on to the bottle longer this time. “Tell me about your morning. Aren’t you supposed to be gone?”

That last bit was a good reminder that not only did she not know this man, but she didn’t know if he was secretly hunting her.

“Some kind of beauty caught my eye here,” Roan said, nodding in her direction.

Delaney laughed because the implication was that she was beautiful and she wasn’t. Once she started laughing she couldn’t stop until she was flat on her back, looking up at the sky above, tears running down her cheeks from the corners of her eyes. “You don’t need to use lines on me. Wine will do.”

Roan lowered himself onto his forearm so that he was closer but still above her. “We don’t need to watch sunsets but they sure make life better.”

“You are something else,” Delaney said. She wanted him to be who he said he was. She wanted this to be simple. “What did you do with your day so far?”

He looked away. “I thought about renting a boat. But I found a trail along the cliffs at the edge of town instead.”

“Why not the boat?”

“Um, you know movies might have made you think every bum you run into is a prince in disguise, but I left my trust fund in another life,” he said, eyes creased in amusement.

“I’ll take you out,” Delaney said.

It sounded like a dreamy promise, one that was meant to be broken even before it was made.

His brows shot up. “Are you a princess in disguise?”

Delaney laughed again. She wasn’t wealthy—there was no trust fund—but she was comfortable enough. She was so good at investing that if she wanted to devote her life to it, she could probably do that as her sole job. As it was, she always had a cushion that made escape a little more doable.

She could rent a boat.

So she did.

It turned out Roan actually knew what he was doing, so Delaney took up a spot on the bow. As they sailed toward the horizon, Delaney thought about Isabel.

Not because she would have loved this day or this moment, but because she wouldn’t. Delaney had rarely let softness into her life, had rarely seized happy moments.

But Isabel was dead now.

Delaney was allowed to enjoy this.

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