Azure (Drowning In You) by Chrystalla Thoma Read Free Book Online Page A

him, though.
    Which only made her more curious.
    “All right,” he said. “One question. But I want your story first.”
    She smiled behind her glass. Then frowned, because she couldn’t avoid telling him any longer. But where to start? Better ease him into it.
    “It’s an engagement ring,” she said and saw his eyes widen.
    Yeah, so much for easing him into it.
    “He left you?” he breathed, and she was instantly angry at him for thinking that.
    “He proposed two weeks ago, actually.”
    “Proposed.” Kai blinked and frowned. “Are we talking marriage here?”
    “What do you think?” She put the glass on the table, watched the marks left by her fingers on the condensation, wrestled down the anger. Not Kai’s fault. “Yes, marriage. He proposed all formal, too, down on one knee, the whole nine yards.”
    He tugged on the neckline of his tee, as if he couldn’t breathe, and leaned forward. “You refused.” It wasn’t a question this time.
    Still, she nodded. “I did.”
    He leaned back, letting go of his tee. He watched her as if reading her face. “But that’s not all.”
    Damn right it wasn’t. But he wouldn’t know, would he? Nobody could. “It was too soon. I wasn’t ready. I didn’t feel...” Didn’t feel like I loved him. “He mentioned babies and a house, and I tried to picture myself with his kids, with him, and I couldn’t. I’ve only known him for a few months!” She shook her head.
    He said nothing; seemed to be waiting for more, and she wondered yet again why she was telling him all this.
    Maybe because he’d asked. Persisted. She hadn’t even told Kirsten what happened afterward, but he gave her that expectant look, as if it mattered to him, as if he really cared to know why she was sad.
    “I said no. He said I’d come around. We had a huge fight.” The things he’d said... Horrible things. Too close to home. That she didn’t pay attention to others’ feelings, didn’t seem to notice or care. “I hadn’t known the ring meant anything. He bought it for me just a month after we started going out together. I didn’t think...” She never thought. That was her problem. “He was supposed to come to Crete with me, but after the fight we didn’t speak again and he didn’t show up at the airport, so... Here I am.”
    With my heart bruised. Sort of shredded. But not broken. Because she didn’t love Justin as she’d thought she did, and the way he’d smashed things and yelled at her during the fight told her there was a reason. Many reasons, probably. Anyway, it was over now.
      “But you kept the ring,” he said, thoughtful. “You were still wearing it around your neck two days ago.”
    “I guess I hoped we’d make up.” Though really, had she hoped that? She’d been confused, that much was true.
    Her chest felt too tight and it wasn’t for Justin. No, it was all that had happened in the past year, rising up to choke her.
    The soft noises of their surroundings — the low voices of the other customers, the rustling of leaves overhead, the clinking of spoons on dishes — rose to engulf her and she feared she might break down, right there, in front of this beautiful stranger who owed her nothing.
    She wanted to run out of the cafe and find a quiet corner to sob. She hadn’t cried after the fight, hadn’t cried... in a long time.
    Oh god, how mortifying.
    His hand was suddenly on top of hers. “ Liv . Are you okay?”
    “Yeah.” She shook her head, her breath caught on a sob. “Yeah, I’m all right.”
    “Here,” he said. “Try this.” He pushed the sweet toward her.
    Glad for the diversion, she leaned forward and gave the sweet a suspicious look. “What is it?”
    “Watermelon preserve.”
    “You’re kidding me. Watermelon’s red, and this is a yellowish strip of something.”
    “Watermelon rind, the white part between the red and the green. Cooked with sugar.”
    “Really?”
    “Try it,” Kai said again and she stabbed the small fork into the