Read Online Promise Me by Richard Paul Evans - Free Book Online Page B

routine gallbladder operation. My aunt stepped in for a while, but it was obvious to me that it was out of obligation, not desire. At eighteen you’re pretty much on your own anyway. I met Marc my sophomore year in college and jumped when he popped the question. I’m not saying I didn’t love him. I just didn’t love him as much as I hated being alone. And I paid for it.
    Was there someone else out there for me? My thoughtsdrifted to the man at the store. Matthew. Was I pushing away exactly what I was hoping for? Would it have killed me to let him in, just a little? To put my toe in the water? He seemed sincere. He seemed nice enough.
    Nice.
I grimaced at the thought.
Another nice guy. Like Marc
. Maybe it’s the nice guys who aren’t to be trusted. Maybe it was the very façade of “nice” one should avoid; sheep’s clothing, right?
Better the devil we know
.
    The bottom line was, I didn’t know. I didn’t know whom, if anyone, I could trust. The only thing I knew for certain was whom I couldn’t trust: me. Or at least my sense of discernment. For seven years I had lived a charade. For seven years my husband, my best friend, my soul mate, had moved through a succession of women while I minded the home fires oblivious to it all. What a fool I was. I mean, really, how stupid could a woman be?
    I suppose that all I knew for certain was that I couldn’t be drained again. There was too little left—my heart too close to empty.
    At midnight I could hear the pop of firecrackers and Roman candles from across the street and the ruckus of Margaret’s clan beating pans together in their front yard. I looked out the window. “Happy New Year,” I said to no one. And I said it without hope. Happiness was a dark horse.

This man just keeps coming back like a flesh-covered boomerang. I hope he’s not crooked too.
    Beth Cardall’s Diary
    I was glad for the holidays to be over and for things to get back to normal, whatever that was these days. I was pressing suit coats when Teresa minced her way back to my station. Teresa was Prompt’s token bombshell, a stunningly beautiful nineteen-year-old blonde—former homecoming queen, head cheerleader, you know the type. Roxanne opined that Teresa’s main purpose for existence was to remind her of how old and undesirable she’d become.
    Teresa had pulled her Walkman’s earphones down around her neck, and her face was bent in a wide smile. “Beth, someone sent you flowers.”
    I looked up from the press. “Me?” I couldn’t guess who would be sending me flowers.
    â€œYes, you. They’re beautiful. And, by the way, you can keep the flowers, I’ll keep the deliveryman. He’s hot. I told him he could just leave the flowers with me, but he said he needed to deliver them personally.”
    The dry cleaner had a two-way mirror behind the front counter so that when we were shorthanded we could work in back and keep an eye on the lobby. I looked around my rack of coats to see this deliveryman she was talking about.Matthew was standing at the counter holding a vase of sunflowers. I went back to the suit coat I was working on, lightly sighing. “I’ll be there in a minute.”
    Teresa looked at me in astonishment. “Aren’t you dying to find out who sent them?”
    â€œI know who sent them. They’re from the man holding them.”
    She looked at me incredulously. “You’ve got to be kidding.”
    â€œWhat do you mean by that?”
    â€œNothing,” she said quickly. “Nothing. So, are you coming or should I send the Disney Prince away?”
    I hung the coat I was pressing on the rack. “I’ll be right there.”
    â€œThen I’ll give you some space. Have fun.” Teresa ran off to the bathroom. I looked back through the glass. Matthew stood patiently, swaying a little to the lobby’s music, the large blue vase clasped