I nodded. “I do.”
“Then come with me.”
I swallowed. “Yes. Yes, I’ll come with you.”
The day before I was supposed to leave, I was preparing to tell my parents, but having a hard time figuring out how. They’d think I was being impulsive. They’d say this was young love that wouldn’t last. How could I convince them otherwise?
A knock on my dorm room door interrupted my plotting. I opened it to find an extremely well-dressed woman in her early fifties.
“Ms. Serena Moore?”
“Yes.”
“I’m Katherine Roarke. Devin’s mother.”
Oh crap, I thought as I looked down at my sweatpants and t-shirt. “Mrs. Roarke. Come in.”
She glanced through my room like she was afraid it was infested. But she stepped inside. “I’ve come to tell you not to go to Europe with my son.”
I frowned. “Why not?” Inwardly I kicked myself. She didn’t want me to sully her son, I was sure.
“Because he’s leading you on.”
Huh?
She gave me an apologetic stare. “I’m afraid my son is spoiled and entitled. It’s one reason we’re sending him to Europe. He needs to grow up. Learn to be responsible.”
The Devin I knew seemed grown up and responsible enough.
She sighed. “He’s not in love with you. In fact, you’re not the only woman he spends time with.”
Something in my chest shifted. I didn’t want to believe her, and yet, I could feel my faith in Devin slip. He was young, rich and handsome. He could have any woman he wanted. In the near-week we’d been together, I couldn’t figure out what he saw in me.
“I hate to do this. Every time I have to talk to some young woman, I hate it. Somewhere I’ve done wrong by him.”
My heart began to split as she pulled out something from her purse. She handed it to me.
“This is Devin the other day.”
I looked at the photograph of Devin with a gorgeous blonde woman who was clearly from his world. He had his arm around her, and she had her hand on his chest, gazing up at him with adoration. He was smiling down at her.
“Why Evelyn puts up with his philandering ways, I don’t know. My husband doesn’t stray. We’re hoping he’ll grow out of it.”
Evelyn. Was that the Evie that sometimes came up in conversation?
I stared at that picture, as I replayed the last days I spent with Devin. The man in this picture, that his mother was describing, wasn’t the man I knew. But then, how mu
ch did I really know about him? Only what he told me.
“This younger generation does love to sow its oats.” She smiled sympathetically. “At the expense of nice young women like you. I do apologize for my son.”
I handed the picture back.
She put the photo back in her purse. “I’m prepared to compensate you. Sometimes money can soothe the hurt.”
I was pretty sure Fort Knox wouldn’t fix my hurt. I shook my head. “No. That won’t be necessary.”
She studied me for a moment, and I guessed that the other women she’d had this talk with had taken the money.