After You (Because of You 2)

I pivot, figuring I should at least face him. His hair is cut short now. I don’t know how it wasn’t the first thing I noticed, but as he walks close, the long, golden locks I loved to run my fingers through are gone. There’s still enough to run my fingers through, but no length.

“You cut your hair,” I remark.

“I did. Like it?”

“No.”

He smiles. My heart stops. Another battalion of ice soldiers plummet to their deaths. Ducking his head in a way I can’t help finding endearing, Derek remarks, “Yeah, you never were a big fan of change.”

My jaw drops at what feels like an accusation. “Change?” I reiterate. “You mean like the kind of change where you impregnate and start a life with someone else? Yeah, you’re right; I wasn’t fond of that one. What a rigid asshole I must be.”

Grimacing and pushing a hand through his shorn locks, Derek says, “That isn’t what I meant. I really don’t want to start off on that foot, Nikki.”

“I don’t care which foot you want to start out on,” I inform him. “This is my father’s wedding. This is supposed to be a good day. You’re clearly just as selfish as you always were or you wouldn’t have crashed it and ruined it for me. Now, you need to leave before Alex sees you, because he will murder you, and I’m pretty sure he doesn’t want to spend his honeymoon in prison.”

“I guess I don’t have to ask if you’re still mad at me,” he remarks.

“Go to hell,” I tell him.

“Nah,” he says, shrugging. “Spent some time there already. Don’t really want to go back.” Reaching into a pocket inside his jacket, he extracts an envelope. “I brought a wedding present, if that helps.”

“Is it a time machine?” I ask.

“No.”

“Then we don’t want it.”

Familiar blue eyes hold my gaze for a moment, then Derek nods. “All right. I’ll leave—but not until I get a chance to talk to you. You got to say your piece in just under a thousand pages; I think it’s time you let me say mine.”

Shaking my head, I tell him, “You’ve got balls, Noble.”

He smirks. “Always have. Don’t know why you’re surprised.”

I cock an eyebrow. “Yeah? Where were they when Kayla got pregnant? I don’t recall you having any balls when all that went down.”

Instead of being offended, he offers, “They went on sabbatical. Had to do a little soul-searching, see the sights. They’re back now and here to stay.”

I am not amused. “It’s been six years, Derek.”

His smile wilts. “I know how long it’s been, Nikki.”

“You can’t just show up after six years.”

Gesturing to his body, he says, “And yet, here I am.”

I shake my head, looking toward the exit doors. I don’t have tim

e for this. I don’t have time to stand here and let him rip my world apart. The wedding is starting in literally minutes. If he’s not going to leave, I need to put him somewhere. I should shove him in a room—the little kitchenette with a sauce-spattered microwave and cheap fold-up chairs assembled around a table, maybe. No one is in there. I can go outside and participate in this wedding, trying to pretend everything is just fine, then when it’s over, before I head in to the reception, I can duck inside the abandoned room and let Derek say his piece, whatever that means. Replay our last goodbye, years later in a different setting.

Why is he doing this to me?

Why am I letting him do this to me? I should just say no. I should tell him I don’t want to hear anything he has to say and he needs to go.

I don’t have the will-power. I’m too curious. What does he have to say to me that’s so urgent he would come all the way here to upstate New York, no less than three hours away from where I know he still lives? And he had to know there was a good chance he wouldn’t even see me. If Alex had seen him first, this reunion would not be happening.

The Derek I remember didn’t take chances for me.

Sighing, I look ahead at the oak double doors leading to the altar room. There’s a smaller man-door off to the left, a subtler entry into the aisle at the end of the room. I know from my last check there are some open seats in the back pew. Could I sneak Derek in the ceremony room without Alex noticing? He might legitimately stop the wedding if he sees Derek here, but he would never in a million years think to look for him.