We Knew All Along

WE KNEW ALL ALONG

A NOVEL

MINA HARDY

For anyone who’s never had a book dedicated to them before, this one’s for you.

CHAPTER
1

WHAT DO YOU do when you look across the room and see the one man you’ve never been able to forget? You thank whatever god is responsible for push-up bras and the stomach flu that got rid of that last four pounds. You swallow the last of your complimentary glass of cheap champagne, and you take a deep breath. You lift your chin and turn away from him.

And then you wait.

It takes Christian Campbell exactly three minutes to cross the ballroom and tap me on the shoulder. I know because I counted each second passing on the big, ornate wall clock above the double doors leading to the hotel hallway. Three minutes is not a long time, but it felt like forever … and also not nearly long enough.

I don’t turn around, not right away, not for as long as it takes me to breathe in and out and my heart to thunk a quadruple beat.

“Jewel? Jewelann Kahan?”

At the sound of my name, I turn, turn, turn. I slowly, slowly turn. A smile. A tilt of my head, brow a little furrowed, but only a little. It’s a face that says I should know him, but I don’t … quite … remember …

“It’s me,” he says with a thump of his fingers on his chest, over his heart. “Christian.”

I take a few delicate steps back, feigning shock. Of course I know him. I’d been searching for a sight of him from the first moment I stepped through the doors into the ballroom. I hadn’t even been planning to come to this stupid reunion until I saw on our high school’s Connex page that he was listed as an attendee. There had been a list of the Labor Day weekend event schedule and the confirmed RSVPs, account profiles tagged for each one. I’d thought of C.C. many times over the years since I’d last seen him, but this was the first time I’d ever looked him up online. There was nothing to see but a gray silhouette and an empty profile.

“Oh,” I reply simply. No gushing. No arms open for a hug, no turning my cheek for a fake air kiss.

He notices, all right. His crystal-blue eyes narrow for a moment, looking me over. Assessing. It’s the way he used to look at me in high school, back when I powdered my fair skin to a ghostly pallor and dyed my naturally pale hair black, when I shrouded my curves in layers of black. I’ve never had a man look at me that way since.

“You haven’t changed much.” I instantly regret allowing him to get under my skin. I’d planned this night so carefully, from top to toe. I can’t screw it up. I won’t.