GET READY TO FALL IN LOVE WITH SNAPDRAGON

Deeply meaningful, desperately sensual, and inevitably bittersweet, Snapdragon deals with the quandary of choosing love over career, the weight of adulthood and the complexity of modern work-life. It rewrites the book on what a 21st century relationship should look like and keeps the reader wondering how it will end.

Read an Excerpt

She slipped out of the ladies’ lounge but dismissed the idea of returning to the reception, eager to avoid more awkward small talk at the singles table. Content to be outdoors, Darby wandered to the elegant marble patio that encircled the grand ballroom. Leaning against the cool stone wall, she breathed away her last traces of annoyance with deep inhales of warm saline air.

Darby liked old hotels, and secluded beaches, where blankets of stars twinkled more brightly than they ever did in the city. The ocean breeze stirred her dark-auburn hair until the ends floated to tickle her lips. The sound of water hitting the shore was faint against animated party sounds coming from inside. It recalled similar evenings spent in the one place she’d always been happy—her family’s house on Lake Geneva.

“You look like you’re having about as much fun as I am.”

The smooth masculine voice broke Darby from her thoughts. Her gaze fell from starry skies. Even in low light, she could see that the man who’d appeared next to her was uniquely handsome, his full lips and strong jaw belying an otherwise slender, heart-shaped face. His nose was uncommonly wide toward the middle, as if it had been broken at some point, but it flattered him.

“Oh, much, much more…” Darby teased. Something about the sarcasm in his voice compelled her to answer more acerbically than she normally would a total stranger. She angled herself toward him. “What gave me away?”

“Staying as far away as physically possible from the wedding party is usually a clue.” Taking a better look, she saw that he was clean-shaven and tall, with a swimmer’s build and a buzz cut that hinted at nearly black hair. His tanned skin offset some of the most striking dark-blue eyes she’d ever seen.

A smile hinted at the corner of his mouth. The combination of full lips and slight laugh lines that would surely improve with age elevated his status to outright sexy. The world was full of beautiful men, but it wasn’t every day she came face to face with one this good-looking.

“So I guess that’s what you’re doing out here?” she countered.

He nodded slightly, as if to admit he were just as guilty. Darby took the last swig of her champagne, and for a moment they both looked back toward the party.

“Are you like this at all weddings or is there something about this one in particular?” The question drew her gaze back to his. She was glad to have an excuse to look at him again.

“All weddings. I knew it was time to get some air when my friend started needling me about when I was going to meet a guy, buy a house with a white picket fence, and have two point five kids.”

He nodded in understanding. “I’ve been hassled about that before. Getting some air was the right call.”

“She pulls the same shit on me every time,” Darby complained lightly. “I should have just said I had a boyfriend, or worn a decoy engagement ring.”

The man weaved his head and let hesitation paint his features. “Yeah, but then you’d have to stage a fake wedding, dig up a fake fiancé, hire an actor to officiate…”

She feigned regret and murmured, “More trouble than it’s worth.”

They both chuckled.

“Well, if it’s any consolation,” he said, “I was just groped.”

She raised her eyebrows. “Groped?”

“By a married woman, no less. She spent the first two courses with her hand on my knee, then my thigh, then…”

Darby’s mouth fell open. 

He nodded in grave confirmation. “And her husband was sitting right there. I feel so…violated.” His eyes twinkled as she laughed.

“You can’t go back in there. You know that, right?”

“Well, if I can’t, neither can you.”

Interesting. “Isn’t it rude to leave before the cake is cut?” Her protest was halfhearted.

“Maybe we could go for a walk.”

* * *

Five minutes later, they were descending to the beach via ancient stone steps carved into the cliff walls. The steps were wide and steep and without a railing. Slight vertigo, plus the fact that she was wearing tall heels, had given Darby a moment of pause. But the stranger beside her gallantly allowed her to remain on the inside while offering a steady hand.

The humidity of south Florida made the air balmy, and the breeze coming off of the ocean put Darby even more at ease. As they floated down in companionable silence, the sound of their steps was muffled by the rushing water. Why hadn’t she thought of this herself? A walk on the beach was the perfect antidote to a lackluster night. And Darby loved the water. She saw it every day, but Lake Michigan did not compare to the ocean.

Before they had left the party, her new friend had slipped back inside the ballroom just long enough to procure an unopened bottle of champagne and two fresh flutes. Moments after they reached the beach and took off their shoes, he popped the bottle open and poured. When he raised his glass in a brief, silent toast, Darby did the same. He motioned in front of them, inviting her to walk first, as if champagne walks on the beach with women he’d just met were something he did every day.

“So, catch me up,” she prodded lightly. “I take it you have a name. Give me the Cliff’s Notes version of things you tell people you meet at weddings.” Attending scores of events alone had taught Darby there were only two ways conversations between strangers could go: hitting it off quickly and connecting over something real, or dreaded, inescapable small talk.

“Michael Blaine, thirty-one. Born and raised in Chicago. Architect with Dewey and Rowe. I have a twin sister, Bex, and a niece, Ella. When I’m not at work, which isn’t very often, I spend my time with them.” His voice was calm and honest. “You?”

“Darby Christensen, thirty-two. Also from Chicago. Psychopharmacologist at Northwestern Memorial. No siblings, but I do have a hermit crab named Consuela. My only other family is my dad, but I don’t see very much of him.”

She watched him attentively. Would Michael make the connection to Frank Christensen, as so many others did? Would he ask about her father, about what it was like to be a controversial senator’s daughter?

“Are you a friend of the bride or the groom?” he inquired instead.

“Benji and I went to boarding school together. I’ve known him since the sixth grade.”

Recognition dawned on Michael’s face, and he stopped walking to turn toward her. “Wait, was there another Darby in your class, or are you the Darby?”

His question was a formality—Darby wasn’t a common name and she was curious as to what he knew. “I’m guessing I’m the Darby.”

Michael took a sip of champagne, the narrow flute doing little to hide his knowing smile.

“I take it Ben’s mentioned me before?”

“Once or twice. All good things.” He said it in a way that guaranteed he was understating the truth.

Darby shook her head. “Uh-uh. You gotta give me more than that.”

His smile hadn’t disappeared, only softened. “I was his roommate all four years at Tufts.”

“Wait, you’re Mickey Blue Eyes?”

Memories flooded back to her as he let out a short laugh. “I forgot anyone ever called me that.”

“He always talked about how women fell all over you. I remember stories about girls leaving their underwear on your door and getting into catfights over you.”

“That’s an exaggeration.”

But Darby wasn’t about to let him off the hook so easily. “Girls breaking into your room to wait for you, naked, in bed was an exaggeration?”

He cast his shaking head down, seeming embarrassed. “That only happened twice.”

She laughed openly.

“Some of them were Ben’s admirers,” Michael insisted charitably.

“Uh-huh.” His modesty was endearing. “I always thought he sounded a little jealous of you…” And now I can see why.

“I don’t know about that. Besides, he was too busy pining over you to be jealous of me. You have to know it took him a long time to get over you. Like, years.”

Darby’s responding smile was bittersweet. “He was my first love,” she admitted, “the first boy I ever kissed, the first boy I ever…”

By then they’d reached the water’s edge. Michael freed one hand to place it on the small of her back and guided her to the left, his small gesture saving her from having to say more. He walked them along the shoreline as the moon shone brightly above them and the breeze from the ocean filled her nose with his spicy scent, which held delicious notes of citrus.

“My first time was with a professor…” he volunteered, perhaps compelled to disclose something personal about himself. “It was junior year of college.”

“But I thought—”

“That’s exactly what I wanted them to think. I put on a good show of confidence back then, but I was actually pretty shy.”

“So, who was the professor?”

“She taught French Lit. Her name was Genevieve, but I called her Gigi.”

Wistfulness colored his voice as he recounted the tale.  

“She asked me to be her TA the semester after I’d taken her class. We were grading midterms one holiday weekend—at her house, of course. The campus buildings were closed, and we had thirty term papers spread out all over her dining room table. We were debating the significance of one of the final lines of Candide, which roughly translates to ‘we must cultivate our own garden’—”

“Il faut cultiver notre jardin,” Darby translated. She’d been taught Candide in school. Her well-honed accent earned her a smile.

“The debate got heated—in a good way—and the next thing I knew, I was spread out all over her dining room table.”

“Sounds hot.”

The moon was bright enough to see his face clearly, and his eyes masked nothing. “It was.”

A heat she hadn’t felt in a very long time began in Darby’s stomach and seemed to work its way down. “So how long did it last?”

He looked out at the water for a second before swinging his gaze back to her. When he stopped walking, she did the same.

“Long enough for her to give me the education every inexperienced teenage boy wants from a very experienced woman.”