Evie - [wlw]

thirteen

Two and half years earlier - October
valentina
-

I walked inside the house quietly and shut the door behind me with a bouquet of peonies in hand. My business trip was cut short due to someone getting sick and meetings having to be cancelled because of it. So I took the quickest flight home without telling Evie so I could surprise her on Monday morning while the kids were at school.

The house was silent and smelled like someone had just mopped the floor. Evie must have been cleaning. I grinned passing by a photo that was hung on the wall, it was one we took together while in Paris.

I set my bag down near the stairs and crept upstairs as quietly as I could to find out where my fiancee was.

The doors to the kids rooms were open but the rooms were tidied up and empty with no sight of Evie in either of them. I frowned and crept towards our bedroom next where the double doors were open too.

I peeked inside first to make sure Evie was in there.

She was standing at our dresser putting some folded shirts away with her back to me. I took this as my opportunity to sneak up on her and cover her eyes with one of my hands.

However, just as I expected the poor blonde was frightened and dropped all the clothes she was holding in her hands with a scream. "Guess who." I chuckled softly kissing the side of her neck while I kept her eyes covered and the flowers behind my back.

"Dammit, Val don't scare me like that!" Evie whined, pushing my hand away from her eyes.

A pout formed on her lips as she turned around to face me. It had been about two weeks that I was gone and I missed seeing Evie's pouty expression the most. I grinned from seeing it again for the first time in a while and grabbed her chin with my free hand. Letting my thumb grace her bottom lip.

"I missed you too." I laughed before pressing a gentle kiss to Evie's soft pink lips.

I brought my hand from behind my back to reveal the flowers I bought for her. But instead of seeing a huge smile on Evie's face, all I saw was a pained expression. She was forcing a smile.

"What's wrong? Do you not like them?" I asked with a frown as my excitement started to die down. Evie continued to force a smile at me and shook her head, "No that's not it babe. They're beautiful..thank you." She replied then quickly grabbing the flowers from me and giving me a small peck on the lips.

Something was wrong. Evie was always excited when she received flowers from anyone but, especially me. I also expected her to be far more excited at the fact that I was home early. Instead I was asked,

"Why are you home so early?"

I raised my brow at Evie and shoved my hands into the pockets of my trousers. "Is it a bad thing that I'm home early?" I asked with a light chuckle. Evie looked at me and then around the room before she shook her head no.

"Meetings got cancelled because someone got sick so we were allowed to go back home." I explained to Evie who was still acting a bit off from her normal peppy self.

"What's the matter?" Evie shrugged at my question and shook her head again. "Nothing. Nothing's wrong Val. I'm happy you're home early." Evie replied. Walking up to me and giving me a short hug that felt unusual.

When she pulled away from the hug, Evie went back to putting the clothes she had dropped away in the dresser.

I sighed watching her unusual behavior and moved to stand beside her. The clicks of my heels signaling to her that I was coming closer. I let Evie put away the last bit of clothes before I grabbed her small hands and guided her towards our bed.