Page 81 of Beautiful Dangerous

Sixteen

Olivia

I feel like I’ve just walked onto the set of a cheesy rom-com, the scene where the guy tries to impress the girl with some huge, wildly over-the-top romantic gesture.

“Too much?”

I look at Javier, and I shake my head and smile. “No. It’s not too much.” Maybe a little, with a myriad of lights strung through the trees and an array of candles decorating not just the table, but the ledges and the low wall that lines the terrace. “It’s beautiful, actually. It’s really beautiful.”

“As are you,mi amor.”

I laugh and roll my eyes as he takes my hand and brings it to his lips, kissing it lightly, and he laughs too before pulling me into his arms, kissing me so gently it sends a wave of confusion ripping through me. This is the Javier I remember. The man I fell in love with, in this moment, this very moment, he’s the man I thought I’d lost. He’s my husband.

“You’re not usually one for a great amount of cheese.” I smile, letting my fingers trail lazily along the back of his neck.

“Maybe I’m a changed man, after my return from the dead.”

“Maybe you are,” I murmur, and he kisses me again, and I close my eyes and remember all the good times we had. The nights we’d eat out here and dance under the stars and talk until the early hours. The times when reality was pushed aside, just for a couple of hours, and everything felt normal. Almost.

Nothing was ever normal, Olivia. Remember that…

“Come. Sit down, let’s eat. Celine has prepared some of our favorite dishes.”

Spicy chicken stew, her famous Mexican bean salad, fresh bread and plenty of butter; pork roasted over the barbecue with corn and green tomato salsa, I’m in heaven with this food! But the nervous ache in my belly is also reminding me that this dinner is for a reason. That’s what he told Lucca, what Lucca told me, although I remembered to act surprised. And it’s obvious now that there’s an ulterior motive for all this fuss; all this beautiful food.

“We’ve barely had any time together alone, Olivia, since I came home.”

“I know. And I’m sorry, if you feel like I’ve been…” I briefly drop my gaze, because I don’t really know how to finish that sentence. “I just…” I look up, look right into his eyes. “It messed with my head, you coming back the way you did. It was so – so out of the blue. And all of a sudden, everything I’d been through… It was for nothing.”

He reaches for my hand, and I let him take it, let his fingers curl around mine. “I can’t tell you how much it hurts me, to know I’ve hurtyou, and I know that I can say sorry for the rest of eternity and it still won’t be enough but, please, believe me, I will do whatever it takes to make it up to you. Whatever it takes, Olivia.”

I know he will. I know hewould. I’m just not sure it’s enough anymore. Has our moment really passed? Or could what I’m feeling for Lucca be nothing more than emotions forced upon me because I missed Javier so much?

No.

What you feel for Lucca is real.

It’s very real…

I force myself to smile, because Lucca’s right. I need to start playing the wife, for both our sakes.

Javier lets go of my hand and reaches for the bread. “Eat, before it goes cold.”

I start spooning stew onto my plate, filling it up with rice and salad, and for a little while we enjoy the food as we talk about his time in Mexico, and how we move forward on both sides of the border, and I’m fine talking business. It’s my comfort zone, I feel safe talking business. But he hasn’t set up this dinner with all its extravagant detail so we can talk business all night. And as the evening wears on, that dread in the pit of my stomach intensifies, a nervous anticipation growing by the minute.

“We never talked about having children, did we?”

My stomach sinks, and I know Angel and I had briefly touched on this just a couple of hours ago, at the beach, but I had no idea it had ever been on Javier’s mind. Like I’d said to Angel, I’d just assumed kids weren’t something on either of our agendas, and the fact Javier’s mentioning it now, it’s enough to set off another small wave of panic.

“No. we didn’t.”

“Did you never wonder what it would be like, to be a mother?”

Yes. For a moment, earlier, at the beach, watching that little family, but the child I’d imagined having was Lucca’s. Not Javier’s.

“It’s never been something I’ve really wanted.”

And that’s true. It wasn’t. I’m still not sure that it is.

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