Page 171 of Modern Romance November 2024 5-8

He wasn’t in the right frame of mind, physically or emotionally, to ask the big questions.

Why did you leave me?

Why did you cut me off so completely?

Why did you not want our baby?

No, he definitely wouldn’t ask any of those. Not yet, and maybe not ever.

Mia shrugged one bare shoulder, the slippery satin of her dress tightening over her breasts as she moved, drawing his attention to the curves he knew so well, hadlovedso well. ‘Why not?’ she asked, her tone almost flippant.

It was no answer at all, of course, and he shouldn’t be surprised. She’d always been good at deflecting. At the start, he had found it charmingly insouciant; with something that actually mattered, much less so.

‘I’m serious, Mia.’ He closed his eyes briefly, willing back the pain throbbing in his temples.

‘So am I,’ she returned, and now she sounded cool. ‘It seemed as good a place as any. I’m a cocktail waitress, Santos, so I went where people drink cocktails.’ She paused and then added indifferently, ‘And it’s crowded and easy to lose yourself. I didn’t think you’d be able to find me there.’

He gritted his teeth so hard his jaw ached. ‘And you didn’t want me to find you.’

‘Obviously.’ She smiled wryly then, her eyes lightening to the blue-green of sea foam, reminding him how he’d once felt...as if he could drown in them. When he’d first met her, she’d seemed like such an enigma, and yet at the same time so warm, open and uncomplicated, so different from him, which had been enchanting. He hadn’t expected not just to be charmed by her, but fascinated. When she’d laughed, he’d felt something lighten in him that he hadn’t realised was so heavy. All the responsibilities that had weighed him down, the memories that had been even worse, had fallen away when he’d been with Mia.

How that had changed once they’d made painful memories of their own.

‘And the dress?’ he asked, nodding towards what could only be considered a sexy evening gown. She looked amazing in it, and perversely that made his blood boil. Why was she wearing it? Obviously, it wasn’t for him. ‘Is that part of yourjob?’

The wry smile that had lightened her features flickered and died. She crossed her arms across her body. ‘What are you implying, Santos?’

‘I’m just asking,’ he returned evenly. ‘You don’t normally need to wear an evening gown to mix cocktails.’

She sighed, a gust of breath escaping her as her shoulders slumped and she looked down at the floor. ‘Yeah, well, that might have been a mistake,’ she admitted in a low voice. ‘I applied to be a bartender but Ernesto—the guy who runs the place—asked me to try being a hostess and gave me this dress to wear. I’ll need to give it back to him at some point.’

‘A hostess,’ Santos repeated evenly. One step up from a paid escort...and maybe not even that. ‘Seriously, Mia?’

‘I didn’t realise.’ She glanced up, her eyes sparkling with anger or tears; he couldn’t tell. ‘He gave me the dress when I arrived tonight and I thought... Well, I don’t know what I thought. I was running out of money, and I really wanted a job. But of course, I wasn’t going to do something like you’re obviously thinking.’

Why would she be running out of money, he thought, when she had access to his? He’d given her a bank card, credit cards, plenty of cash. They hadn’t even signed a pre-nuptial agreement, much to the dismay of his lawyer, but most of the Aguila fortune was tied up in the estate and investments, anyway, and was out of reach. At that point, he’d felt so recklessly heady with what he’d felt with Mia, so certain that being with her was right, that he hadn’t given himself time to think, to be sensible, to behimself. That was the last thing he’d wanted to be. He’d been himself, dutiful and dour, for his entire life. With Mia, he’d been able to be—to feel—different, and it had felt thrilling.

But Mia should not have had to take sketchy bar jobs for a few euros. He took a step towards her, even though it made the room tilt as his head blazed. ‘And what,’ he asked, ‘Do you think am I thinking?’

‘I don’t even know,’ she cried, flinging her slender arms out wide. ‘I never know what you’re thinking because you never tell me. You justlookat me like—like your dog just died or something.’ The words hovered in the air for a sizzling moment and then fell to the ground like ash.

‘Not my dog,’ Santos said quietly, and Mia’s face crumpled.

‘Don’t, Santos,’ she whispered.‘Don’t.’

Was there any point to this discussion? Santos wondered wearily. He was a reasonable man; he prided himself on it. But he did not know how to reason with Mia. Not when there were so many unsaid things between them, things neither of them could bear to talk about, because he didn’t think either of them could handle the answers.

And yet...she waswife. He’d meant what he’d said about taking his vows seriously. He wasn’t going to walk away from their marriage, and he wasn’t going to let her walk away either. Yet what did that mean for their future? How could they possibly work this out when he couldn’t trust her and obviously, for whatever reason, she didn’t trust him?

Everything felt impossible. Part of him wanted to go back to that moment in the bar when he’d met her and relive that enchantment, the way she’d wound around his soul. Another part of him wanted to go back to that moment and walk away—turn in the other direction and never slide onto that bar stool, never ask her what she’d recommend he drink. Never watch the way her hair flew about her face, the way her freckles seemed to dance across her nose when she laughed.

A whole lot of nevers, and it was all too late now. They were married. They’d married on a beach in Lagos Old Town, the waves glinting behind them as they’d held hands and said their vows. They’d known each other for a little less than two weeks.

In hindsight, it had been utter insanity. It was the kind of thing he’d never, ever done, which was why he’d done it. All he could remember now was always wanting to feel the way Mia had made him feel—happy and light, as if anything was possible, as if freedom and joy were the very air he breathed. For a little while, a very little while, he had felt like that and it had been wonderful.

That felt like a long time ago now, and he didn’t know if he would ever get it back—iftheywould—but they certainly wouldn’t if he Mia didn’t come back with him. They wouldn’t even have a chance.

‘Fine,’ he told her. ‘I won’t talk about all that. But you’re coming back with me to Seville, Mia.’ That much was non-negotiable. He was not going to have his wife running around Europe, bar-tending in dives.

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