Page 31 of Savage Love

“Elena.” Levin reaches out, his hand covering mine, stilling them where they’re still wringing in my lap. “I will do anything I can to make you happy. To make this easier for you. If that could have been my wedding vow, it would have been. If that means staying here until you’re ready—”

“Just a day or two.” I cut him off before he can say anything else. I don’t know anymore what hurts worse, rejection or these moments when he tells me he wants to make me happy, and I know that if he could give me everything, he would. It just underscores the fact that he’s not doing this maliciously, and therefore, there’s not anything that can likely change it.

If Levin had a heart left to give, it would be mine. That’s what he’s been trying to tell me all this time, I’m almost sure of it. But according to him, he doesn’t.

And I’m no longer sure that he’s wrong.

“A few days is fine,” Levin agrees. “We can look for an apartment or a house to rent, whatever you want–”

I nod, swallowing hard and reaching for the door handle. I know it’s unfair, but if I hear him sayanything you want,anything I can do to make you happy,one more time, I think I’m going to scream.

Levin is out of the car almost immediately, coming around to open my door the rest of the way for me. I step out and try to bolster myself as we walk up the path to the house.

I almost feel like knocking, but of course, I don’t need to. This is my house, too; Isabella has made that clear, for as long as I need it to be. Levin hangs back as I open the door and follows me inside as I call out.

“Isabella? Niall? We’re back—”

Niall appears almost instantly, looking a little frazzled. “Isabella will be out in a minute. Sorry, Aisling is having a bad day.” He glances at the two of us. “The bigger guest room is made up for you both now, lass. Isabella moved Levin’s things in there.”

“Thank you.” I don’t know why I’d thought I would be going back to that room—the one I’d been staying in since Levin brought me here from Rio—alone, and that Levin would be staying in the other room.You’re married now. Of course, you share a bed.But nothing else about our marriage is normal. I’d somehow thought that wouldn’t be, either.

As it turns out, sharing a room isn’t enough to make it feel normal. When we emerge from putting our things away, Isabella is up and about, my fussy niece propped on her hip. She hugs me and gives Levin a curt nod, and goes about finding lunch for us. For the remainder of the day, she dotes on me and seemingly pretends Levin isn’t there unless necessary, which means for a great deal of my first day as a wife, Levin is off with Niall, and Isabella and I spend time together.

“I’m glad you’re back.” She glances down the hall as she finishes feeding Aisling her lunch, her own sandwich still mostly ignored next to her elbow. I can see a lot of that in my future, depending on how fussy my own baby is. “I wasn’t going to move Levin’s things into your room, but Niall said I should. That you’d probably intended on sharing a bed.” She glances at me. “I’d thought he would leave you alone—it being a marriage under duress and all of that.”

“I think—” I press my lips together, not knowing how to talk about this with my sister. If it were any other man, any other marriage, I could see myself sitting here with her the morning after, gossiping about my new husband. But I feel protective over Levin. I know how much she dislikes him, and I don’t want to give her more reasons to feel negatively about him. “I think he’s going to do his best. It’s not easy, Isabella.”

“It’s not easy for you, either.” Her voice crisps around the edges, tight and irritable, as she stands up and takes Aisling’s small plate and spoon to the sink. “Being married to a man who wouldn’t have come back unless you were pregnant. Who got you in this position in the first place.”

“It took both of us, Issie. You know that as well as I do.”

I see Isabella soften slightly at the use of my childhood nickname. I haven’t called her that in a long time, and I see her grip the edges of the counter, her head tipping forward for a moment as I see a long sigh go through her before she turns back to me.

“Be that as it may,” she says softly. “Things were supposed to be different for you here. You were supposed to marry someone you loved, if you decided to get married. There was supposed to be a whole life that you wouldn’t have had back home. That’s all going to be different now. And Levin—”

“Is not entirely at fault,” I tell her firmly. “I was a part of this too. Don’t take away my agency in this, Issie. Don’t make it not my decision. You know how that feels. You made your choice; consequences be damned. I have that same right. And I—”

Isabella looks at me, her dark eyes suddenly very sad. “You love him, don’t you?” she asks, resignation there too. “You really do.”

I swallow hard, nodding. “Yeah. I think so. Levin keeps saying I have feelings for someone who doesn’t really exist, but I don’t agree.”

Isabella snorts. “For once, he and I agree on something. I wish it was on a different topic. Like him being an absent husband in New York, while you stay here.”

“I don’t want that either.” I give my sister a pleading look. “I’m not a child, Issie. And Levin isn’t making these decisions for us. I’m making them too.Itold him I wanted to stay in Boston, that if we got married, we’d be in Boston together. I wanted to stay near you and Aisling and my new brother-in-law. Levin is lettingmemake the choices for us.”

“Because he feels guilty.”

I shrug. “Be that as it may, he’s still letting me make them.”

“How long are you staying?” Isabella sits back down, reaching for her sandwich as Aisling absentmindedly chews on a teething ring. “At the house here, I mean.”

I pick up a potato chip, crumbling it between my fingers. “I told Levin I wanted a few days before we look for a place. And then after that—however long it takes for us to find somewhere we like, I suppose.”

“Do you know what you want?”

I shake my head. “I’m going to look at some things today online. And think about it from there.”

It’s not entirely true, but the conversation isn’t one I really want to have. I know Levin and I aren’t looking to buy a house yet, but I want to look at houses to rent. He told me that he and his late wife lived in an apartment, that they’d never had a house together, because she’d died before they could decide where they wanted to raise their family. I want to start our life the way I hope it will continue, in a small house like the one I’m sitting in now. Maybe something that eventually, if we like it enough, the owners could be convinced to sell to us. Something that could be our home.

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