Chapter Twenty-One
chapter twenty-one
RAFAEL
I slump back into my office chair with a sigh. Nico left over an hour ago and I’m still exhausted. That kid has bounds of energy that I cannot keep up with. My team seems to like him though—there are more smiles and laughs in the restaurant when he is around, and I hate to admit that I wish it was always that way.
I reach into my bottom drawer and pull out the Macallan that’s been sitting there since the night of the fire. I came here that night. Holed up in my office and locked the door. I couldn’t drink a drop of the whiskey though, it felt wrong. I wanted to reserve the bottle for a night worth celebrating. Not the night that still gets under my skin to this day.
But tonight, I don’t seem to care. I drink straight from the bottle. The warm liquid coating my throat as I swallow the drink down. A big sigh releases from me without any effort. It seems my natural state of being is sighing these days.
My mind throws me back to last night. To May asking me why in the hell I have such a ginormous dining table, and to the fact that I didn't really have an answer for her. I always thought that renovating that place would make me feel more at home, less like I was living in the home of my family. I thought I could make it feel like mine. But all it does is points out how empty it is. How empty I feel. But having her there…it helps. As much as past me would pass out hearing that.
I push out of my chair and set the whiskey back on my desk before I trudge out to the front of house. It’s dark, and it’s quiet. Everyone else having left for the night. It’s just me and my restaurant.
As I walk through the empty tables, it doesn’t feel like mine. It never has, but it gets worse and worse with every passing day—the feeling like I’m not where I’m supposed to be. I’ve got half a mind to shut this place up and get a simple job down at the local market. At least there I wouldn’t be spending every day with the ghosts of family passed.
I know I sound pathetic. I should be grateful for this, for what I’ve got here. A thriving business and an amazing team to work with. And I am grateful, but I’m also exhausted.
Out. I need out. I need a break. Maybe some time away will give my mind the rest it needs, and I can be back fresh and ready to go on Monday morning.
I pull my phone out of my back pocket and flick a text through to Gianna, letting her know I’ll be out of the office tomorrow and that she’s the boss. I’m lucky enough to still have her around, despite my grumpy pain in the ass. Knowing I can take a day off when I need to, and that Olive&Vine runs just the same, eases any guilt I have of taking a day for myself. I walk back to my office and grab my keys before locking up. I need a day away, far away. And I know the perfect place.
I can hear the music playing from my house before I even shut the door to my truck. I swear May listens to the same six artists on repeat. All of them singing about men being trash and all that independent women shit .
Trust me, I’ve got no problems with an independent woman. But when I have to listen to these songs about it every day, it gets a little much.
I push open the oak door and the music just intensifies. May doesn’t even hear me arrive over her music. She just continues to float through the kitchen, opening every drawer she possibly can until she finds what she’s looking for. But the thing that's got me standing here at the door like an idiot is the way she’s swinging her hips with every beat of the song.
I’m paralyzed by the sight of it. Her sexy hips giving me the view of my life. It’s taking me straight back to that night in the club, seeing her move with such ease, like she was born to dance. Except this time instead of a dress, she’s wearing a pair of dark blue sweat shorts and a gray singlet, her hair in a damp mess, like she’s just walked out of the shower. Fuck , now I’m thinking about her in the shower.
“Oh my god!” I break out of my trance as May hurries over to turn her music down. “How long have you been standing there?”
“What are you doing?” I avoid her question. Partly because I don’t want her to think I was standing here perving at her, and partly because I don’t know how long I’ve been standing here perving at her.
“Uhm,” she tucks her short hair behind her ears. “I’m making dinner.”
“You’re making dinner?” I ask, moving to put my keys down in the bowl beside me and shut the door, instead of continuing to stand here like an idiot.
“I thought I’d try my hand at it, considering you’ve been cooking all day.”
I frown as I walk further into the space. The smell coming from the kitchen is surprisingly delicious, but something I can’t pinpoint.
I walk around the island and into the kitchen, floating towards where she’s cooking on the stove.
“It’s probably the one good thing my mom taught me to do before she left, apart from the whole ‘don’t trust men’ thing,” she laughs under her breath, but it’s devoid of humor.
“Where did she leave to?” I come up behind her, looking over her shoulder at the chicken cooking in the pan in front of her. She doesn’t answer. In fact, it feels like she’s holding her breath at my proximity. Her body is as still as a lake at dusk.
I’m so close I can smell the coconut of her shampoo and see the few light freckles that smatter over the bridge of her nose when she ever so slightly turns her head to face me. The urge to reach out and run my finger across them overwhelms me. Every time I’m near her now, that urge to touch her intensifies, and somehow, I've managed to hold myself back so far. But I don't know how much longer I can keep it up.
She hisses and her head jerks forward as she pulls her hand away from the stove. “Ah, fuck!”
I snatch her hand into my grip. “Did you hurt yourself?”
“What do you think?” She narrows her eyes at me, but it doesn’t last as she looks back down at her hand where a blister is now forming along the side of her hand.
I roll my eyes at her, turning off the induction. “Come on,” I say, walking across the kitchen to run the cold water. With the ingredients scattered around the island, and the chicken she was cooking in the pan, it looks like she’s making some form of chicken parmigiana.
“Don’t I need to put ice on it?” she asks.
“No, cold water, never ice.”
“Why?”
I sigh. “Would you just come here and put it under the water?”
She looks like she wants to say no, to go against my suggestion, but the pain that I can imagine is still searing her hand must win her over.
Once she’s got her hand running under the water, she hisses, flinching away from it. I guide her hand back under the water, pushing her arm by the elbow. “It’ll help, I promise.” She looks over at me with skeptical eyes, but she leaves her hand under the water.
“So, your mom?” I ask, distracting her from any pain, and picking up the conversation she dropped earlier.
“She left to anywhere and everywhere,” she sighs. “She’s been traveling around the world for about three years now with her boyfriend, Dave.”
“I thought you said she doesn’t trust men?” I say, taking a seat on one of the bar stools.
“Oh, she doesn’t,” she says, her focus on the water running over her hand. “But Dave is… well, he’s Dave. He’s never going to hurt my mom. He couldn’t hurt a fly. Plus, she doesn’t let him close enough to hurt her. That’s the most important part.”
I relish in the tidbits of information she’s sharing with me. Even though she might not think she’s giving me much, I’ll take anything when it comes to learning about May. I don’t know when I started feeling like that.
I think about it. The way that I’ve never seen May with a guy for longer than a single night since she’s been here. It could be due to the fact that all the guys she’s been with are twats, or maybe it’s got something to do with her mom’s advice. But surely May has had serious boyfriends. I can’t believe there’s never been a person who got a hold of her and didn’t let go.
“What time do you have to work tomorrow?” She asks almost mindlessly. I’m still adjusting to this new dynamic between us. I think she is too.
“I actually have the day off.”
Her head snaps up to look at me across the countertop. “Are you sick?” Her eyes survey my face for any sign of illness.
“No, just needing a day away.”
“Hm,” she nods mindlessly. “How long do I have to do this for?”
I nearly smile at her impatience. “How does it feel?”
She pulls it out of the water, inspecting it. “Worse now that I’m looking at it. ”
“I can wrap it for you.” Her eyes flick to mine. “I have some bandages from an old injury.”
“What injury?”
I refrain from telling her that it’s from when I burnt my hand at Rosemary Cottage. “Are you always this nosy?”
“Yeah, kinda,” she shrugs.
I sigh. “Do you want my help or not?”
She nods.
I grab my bandages from the bathroom and walk back out to the kitchen. “Sit.”
She narrows her eyes at me. “I’m not a dog.”
I roll my eyes, but then I clear my throat. “Miss, would you care to sit down, if you please?”
Her face deadpans, but she trudges over to me and sits on the stool I pulled out for her.
She watches me with a close eye as I place a gauze pad over her burn. She hisses as the fabric touches her skin. “Sorry,” I say.
She shakes her head. “It’s okay.”
I can feel her breath on my skin, we’re that close. Add that to the way I can feel her pulse where I’m holding her wrist, and my focus turns hazy as I begin to wrap the bandage around her hand.
Being this close to her sends my mind spinning into places where it shouldn’t go. Like how soft her skin feels under my touch, how badly I want to trace her entire body with my fingertips and see if she’s that soft everywhere. It’s a good thing I haven't touched her until now, because I think I'm addicted already. I blink the thoughts away as I clip the bandage in place and let go of her hand, but it doesn’t help my focus when I look up into her green eyes.
“Thank you.”
I clear my throat. “Sure.”
She pushes off the stool, immediately picking up where she left off with her cooking.
I sit at the island, watching her as she works. Fascinated by her as she lays a spaghetti sauce over her cooked chicken, followed by a generous sprinkling of cheese on the top. I like watching her work. Like seeing the muscles in the back of her legs flex as she bends down to put the meal in the oven.
She pulls it out once the cheese has melted on the top, and the sauce has thickened, laying the dish on the countertop, favoring her right hand over her left, trying not to put pressure on the burn. She pulls open multiple cabinets, looking for the plates. “Top right,” I say.
“Thanks,” she responds. She’s lived here for over a month now, and still doesn’t know where to find anything in this kitchen. She plates up our dinner and I can’t deny it looks amazing. Better than I expected.
She opens the drawer for the utensils and puts a fork and knife on each of our plates. At least she knows where those are.
“So what are you going to do, then?” She asks, coming to sit beside me on the other side of the counter. It doesn't surprise me that she wants to sit here, given her commentary on sitting at the big table last night. And I don't mind it so much either.
“What?”
“Tomorrow?”
“Oh,” I say as I start cutting into my chicken. “I’m going fishing.”
Her fork hits her plate as she whips her head to face me. “ Fishing ?” I nod in response. “You fish ?”
“Yup.”
“No, you don’t,” she scoffs.
I swallow down a bite of her delicious meal before responding. “I can assure you, I do.”
“I can’t envision it.”
I roll my eyes. “Then maybe you should tag along and see for yourself.” I regret the words as soon as they leave my mouth.
I try to subtly glance over at May. She’s got a frown on her face, one that I can assume is reflected on my own. She might be confused as to why I just said that. I am too.
It’s a two-hour drive from here to my fishing spot. Two hours in a car with May. Two hours there, and two hours back. Never mind the hours of peaceful silence I had in mind. I was planning to stay the night at my cabin.
The cabin where there’s only one bed. I know on my life I could not share a bed with May Whitley. She’s probably one of those people that spreads out like a starfish in the middle of the bed.
I suck in a breath to take my offer back, but before I can get it out, she says, “Okay.”
“Okay?”
“Mh-mm. Okay.”
“Okay, like you want to come fishing with me?”
“Okay, like I guess I’ll come fishing with you since you asked.”
I shake my head. “You definitely do not have to.”
“Do you not want me to? If that’s the case, then you shouldn’t have asked.” Her tone is turning up. Her face scrunching up as she looks at me like I’m the biggest asshole she’s ever encountered. To be fair, I probably am.
“No, no, that’s not what I’m saying.”
“What are you saying, Rafael?” She drops her knife on her plate and the sound rings through the open space around us.
Her eyes are piercing into my soul, the fire in them burning me up as she stares straight into my eyes, waiting for my response.
“We’ll leave at five.”