Chapter Fourteen #2
“I wouldn’t call you that.”
“Because you haven’t really seen me in my own clothes.”
He tilted his head, looked at her as if she had gone mad. “Of course I have. I’ve seen you at work every day for the last two years.”
“Those are my work clothes.”
“But then I saw you on our honeymoon.”
“Mostly naked, and otherwise in clothes that were furnished by you. Or rather, your people.”
“What do you normally wear?”
“Lots of bracelets, flowing skirts.”
“I saw your family. They were aggressively...”
“Mid-level department store?”
“Well. Yes.”
“When I was younger, I wanted to find some way to be an individual. To be me. Little things that were authentic, especially because I was always shoving pieces of myself down to make everybody else happy.”
“I want to see them. I want to see that part of yourself.”
His eyes glowed with the truth of that, and she felt so warmed by it. Renewed.
“Then, you will.”
It was always nice when she found ways to talk to him.
She could info dump on him, sure, the same way that he did her when they had gone over their pasts, but it was exciting to discover these kinds of things.
These little things that they didn’t know about each other yet, even though they have been so intimate with each other.
Even though she was finding new ways to touch him every day, there were still so many things to discover.
And every time he did, he seemed happy. He seemed to care. No one else in her life ever had.
When the plane touched down in London, the first thing they did was go to his town house.
She realized that this was the opportunity she had missed when they had gone to Athens.
She was busy feeling afraid. Because she had gone ahead and let herself get worried about what it meant for the two of them to be in the public eye.
But here she was, in a house that had been put together especially for Alex.
That meant that she could get to know him in a different way.
It was wild to her to think that she had married this man and she hadn’t really been to his house.
She walked straight through the entryway, down the hall and into the kitchen. She went over to the stove and opened a cupboard just above it.
“What are you doing?”
“Looking for coffee. Tea. Little things about you. I haven’t really snooped around one of your houses.”
“We just stayed in my over-water villa.”
“Well yes. But also no. Because you said yourself you hadn’t even been there. You bought it sight unseen. It wasn’t really yours.”
“I rarely spend any time here.”
“What do you like?”
“Coffee. Not tea.”
“Okay. What else?”
“We have a dinner reservation, and you should get dressed.”
“When is it?”
“Soon.”
She fixed him with an irritated scowl. “Okay. Do I have enough time to go out and buy something for myself?”
“I... Why?”
“You said you wanted to see me. My taste. Who I am outside the office, who I was before I came here. I want you to know me.”
“We don’t have time tonight. And, also, this is for the cameras, it isn’t for us.”
She felt a little bit like she had had her hand slapped. Like she had found her limit. She knew that it was a silly thing to be upset about, but she felt herself deflate. “Oh.”
“Why are you looking at me like that?”
“You said you wanted to see my clothes. You said you wanted to see me. You don’t, really. Do you?”
“I do. But tonight we are performing for the cameras. I will wear a suit and tie, regardless of what I might wear if we were on an island together.”
“Right. Sorry. It’s a silly thing. I’m being oversensitive. I feel like I’ve been oversensitive since we got back.”
“Well. I didn’t want to say anything.”
She made a tsk-tsking sound, and went up the palatial staircase without asking him where his bedroom was. She had a feeling she could guess the whereabouts easily enough. He followed her, though.
“If you know you’re oversensitive then why are you being oversensitive?”
She turned around, her head practically swiveled all the way around, in fact. He was standing in the doorway, looking maddeningly male, and she had the sudden blessed insight as to why she hadn’t pursued relationships ever, in her whole life. Because this was the exact thing women complained about.
“I can’t stop myself from having feelings. Moreover, very importantly, I won’t. I have feelings, Alex. Having to leave the island like that, it was abrupt. I’m adjusting. I told you that this feels really personal.”
“And I told you that I can’t quite understand that.”
“I’m sorry that you can’t. But it’s not going to make me feel any different.
What the two of us have is intimate for me.
I’ve never slept with anyone else. I’ve never.
.. Alex, the relationship that I have with you is not like any other relationship I’ve ever had.
I want to protect it. And I wanted to be mine.
I want...to make you birthday cakes and be your wife.
I don’t want to perform it. It just reminds me that you didn’t choose me. Not really. I’m part of the scheme.”
“That’s where you’re wrong. I did choose you. I told you. Everyone likes you. There is something in you that draws people to you, and I don’t even have a fraction of that. I’m brilliant,” he said.
“And very modest,” she pointed out.
“Honest,” he said. “I’m brilliant at certain things. But I can’t do the things that you do. The way that you make people feel is... You warm them up from the inside out, Verity. You even do it to me. You asked me...you asked me why I hired you. And I lied to you.”
She froze. “You did?”
“Yes. I said that you were the first applicant. That wasn’t true.
I had interviewed several people at that point.
Men, women. People closer to my own age.
People with similar interests in technology.
No one was you. There was something about you when you walked in, and I just knew that I couldn’t let you walk back out.
I knew that I had to have you. Every day.
I knew that I needed you sitting across from me.
I knew that you were the person that was going to teach me what I needed to know.
And it couldn’t have been just anyone. That’s why I wanted you to marry me.
Because I knew that you would affect everyone the way that you do me.
Because no one affects me. Nothing. Which means the board is going to love you—and they do. The public is going to love you.”
It was very nearly the sweetest thing anyone had ever said to her. It was maybe the sweetest thing he’d ever said. But it wasn’t altogether that sweet.
She had touched something in him, and he had immediately figured out how to make it useful.
She was awash in a strange sort of sentimentality, and also a fair amount of pain. Because it was just the most Alex. She meant something to him, and so he had figured out a way to make it relevant to his business.
Maybe she should just be happy that she meant something to him.
“Sorry. I will let you get dressed.”
“Yes. Thank you.”
She went to the closet, and fished out the most flowy dress she could find.
Amazing how he had brought a whole wardrobe here too.
She frowned as she touched the dress. These were the things that he saw her in.
Because he knew her at the office. She fought off an intense wave of sadness.
Fought off the terrible impression that in some ways, she was just still his assistant; it was just now it was for better or worse until death, rather than until HR separated them.
She had the jarring realization as soon as she finished getting dressed that this wasn’t even permanent.
She really had lost all sense of everything on that island.
She had lost all sense of self-preservation—that was for sure.
She was in the deep end. She was also acting like he had all the control.
When in fact, she could choose to walk away just as easily as he could choose to boot her back out into obscurity.
That should be cheering. It wasn’t.
She took a deep breath, and walked out the door, coming face-to-face with him. And right then, she realized something. “I’m sorry,” she said.
“You’re sorry?”
“Yes. I’m acting... I’m being... It’s fine.
The way I’m being is actually fine, because my feelings are actually fine.
But I realize that I feel insecure about how well we know each other, and how well we don’t.
I don’t know my parents. Not as human beings.
I know them as these terrible people that inflicted so much damage on to me, but I have no idea how they turned into those people.
And I had to build up so many walls to keep myself safe, that I think I’m just very aware of. ..walls.”
“I do not wish to hurt you, but I’m...me. And that means the wall is somewhat inevitable. Especially right now. Because this is the business aspect of this arrangement. But I gave you the honeymoon.”
She wished that he didn’t make it sound so much like a forfeit.
“True. You did.”
She decided to let it go, because now they had to go out.
And she did feel a moment of radiant sun when he held her hand, and led her into the restaurant.
She didn’t know why she felt so raw about them being on display.
But she had to try and sort it out instead of just taking it out on him.
No, she didn’t want to get into a situation where she suppressed her feelings, but at this point, she was just whining at him.
You’re being a coward, is what you’re doing.
She shut that thought aside.
And she had a lovely dinner with her husband, and didn’t let herself worry for the whole rest of the night.