Tangled in Vows (Tangled & Torn #2)

22. Holden

Chapter 22

Holden

Day 779 without you: I can’t remember the sound of your laugh anymore. That scares me more than anything in this place.

I watch Olivia like a hawk as we walk through the house, not wanting to miss her reactions. The house is almost five thousand square feet, so we have quite some ground to cover. Despite its size, I still wanted it to be welcoming and cozy. The interior designer mentioned something about modern yet rustic. I had no idea what she was talking about, but she showed me some pictures, and I was instantly hooked. It’s a perfect balance of sleek, contemporary designs and warm, natural elements—lots of wood and leather—softened by plants and emerald and teal decorations.

Olivia hasn’t said anything, but if the soft smile and wide eyes are any indicators, I think she approves. Stormy seems happy too, sniffing everything she comes across, and her tail hasn’t stopped wagging once.

After I showed her the top three floors—the second and third floors mainly consist of bedrooms—we headed to the basement. I showed her around the family room, with a large sectional couch, the oversized media room, a state-of-the-art gym, and a sauna.

We walk toward the last two rooms she hasn’t seen yet. My main office is on the left, and Olivia’s surprise is opposite it. I could have done it anywhere in the house, but I wanted it close to where I spend a lot of my time.

My pulse speeds up with every step we take. What if she doesn’t like it? What if she thinks I not only overstepped but was also incredibly presumptuous?

Both are valid points.

Fuck.

It’ll all be okay. Just focus and get it over with.

First, I show her my office, and she marvels at the screens covering almost the entire wall. “This is amazing, Hold. And seriously impressive.”

Her praise is genuine, and I lap up every word.

“Thank you.” My voice is thick with emotion, and I don’t dare look at it too closely right now.

That means it’s showtime. We exit my office and stand in front of the last door. Her door.

This isn’t a big deal, or the end of the world. If it’s not what she wants, we can always change things or even get rid of the whole setup if she truly hates it. Okay, maybe that would be a bit extreme.

Olivia fidgets awkwardly. “You’re starting to freak me out. At this point, I’m either expecting a room full of dead bodies or a genie to jump me the second we open the door.”

Some of the tension leaves my body, and I shake my head at my questionable reaction. And the fact that Olivia has a front-row seat to all of it. But then I shrug it off and smirk. “Definitely the second one. I’ve always wanted my own genie. And if you ask real nicely, maybe I’ll let you be the Jasmine to my Aladdin.”

What on earth are you doing?

She quirks an eyebrow. “Oh really? Maybe I’ll let you be the Beast to my Belle.”

Was that a challenge?

My brain seems to think so because I’m moving.

One step closer, then another one. And another one until I’ve got her backed against the wall, caging her in with one arm on each side. “I’ll be your Beast or Peter Pan or whatever damn hero you want me to be.” I pause and study her. Her quickening breaths. Her slightly parted lips. Then I lean in and whisper in her ear, “Or maybe I’ll be your villain? Is that more your thing, Hurricane?”

I linger for a second and listen to her loud swallow. Inhaling her sweet scent and feeling her warm skin close to me—close enough to touch or taste. If I moved half an inch, I could press my lips to her pulse point and lick a path toward her jaw.

She squirms, the movement brushing her chest against mine, and I almost cave right then. How easy would it be to devour her right now?

And then she’s gone, ducking underneath my arm and putting several feet between, storming straight toward the door and opening it.

“Holy shit.” Olivia stands in the open doorway, staring into the lowly lit room.

Her wide-eyed gaze swings to me briefly before focusing back on the studio.

Her studio.

“Holden. This is . . . I . . . I don’t know what to say. Wow.”

She walks into the room, and I follow. My heart is still beating strongly from yet another something-almost-happened moment, and it continues to do so when I see her slack-jawed expression and the excitement in her eyes.

She walks around the room, brushing her fingertips over the long mixing console and checking out the recording booth beyond it.

The crew I hired for this had free rein and one job only: building the best home recording studio possible. We took out a wall to combine two large rooms into an even bigger space, making it the perfect place for her.

I lean against the door and watch her move around, happy to see her here. While this is her space, it’s still in my house. But only until I can convince Olivia that it’s ours .

Eventually, she’s inspected everything and heads back to me, stopping right in front of me.

She tilts her head back and just stares at me for a minute, as if to decide what to do next.

And I let her, staring right back.

“I don’t know why you did this, or when you had the time for all of it, but it was incredibly kind of you. It’s the most beautiful studio I’ve ever seen.” She goes on her toes and grabs my arm for balance, pressing her soft lips to my cheek. “Thank you.”

Getting all my brain cells back in order takes me a while.

I clear my throat. “You’re welcome.”

I’m slowly starting to understand why Phoenix turned into such an idiot around Evie at the beginning. It’s an emotional roller-coaster ride where you’re blindfolded and have no clue where you are or which direction you’re off to next.

Since the universe has it out for us, Olivia’s phone rings. One look at the screen, and her soft expression turns tense. She closes her eyes and takes a deep breath, like she needs to prepare herself for whatever’s about to happen. I use that chance to peek at the caller ID. Her producer, Ian? As far as I know, these two get along without any issues.

So why does Olivia act as if she doesn’t want to talk to him?

She gestures toward her phone. “I’m sorry, but I have to take this.”

I brush a hand through my hair. “No worries. I’ll go back upstairs.”

Olivia mouths, “Thanks again,” and disappears into her studio, closing the door gently behind her.

I stand there, frozen, a total idiot. This went both better than expected and not as good as I thought it would.

All the interruptions definitely aren’t helping. Neither is Olivia acting like nothing happened.

We almost kissed the morning after the club, but an envelope with a threatening picture of us was delivered. Olivia pretends it never happened.

I told her Felix is dead. She actually lets it affect her, then again, pretends it didn’t happen.

We wake up together and are on the brink of something more, but Heather arrives. And yes, Olivia wipes the moment from her memory.

I know that’s her preferred way of dealing with things, but why does it start to feel as though she’s constantly erasing any progress between us?

“Maybe you should take the leap and see what’s waiting for you on the other side. You might be surprised by what you find.”

Archer’s words pop back into my mind, and I groan in utter frustration as I go back upstairs to find the man of the hour in the kitchen with Stormy.

Similar to the rest of the house, the kitchen is a striking mix of modern luxury and rustic charms. Crisp gray cabinets and high-end appliances line one wall, their polished stainless-steel surfaces gleaming in the light. The massive granite island commands the center of the room, adding to the elegance of the space. Overhead, exposed wooden beams stretch across the high ceiling, infusing a warm and earthy contrast.

I stare at the open fridge door, and the man hidden behind it. “What are you doing here? I thought you had work?”

Archer pops his head out of the fridge and smirks at me. “Change of plans. Where’s Olivia?”

“Ian called.”

“And why does that make you look like a sad puppy?” Archer narrows his eyes at me, slowly stepping out of the fridge with his hands full of food.

He sets the butter package, six eggs, milk, and shortening on the counter. Then he goes to raid the pantry and adds dark chocolate, sugar, brown sugar, salt, vanilla extract, espresso powder, flour, cocoa powder, and peanut butter.

My gaze homes in on the myriad of food on the counter. Baking supplies. A telltale sign that Archer is about to stress-bake.

I raise my eyebrows at him. “Do you want to talk about it?”

He gets a mixing bowl and a spatula out of the drawers and points the latter at me. “Don’t deflect. We were talking about you, not me.”

“I know that, but I want to be prepared in case my kitchen is about to be turned into a bakery.”

“Oh, come on, that was only one time, and at least eight years ago or something.”

I lift my hands in defeat. I’m only teasing him, and he knows it. Especially since the incident he referred to was about an unrequited crush he had on a girl back then. But he caught her making out with one of his exes and got depressed, I suppose. I think the real issue was that his grandma had just passed a few months prior, and he was looking for comfort more than anything. We shared a place back then, but there was only so much I could do to help him with his loss.

“I wasn’t complaining, purely wondering if this will only be a one-cake situation, or if I need to lengthen my workout routines.”

“Fair enough.” He moves around the kitchen, adjusting the oven rack to the middle and preheating it.

We’ve been in countless similar situations before, so I watch him in silence, wanting to know what’s on his mind while at the same time not particularly keen on drawing attention to myself.

A few minutes later, he mixes the melted butter with the chopped dark chocolate before putting that aside and starting on the batter. Eggs and a few other ingredients are thrown into the large mixing bowl before he attaches it to the stand mixer. The whisking is loud, and Archer finally focuses on me.

“Truth for a truth?”

I cross my arms over my chest and nod.

He blows out a breath, almost unsure about this. “Fine. I’m worried about you and Olivia, okay? We’d talked about her, but seeing you together earlier felt different. I can’t pinpoint why. Maybe having her here made it more real, more serious. I don’t know. I might just be talking out of my ass, and it’s nothing, but I don’t want this to end badly for either one of you. No matter how much you deny it, I think you’re both attached to each other more than you think.”

My brain is still trying to process his words when he adds, “I’m also incredibly pissed I still haven’t made any progress figuring out who’s behind all the shit with Olivia.”

“Sugar coma it is then.”

The words sound like surrender, and maybe that’s what this entire thing with Olivia is. Pure surrender. Because telling her my secrets would be giving her the choice to leave me, but I hope against all odds she won’t run screaming for the hills.

While leaving me should be her choice, I also want to be selfish and keep her in my life whichever way I can. Archer was right, I’m attached to her. I was her friend first and foremost, and that hasn’t changed on my end. But I want the other parts of her too, all of them. And that’s a risk that’s hard to take, but one that seems to be unavoidable.

Maybe I should ask Archer to make more than one cake, after all.

I grab one of the barstools on the opposite side of the island and sit. Archer goes to the fridge and gets two cans of sparkling lime water, pushing one across the granite surface to me.

“Thanks.”

He opens his with a whoosh. “No problem.”

The mixer continues to whirr while he gets the flour and cocoa powder and sifts them together. I didn’t even know we had a flour sifter or what it was until Archer lectured me on it.

Baking was his favorite pastime with his grandma, and she taught him everything she knew. I think, in the beginning, she did it to distract him from the fact his mom hadn’t come back yet. He was used to her dropping him off at his grandma’s at a whim. But usually, she’d pick him back up after a few days or weeks. The last time, she never returned. We were twelve.

He always had a good relationship with his grandma, much better than either of us had with our moms. Baking together bonded them even more. It became their thing, and they did it often in the years he stayed with her until she passed a day after his eighteenth birthday. Since I spent much of my time there to avoid my mom and her endless boyfriends, I reaped the benefit of their baking prowess and the reprieve of being around people who don’t want to smack you around whenever they felt like it.

“Hold, do I need to explain the rules of a truth for a truth again?” He doesn’t peek up from his task, already having moved on to the next step in the recipe.

I huff. I should have known he wouldn’t forget about the truth I still owed him in return for his. Shit. I could tell him anything. That I’m excited to eat the brownies he’s making. Or that I miss Evie and Phoenix because we’ve all been busy with our own lives and responsibilities, and they’ve been traveling a lot lately. All truths, yet not the kind of deep revelations the game asks for. At least, the way we play it.

It’s about being vulnerable, which is exactly why I started playing it with Olivia after I met her. That woman had her feelings locked away in a vault, but if I offered her something first, she would slowly open up in return.

Archer turns off the mixer while I say, “I’m absolutely terrified this thing with Olivia won’t end well. Especially once she finds out the truth.”

My words are followed by silence from Archer and a clattering noise from the hallway that immediately has me on my feet.