Wish You Weren't Here

Chapter 44

James

As I step back out beneath the awning, I realize we couldn’t have asked for a more beautiful night. Above the bleached white piece of fabric stretched out overhead, there isn’t a cloud in the sky, making it possible to see the stars clustered over the Palazzo Ducale. On nights like this, it’s hard to find the sky’s end, the candles suddenly an extension of the constellations hanging above.

“Che romantico!” someone says from my left, and I turn to find a table of twenty-somethings looking out toward the dancers over Ava’s head. In fact, when I glance around me as I step around another table, I see that everyone is looking out at the square where couples are stepping in time to the melody of a Bocelli song.

My eyes settle on Ava’s golden hair and I swallow down the wish that this day would never end. It’s useless to make wishes like that. Wishes that just make it all harder.

“Holy bling. Look at the size of that ring,” one of the women murmurs, and I realize that no one is looking at the dancers. In fact, the dancers are now looking back toward us. I slide my gaze away from Ava and it lands directly on the cause of all this attention. The music stops—a rare occurrence for the dueling pianos—and the golden-haired man who is down on one knee holds the obscenely sized ring out to Ava and opens his mouth to speak for all to hear.

“I know it was a mistake to let you go without this ring, Ava. I should have told you before you left. I should have sent you here with a reminder of how much you mean to me—how much I love you.”

I’m frozen. Staring at Ava’s profile, her visible eye wide and glistening with—happy tears? No. She couldn’t possibly be happy. This arse sent her here with a calling card. Not a ring. But her plan—

“When I heard you were coming to Venice, I couldn’t think of a better place to do this. These few weeks without you just confirmed what I already knew. I want to spend the rest of my life with you. I want to be a part of every step of your plan in life. Will you marry me?”

She doesn’t move her hand from where it covers her mouth. People around me are whispering, “Say yes!” in excited but hushed tones, and I want to tell them to shut up—that the admittedly good-looking guy on his knee is not what she wants. That her plans don’t involve him anymore. There are flashes from a camera and I notice a woman standing beside them taking shots from every angle. A paid photographer? A reporter he’s brought with him?

“Ava?” Ethan says louder, putting one hand on her thigh. I want to break every finger on that hand.

The flashing lights seem to knock Ava out of her daze, and she lowers her hand, which he immediately takes and holds in his own. I wait, my fists clenched painfully by my side. I wait for her to shake her head. To stand up and storm off. To tell this asshole what he needs to hear. But she says nothing and her silence stabs me square in the chest.

I need to get the fuck out of here. Away from the dashing douche proposing in the most romantic place on the planet. Away from the crowd soaking it all in with ignorant stars in their eyes.

Away from the woman who I’ve fallen in love with despite every effort to keep myself from doing so.

I turn and make my way into the shadows beneath the loggia, escaping to the darkness before I can hear her say yes to the life she’s always wanted.