Chapter 34
Ava did not, in fact, run away in the middle of the night, but she couldn’t blame Roman for being worried. Instead, she slept
with him in his room upstairs, and the next morning, she woke him with a kiss, which led to more.
By the time they left to finish the last of the wedding tasks, she was floating on a cloud of bliss. And now that they’d figured
out each other’s patterns, they got through the meetings with minimal fuss.
From there, they spent the rest of the day at the resort spa, getting massages and facials. After dinner and a quick swim
in the pool, Roman shuttled her off for another “surprise,” which turned out to be the bioluminescent bay in Fajardo.
Ava had been kayaking exactly once in her life and wasn’t a fan, and she was even less excited about the possibility of large aquatic animals swallowing her whole out of a dark, neon-accented abyss. But New Ava embraced new experiences, right? So she’d gone. Then, when she’d been very close to a panic attack, Roman had sidled his kayak as close to hers as he could and whispered the filthiest dirty talk she’d ever heard. Miraculously, it calmed her down to the point where she could actually enjoy herself. After they returned, exhausted but exhilarated, Ava was more than happy to curl up in Roman’s arms.
“This was the best day ever,” he whispered to her before he fell asleep.
“For me too,” she murmured into the darkness. She expected the admission to scare her, and it did, but only a little.
She slept like a rock, but the next day, she woke up with a ball of dread sitting low in her gut. Their private island getaway
was coming to an end and they were returning to New York in a few short hours.
Ava didn’t want to leave. Once they got home, she’d have to go back to being Old Ava, the pathologically helpful middle-school
teacher who wasn’t involved with a handsome hotelier who was sweet, thoughtful, charming, and sexy as hell.
She’d have to go back to a world where Roman wasn’t hers and hers alone.
With a deep sigh, she shoved down her worry. She refused to spend her last few hours of vacation feeling depressed. Besides,
something smelled really good, so she sat up in bed to investigate. Blinking in the muted sunlight filtering through the filmy
curtains, she rubbed her eyes and peered around the room.
“What’s all this?”
A massive floral arrangement took up the nightstand on her side. Red gingers, orange lobster claws, and yellow orchids exploded
from a base of palm, monstera, and philodendron leaves. At the foot of the bed sat a tray laden with food. Ava breathed in
the mouth-watering trifecta of bacon, maple syrup, and orange juice.
At the sound of her voice, Roman looked up from where he sat in a plush armchair. Their eyes met, and his face broke into a wide smile. Setting down his tablet, he padded over to her in nothing but his boxers.
“Buenos días, mi amor.” He dropped a kiss to her forehead, then handed her a hot cup of coffee.
She accepted it and took a small sip. “Mmm, thanks. Good morning to you too. Did you do all this while I was asleep?”
“I wanted to surprise you.” He gestured at the table. “Help yourself to breakfast. I’m checking in with Camille. If I rearrange
a few things, we can stay an extra couple of days.”
Ava hadn’t met Roman’s assistant, but Roman spoke highly of her organizational skills, something Ava could appreciate. He’d
said Camille was handling things in his absence, but when he’d briefly turned his phone on the day before, he’d been inundated
with missed texts, emails, and voicemails. Rearranging “a few things” would mean a logistical nightmare for Camille, so Ava
put a hand on Roman’s arm before he could continue.
“We should head back,” she said. “You’re busy, and I didn’t clear out my fridge.”
It was the best she could come up with before the caffeine kicked in. As much as Ava didn’t want this to end, she knew Roman
had more important things to do than get massages and go swimming with her.
That sarcastic little voice in the back of her head whispered, You just can’t let yourself have too much of a good thing, can you?
Ava kindly told that little voice to mind its own business.
Roman studied her face for a moment, like he knew the fridge thing was an excuse. But all he said was, “All right.”
Ava set aside the coffee and resolved to make the time they had left memorable. She gave Roman’s arm a tug, catching him off
guard and toppling him onto the bed with her.
“We still have a few hours before we have to leave,” she said, climbing on top of him to straddle his thighs. The sheet fell away, leaving her naked, the only thing between them the silk of his boxers.
The way he smiled up at her made her heart squeeze. His sweet brown eyes filled with tenderness, and... shit, maybe that
was love. It had been so long since she’d seen it. She hoped she was reflecting something similar back at him. Not love yet,
but... something.
He cupped the back of her head and pulled her down for a kiss, sending her thoughts scattering. She made no attempts to reel
them back.
By the time they sat down to eat, the food was cold, but neither of them cared.
On the plane, while Roman was on the phone with a senator explaining Puerto Rico’s real estate crisis and the political corruption
surrounding the electrical grid system, Ava listened with one ear and tried to lose herself in the crochet project she’d brought.
But making a blanket for a coworker’s baby shower just wasn’t holding her attention. Even as her fingers worked the hook,
guilt ate at her.
Why did the thought of returning home, back into her family’s orbit, fill her with trepidation? She loved them. She would
do anything for them.
Except tell them about Roman.
Setting aside the yarn, she pulled out her personal planner and flipped to a section in the back that she used for journaling.
Riffling through her pencil case, she selected a fountain pen with purple ink and began to write.
At the top of a clean page, she wrote, What will happen if I tell my family about Roman?
And then she made a bullet list.
The “What Will Happen?” game was a tool Colleen had given Ava for when her anxiety threatened to get the better of her. Instead of spiraling out, her therapist had directed Ava to actually ask and answer the question that plagued her.
For the first point, Ava wrote, They’ll tease me .
Teasing was a fact of life in the Rodriguez family. At first it would start with a wink-wink nudge-nudge Ava tienes un novio level of teasing, like she was sixteen. But after that, the helpful “reminders” would start.
Remember what happened with Hector , they’d warn. Do you really want to go through that again?
She knew, because they’d done it to her mother when Patricia had dared to go on dates after breaking up with Ava’s father,
even though it had been an amicable split and years had passed. Remember what happened with Miguel , they’d said.
Of course, no one said anything to Ava’s father when he started bringing Olympia to family gatherings. And when Tio Luisito
divorced his wife and married a man, everyone fell over themselves to congratulate him, and not a single person had said Remember what happened with Helen .
None of the women were allowed to forget their mistakes, and god forbid they moved on from the wrong man. Internalized misogyny
was a real beast.
On the next line, she wrote, When it’s over, they’ll make my life hell .
If she’d learned anything from her experiences, it was that true love wasn’t forever, at least not for her.
Hector had loved her. Hector had made promises, spoken vows. And then he’d changed his mind.
Things were great with Roman now, but they hadn’t yet been subjected to any of the stressors of real life. Something would inevitably come along and burst the bubble. It might happen tomorrow, it might happen in two months, it might happen in two years. But it would happen.
And when it was over, her family would trot out, Remember what happened with Hector? Like she was a fool for daring to believe she could be happy again.
Something startlingly close to anger simmered in her veins. All of this would have been fine if Roman weren’t in the wedding.
But because he was, her whole family knew him now, and by the time the ceremony and reception were over, they’d feel a claim
on him.
Her family and Hector’s had been so entwined in their lives, disentangling those threads had been as hard on her as the separation
itself.
Roman was everything she could ever ask for in a man, and she wanted him all to herself. But he wasn’t just hers. He was Ashton’s,
too.
Which brought up the question of what this would do to her relationship with Jasmine.
Fighting the sudden tension in her limbs, she forced herself to write, It’ll make things awkward with Jasmine .
She could just picture it. When this thing between them had run its course, Jasmine and Ashton would have to decide which
of them to invite to events. Or worse, Ava and Roman would have to pretend everything was fine. And maybe he would be fine.
He probably had a lot more experience with this sort of thing. But Ava knew she wouldn’t be. God, just look how she’d reacted
to running into Hector. Something told her it would be even worse with Roman.
Ava knew she should tell Jasmine about Roman, but she couldn’t suppress the anxiety that cropped up every time she thought about telling anyone but Damaris.
Oh, shit. Damaris .
Ava turned her phone on and gasped at the number of text messages. Nowhere near as many as Roman had been inundated with the
day before, but damn. There were messages from the Primas of Power and the Wedding Flashers group texts, from her mother,
her grandparents, her stepmother, her sister, from the group text she had with a bunch of Alliance teachers, and even one
from Hector’s sister. And of course, a series of texts from Damaris, spanning the past couple days. Ava opened those first.
Damaris: How’s Puerto Rico?
Do you have phone service?
I hope you’re not dead.
Text me if you’re dead.
Fuck, please don’t be dead.
If you don’t reply by this afternoon, I’m filing a missing persons report.
I’m serious, by the way.
The last text had been sent two hours earlier. Ava scrambled to reply.
Ava: I’m here! Not dead. Sorry to worry you.
Damaris: Well, shit. What happened to checking in when you’re with Roman? I know he’s your cousin’s fiancé’s best friend but I’m the
only one who knows you two are
Ava: Ew. And I’m sorry. I’ll explain later. We had our phones off. I’m on the plane back to New York now.
Damaris: You can buy me brunch tomorrow to make up for the near heart attack.
Ava: Absolutely. See you then.
Ava shot off a quick text to her mom letting Patricia know she would be home soon, then because her strong sense of responsibility
wouldn’t let her ignore them, Ava began to skim through the other messages.
Willow: HELP Mom is driving me CRAZY
Olympia: This child will be the end of me. Can you talk to her?
Dad: look i got a new grill
Abuela: Ayúdame a cocinar pernil este fin de semana OK?
Ronnie: Hi A! Can you babysit Friday night? 7pm. Thanks!
Michelle: Don’t you dare babysit for Ronnie. She never pays you!
“Pretty handy that you already have your travel size bottles with you,” Roman said, breaking into her thoughts before she’d
managed to catch up on all the texts she’d missed.
“What?” Ava glanced over and saw he was done with his call.
“All your hair stuff,” he said. “You can leave it at my place.”
She blinked, not following. “What do you mean?”
“When we get home,” he said, throwing around the word like it was the most natural thing in the world. “Feel free to put things
anywhere in the bedroom and bathroom.”
Home . He was talking about his home, about making space for her there.
Ava’s heart rate sped up. This was going way too fast. Even as one small part of her thrilled at the idea—she had loved sharing
a room with him—most of her was terrified.
She had a flash of moving into the “guest room” at her father’s new house, because even though she’d spent every weekend with
him, she’d never had her own room. Not even when she lived there full time at the end of high school to help with Willow.
“Don’t your mother and sister live with you?” she asked, trying to bring him back down to earth with the reminder that they didn’t exist in a bubble like they had in Puerto Rico.
He sent her an indulgent smile. “I’m forty-one, not fourteen. You can be there. I don’t need to sneak you in.”
Ava thought about Michelle, who had been sneaking Gabe in and out of Titi Val and Uncle Dom’s house the year before. And they got caught .
“Still, we should keep this quiet for now,” she said. “We shouldn’t tell anyone else yet.”
His smile dimmed, and his eyes cut away from hers for a second. “About that...”
Her pulse thumped even harder. “Yes?”
“Um, Ashton knows.”
Ava stopped breathing. “He knows what?”
Roman gave an apologetic shrug. “I had already told him about you, and then at the engagement party... Long story short,
he figured it out.”
Ava covered her face. “Oh my god.”
This was her nightmare. Already, this whole thing was unraveling. How the hell had her simple fling become so damned complicated ? Because if Ashton knew, it was only a matter of time until Jasmine did. And if Jasmine found out before Ava could tell her
herself...
It would be Michelle and Gabe all over again, and Jas would be furious .
Fuck. She had to tell her primas. But when?
“Don’t you have a friend who knows about us?” Roman asked.
“One.” She held up a finger. “I have one friend who knows about you, and that was only in the event you turned out to be a serial killer. She has no connection to my family. Unlike Ashton .”
Roman’s lips quirked.
“Do not laugh,” she growled.
“Sorry.” He coughed, probably to hide a chuckle. “Aren’t you glad I’m not a serial killer?”
“This isn’t funny!”
“You’re right. It’s not.” He schooled his features into a mock frown.
“I’m serious. No one in my family can know.”
No one else , she thought, since Ashton was technically one month away from becoming her cousin-in-law, if that was even a real thing.
Roman moved to the seat closer to her so he could take her hand. “Will it make you feel better if we don’t tell anyone until
after the wedding?”
Ava took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Yes. I think so.”
“Then that’s what we’ll do.” He paused. “Except for my mother and sister. I want you to meet them. I would’ve introduced you
to my aunt and cousins while we were in Bayamón, but my mother would’ve killed me if her sister got to meet you first.”
Compromise. This was a compromise. She could do that. Even if, in the back of her mind, a little voice whispered, This is how it starts .
Memories flashed through her mind, of helping Hector’s mom pick out a new sofa, of being a bridesmaid in his sister’s wedding,
of reading picture books to his niece.
Why did romantic relationships have to involve other people?
It would be okay. She could meet Roman’s family. There was a big gap between saying hello and helping his mom renovate her house.
“All right,” she said, because Roman was clearly waiting for an answer. “But not today. I’m really tired, and I’d just like
to go home.”
He studied her face for a moment, then leaned in to press a soft kiss to her lips. “Anything you want, mi vida.”
My life , he called her. God, what was she getting herself into?