Chapter 8
Russian Spring Punch
IVY
After a light lunch of beautiful fresh fruit and Spanish omelette, Alistair and I are lazing in the sun on the beach loungers.
We slept in, skipping breakfast, but the lunch more than makes up for it.
We’re quieter than usual, most likely still processing what happened the night before.
Body relaxed, eyes closed, he trails his finger softly along the back of my arm.
Despite the sunscreen, I’ve picked up a decent tan, but Alistair’s is golden in the afternoon light.
It reinforces the image I have of him as a Greek god.
The moment I first saw him—he was like a beacon of light.
Sure, I was suffering from head trauma and most likely shock and a light concussion, but he has since lived up to the pedestal I’d put him on. How is it possible that we are married?
“You okay?” he murmurs, sounding half asleep.
I want to eat him up when he looks like this, his defenses completely down, his muscles as impressive as ever, firm under his burnished skin.
If my mouth wasn’t so dry I might have drooled a little.
The cross around my neck—his wedding gift to me—sways as I shift to sit up.
A slight headache nags, most likely due to last night’s indulgences, and I know I need hydration.
I call over a waiter and ask for coconut water and a bottle of sparkling. I need electrolytes, but that will have to do for now.
Alistair groans as he stretches, then moves to sit up too. The drinks arrive and we are both grateful. I can’t see his eyes behind his Tom Fords, but I can tell he is happy and relaxed, which makes me relax.
“You want to talk about it?” he asks.
I breathe in and sigh it out. “Okay.” I’m nervous but also genuinely curious as to what he is thinking.
He lifts his shades so that I can see his eyes. “Any regrets?”
He asks it casually, like he’s asking whether I want another coconut water. Which is exactly how I know it cost him something to ask.
“No,” I say. “None. You?”
He considers this with the seriousness it deserves, which I appreciate. Alistair has never once told me what I wanted to hear at the expense of what was true. The waves roll in, slow and unhurried. A gull wheels overhead, catching the light. I wait.
“No,” he says finally. “Though I reserve the right to revisit that position if Matt tries to friend me on LinkedIn.”
I smile and sink deeper into my lounger, tipping my face up to the sun. The light is syrupy and golden and the air smells of coconut oil and salt and somewhere nearby someone is grilling fish. My body feels wrung out in the best possible way—loose and warm and deeply, profoundly rested.
Back home, things are as good as they have ever been.
Ari and Henderson, solid and warm. Alex almost walking, Brumilde sending daily videos of him pulling himself up on the furniture and looking immeasurably pleased with himself.
Becks already laying the groundwork for the Foundation, firing emails at all hours as only Becks can.
Even Jamie, settled in his new flat, driver’s license freshly printed.
The thought of all of them—safe, contained, whole—sits warmly in my chest alongside the sun.
I am thinking, vaguely and pleasantly, about whether to order something sweet, when Leo appears at the edge of my vision, making his way along the deck toward us.
He sets the tray down between our loungers with a small knowing smile—the smile of a man who poured a lot of cocktails last night and is very pleased to see us still breathing—and disappears back toward the bar without a word.
I reach for my glass. The condensation is cold against my fingers and the drink is the same pale gold as the afternoon light and it smells incredible.
I am halfway to my lips when Alistair’s hand closes around my wrist.
Not gently. He moves the way he moves when something has fired in him that he can’t fully explain yet—fast, instinctive, certain—and the glass tips from my fingers and drops, shattering on the wooden deck in a bright cold splash of citrus and spirits.
I stare at the pieces for a moment.
Then I look at him.
He is already scanning the beach, the bar, the terrace above us—the mafia boss fully present, running his calculations. His jaw is set.
I leave the broken glass where it is and stand up.
He takes my hand and we jog to the beach bar together, bare feet on warm wood, the afternoon still golden around us as if nothing has shifted at all.
The bar smells of pineapple and rum and something sweetly tropical, and the ceiling fans turn slowly overhead, pushing the warm air around.
Leo is behind the bar, his back to us, and he turns when he hears us approach.
Alistair rests both hands on the bar. “The drinks you just brought us,” he says. Quiet, pleasant, completely immovable. “Who sent them over?”
Something in his tone recalibrates Leo’s face. “A woman,” he says. “This morning, before your lunch. She came to the bar and asked me to bring them at a specific time.” He pauses. “We don’t have it on the menu. Russian Spring Punch, she called it.”
My stomach clenches.
“What did she look like?”
“Older. Elegant. Very composed.” Another pause. “Eastern European accent?”
Alistair and I look at each other, fear bright in our eyes.
A Russian Spring Punch.
She hadn’t even needed to leave her name.
“How long do we have to pack?”