Chapter Twelve
She had agreed. All he knew was triumph. From the moment she said yes, to the moment his plane touched down on the private Caribbean island where they would be spending their honeymoon.
He had bought it some years earlier, but had never been, and it felt like the perfect place to try and become something different.
And she responded to the beauty of the location just as he hoped. As they disembarked from the plane, and she looked around at the smooth, crystal blue water, the white sand and bright pink flowers dotting the bushes, her face lit up with joy.
The over-water villa had been stocked in preparation for their stay and as they walked out on the gangway that took them to their accommodation, it wasn’t the view that captivated him most. It was her.
The opportunity to give this to her. To watch her face as she took in each detail around them.
As she smiled when the breeze blew through her hair, the way her mouth dropped when he opened up the front door to the villa, and revealed an expansive living area with a vaulted ceiling. There was a small kitchen area with glossy black countertops and a bowl of fruit placed at the center.
And she was enraptured by all of it. “This is the most beautiful place I’ve ever seen,” she said, taking a turn around the room, and then moving into the bedroom, before coming back out. “And this is the biggest bed I’ve ever seen.”
Her cheeks turned instantly pink.
“Good for our purposes,” he said.
He went into the kitchen area and opened up the fridge, where he found wrapped trays with precut fruit, a bottle of champagne and a tray of meat and cheese.
He began to get all of it out, taking down glasses and pouring a measure in his and hers.
“Why don’t you go out to the deck. There should be appropriate clothing for you in the bedroom.”
She looked at him with intrigue, then vanished back into the bedroom.
He took his time preparing the trays, walking out to the expansive deck area and going to the loungers just outside the bedroom.
He set the trays of food and champagne flutes on a table between two of the loungers, and then Verity appeared, wearing. ..
Nothing.
He thought his heart might beat itself through his chest.
“There are some beautiful things in there,” she said. “But I did sort of think that since it’s a private island...”
“I very much like the way you think.”
She smiled at him and sat down in the lounger.
This, he knew, was a tease, because she was going to drink her champagne and have her snack. And he wanted her to be happy.
He was hard, though, and it made it difficult to focus on the food.
“This is really beautiful.”
“I know,” he said, never taking his eyes off her.
“Have you ever done anything like this before? I mean, with anyone else.”
“No,” he said. He looked at her. “Do you actually want to hear about past lovers?”
“No and yes. I’m curious how much of this is...a routine for you.”
“None of it,” he said, honestly. “I told you, I can have sex without romance. I do it all the time.”
“How much is all the time?”
“Don’t ask questions you don’t want the answer to, Cricket.”
“Ah. I am Cricket again.”
“Does that bother you?”
“No. I like it. Because it’s something that only you call me. But I also like it when you call me by my name. Because you never did, so when you started it felt like something. Special. Maybe that’s why I’m asking you these questions. This feels special. I want to believe that it is.”
“You’re the only woman I’ve ever married.
I wasn’t protecting myself, not the way that you were.
I wasn’t afraid of accidentally getting attached to somebody that I didn’t want to be attached to, or getting hurt by someone.
I never have been. The first time I had sex was one of the most truly disappointing experiences of my life. ”
“Why?” She sat up, naked and holding a champagne flute, and it distracted him from the disturbing feelings that were rising up inside of him.
“I thought... I thought I might feel something. You’re supposed to.
The first time, it’s supposed to mean something.
It’s supposed to matter. I didn’t feel anything.
If anything I felt more alone then than I ever had before.
Like I was lying next to a stranger, and also like I was one.
” He tried to smile. “I suppose that’s how it is when you sleep with a stranger. It feels like exactly what it is.”
“How old were you?”
“Twenty-one. I didn’t ever sleep with a woman until I had somewhere nice to take her.
So not until I had some money. So that I could take her to a nice hotel.
I dressed it up as something that looked like romance, and I thought perhaps I would feel it.
I didn’t. That was the day I knew that I was truly broken.
I said goodbye to her, and I can’t even remember her face now, all these years later.
I couldn’t remember her face very soon after, if I’m honest.”
She got off the lounger, and moved onto his, scooting right next to him, then wrapped her arms around him, the gesture so unusual, so foreign to him, that he almost didn’t know what she was doing. Hugging him. She was giving him a hug.
“That’s very sad,” she whispered. “And I’m sorry.”
“Are you hugging me?”
“Yes. Because someone should.”
Someone should. Was that true? Did he deserve those things, those simple gestures, connections, when he didn’t know how to give them back? Or maybe what she meant was that he should’ve had them in the beginning, because then maybe he wouldn’t be the way he was now. That he could see.
“To answer your question,” he said, because he didn’t know how to continue the conversation about hugging, “no. I have never brought anyone to a place like this. I’ve never spent time with a lover before. I’ve never had a relationship. And I suspect that’s what this is.”
“Is it?” She turned her head, rubbing her nose against his neck.
“I suspect.”
“You’re so funny, Alex.”
“Not on purpose.”
“I know.”
They sat like that for a long time. It was an incredible thing, to want her, but to also be able to sit with her. In silence or otherwise.
“I think,” she whispered finally, “you might be protecting yourself more than you know.”
“In what way?”
“Never trying to have relationships.”
“Why would I try something I felt I would inevitably fail?”
“You’re trying with me.”
It was true. He was. Except... She understood. She understood that he might not be able to...give what most men could.
“You know, though,” he said, suddenly desperate to hear her say it. “You know who I am. You know how I am. You know that I might not be able to give you something that feels like...what every other relationship feels like.”
“I don’t know what any other relationship feels like.
So I guess that’s a good thing, isn’t it?
I don’t know what it feels like to be with someone else.
And I never wanted to be, not before you.
When I said that I didn’t know myself, what I meant was.
..admitting to myself that you were the one I wanted was a shock. ”
“What?”
“I never wanted Stavros. He was safe. I made rules for myself. Before I went off to school, I told myself I would never get involved with a man who would make me lose my head. I never wanted anyone who was intense, someone that I felt like I needed to manage them, or... You know how my family is. So I told myself that if I was going to date, it was going to be someone that I could manage. Then I took a job working for you, and you were definitely not someone that I could manage. Stavros being in the same building was convenient. He’s handsome, he’s not demanding.
He smiles all the time. I could distract myself looking at him, and fill that surface need to be distracted by someone.
So that I didn’t have to admit I wanted you. ”
“You wanted me?”
“Yes. From the very beginning. That’s also why it took me two years to ask Stavros out.
I didn’t really want to go out with him.
I didn’t really want him. I had gotten to the point where I thought maybe I was going to just have to do it, and maybe I would have.
But somehow I doubt it. Being with you..
. I didn’t even have to think about it. I didn’t have to question it.
It was right. It was what I wanted. That’s why I’m here.
It’s easy for me to say that you railroaded me into this.
Comfortable, even.” She smiled. “But I’m not really being tortured, am I? ”
“You might feel differently after several days in my company.”
She laughed. “Maybe. Maybe. I’m trying to figure out all the things I’ve been ignoring. All the things I’ve been pushing down. You definitely taught me something about myself when we...”
“You like it when I praise you.”
“Yes. I guess it doesn’t take a psychologist to figure out why.
I spent a long time feeling like I wasn’t enough.
Not good enough, not smart enough, not anything enough.
That’s one reason I enjoyed working for you so much.
Because you are such a pain. You are so exacting, all the things that other people don’t like about you I—” She stopped talking.
“Sorry. I guess I shouldn’t say it like that. ”
“It doesn’t hurt my feelings that people don’t like me. I’ve never tried to make them like me.”
And there he wondered if she had spoken some wisdom to him a few moments ago.
He had never tried to make anyone like him. He had never tried to have a relationship. What if that was a version of self-protection?
No. He had wanted to feel something. There were times in his life when he’d wanted it desperately.
But the feelings had never been there. It would be a convenient fantasy to tell himself that it had been self-protection all along.
It would make him feel better, in some ways.
But it would give both of them false hope.
“And then you had to. For work.”
“Yes. I have always seen my company as my legacy. I always thought that I would never have children, and so it would have to be what remained of me. Do you understand?”
She nodded slowly. “And what do you think of children now? Hypothetically. If we were to stay married.”
The idea fascinated and terrified him. Made him feel like he was on the edge of a cliff, and also on the edge of a brilliant discovery.
A child. His child. A great and terrible experiment, he thought.
Maybe the only chance he would ever have to love someone or something instantly and in an all-consuming way, but if he couldn’t. ..
“Don’t try to figure out if you’ll be good at it. Just... Do you want a child?”
He nodded slowly. “Yes. I do.”
“Me too. I didn’t think I did, but thinking about it now it makes me realize that I do.
But I want to build a family on my own terms. Can you imagine that?
The power in finally taking control. You can have a family, and it doesn’t depend on choices other people made.
I can have a family, one that’s as good as I make it.
Choosing to avoid this, it was always giving our power away. I realize that now.”
When she said it like that it made sense. It was giving their power away. And neither of them would do that, not anymore.
“Finish your champagne. I need you.”
“Oh. I’m finished.”
Then he swept her into his arms and carried her to that big bed, and showed her exactly why they needed all that room.