Chapter 2
CHAPTER TWO
O migodomigodomigod.
Lucy’s mind reeled as Nico’s head swiveled from Joel to her. “You’re married?” Slack jawed and wide eyed, his complete shock left her feeling insulted.
“Of course not. Well, not exactly?—”
“That’s—absurd!” Nico sputtered. “Who even is this?” He fluttered his hand in Joel’s direction.
This could not be happening. How was this happening? And why did Nico not know who Joel was? She thought everyone in her family knew the Morgan Construction successor.
“He’s…” Her gaze darted toward Joel, then back to Nico. Nope, she wasn’t ready to look at Joel. But she sensed his gaze on her now, and her heart responded by thumping wildly behind her breastbone. “He’s a business associate of my father’s.” Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the jaw twitch again.
“A business associate? How is it possible that I’m unaware of this business associate who you are married to?” Nico’s accent thickened the more upset he got .
“He’s not my husband.”
Jaw tick.
She shut her eyes to block her peripheral vision. “It’s complicated,” she added lamely.
“Complicated. Complicated!?” Nico laughed. “Well, cara , maybe you should uncomplicate it,” he huffed out before he spun on his heel and walked away.
Super. God knew where Nico would go to lick his wounds, or what he would say to whom. If he called her father…
“Luciana.” Her name came off Joel’s lips as it always had. Like a prayer. Like she was his salvation. But she wasn’t his to worship anymore. “Are you alright?”
She hated the way the smooth sound of his voice still hit her everywhere. The hairs on her neck rose in his direction. A shiver of pleasure swirled up her spine to her brain, triggering memories she’d worked years to forget. Memories of his deep timbre breathing her name into her ear as he moved inside her…
“What the hell are you doing here?” Anger had always been easier than confronting uncomfortable feelings, so she whirled on him with hers and glared at him head on.
God, why did he have to be so gorgeous? Entrancing eyes, strong, angular features, light-brown hair, and his long, lean body, built in that athletic way he’d earned from years of cross-training. He looked more fantastic in a suit than ever.
“What am I doing here? What are you doing here?” Joel demanded in return.
“This is my cousin’s wedding,” she exclaimed in a whisper-yell, tossing her hands in the air. She wasn’t sure how much attention the altercation with Nico had drawn, but she didn’t want to risk any more.
Italians made gossip an Olympic sport.
“Well,” Joel said casually, before lifting a shoulder. “I live here now.”
“No, you don’t.” Lucy couldn’t imagine Joel living anywhere other than in his ocean-view penthouse in downtown San Francisco.
He was the new CEO of Morgan Construction, having officially taken over the business after his father had finally retired not long ago. Never in a million years would she have imagined he’d move away from the family empire.
“Yes, I do. Temporarily, at least. There’s a property here I’m developing. I’m expanding the business, and Portland seemed like the natural place to start, seeing as I have family living here now.”
It took a moment for her to catch up, but the lightbulb went off. “Hope.”
Joel’s younger sister now resided in Portland. Lucy hadn’t thought about the possibility of him being here as well, or she sure as heck wouldn’t have come to her cousin’s wedding.
Joel nodded. “Gambo invited my family. Unfortunately, I was the only one able to attend. My sister and parents weren’t able to be here.”
Her Zio Gambo, whose real name was Ricardo (she didn’t know where the Gambo nickname came from, only that no one ever called him Ricardo), had been a contracted employee of Morgan Construction for decades. When he’d lived in California, his company had done the flooring for Morgan builds. He’d raised his family on Morgan wages, same as her own father. But five years ago, at aged 55, Gambo suffered a heart attack that nearly killed him. So he sold his flooring business, packed up his wife and daughter and moved them to Portland, where he thought life might be less stressful. Given that he lost 25 pounds, gave up smoking, and started baking, he hadn’t been wrong.
Now his only child had gotten married. Of course he’d invited the Morgans. They were famiglia to him and all the Barones. Between Gambo’s flooring and Luciano’s cabinetry, they were basically one big family business. And that’s how they’d been raised. Family.
Joel’s sharp eyes zeroed in on hers, telling her what she needed to know. He’d come to the wedding, hoping he’d see her. He reached out his hand. “Dance with me.”
Lucy stared at his palm, then his face, then his palm again. “I don’t think that is a good idea.”
“Why not? I remember days when you let me dance with you in our kitchen.”
Lucy remembered that, too. And that was part of the problem. The memories.
“That was long ago. We aren’t—that’s not us anymore.” She didn’t want to reflect back to when, for a brief moment in time, her life had been amazing. Perfect. The four months she’d spent with Joel, under the radar of everyone else’s knowledge, had been bliss.
He brushed his fingers against hers, tangling them together, and an old, dormant burner flared to life inside her.
“You’re still my wife,” he said quietly, stepping closer. His body heat rolled over her, sealing them together in a bubble of warmth she only ever experienced with him.
“I haven’t been your wife for four years,” she whispered, her voice catching on a breath as he lifted her other hand to his shoulder, positioning them in a dancer’s embrace. Her gaze clung to his movements.
His presence was mesmerizing, his rich, spicy scent enveloping. His voice was an echo of her heart. Everything about him drew her in.
“Our marriage license says differently.”
“That doesn’t count anymore.”
“Did you sign the divorce papers?” he murmured.
Lucy’s gaze snapped up to meet his. “What divorce papers?” She’d never filed for a divorce, and as far as she knew, he hadn’t either. Had he? Her heart started hammering in her chest.
“Exactly.” His eyes burned into hers. Intense, triumphant. Heart breaking. “Which means you’re still my wife, Mrs. Morgan.”
Joel’s movements mimicked Nico’s from a few moments ago, but Lucy’s response couldn’t have been more different. Her heart pounded, and her stomach tingled. Her skin came alive under his touch. When he wrapped his arm more securely around her lower back, her breath caught. He drew her closer until their chests touched. The hard planes of his were noticeable under his suit.
She vividly remembered running her fingertips over that smooth muscle, the way his warm skin slid against her own. In the past, they fit together so seamlessly that it felt destined, like it was written in the stars. And Lucy truly believed they’d be together forever.
And then…
Planting her palms on his chest, she pushed away from him. Joel resisted momentarily, then let her go. As he’d done so many years before.
She stepped away. “I can’t.” To her frustration and embarrassment, tears pricked her vision. Memories tugged the edges of her mind. The embers of old wounds caught a breath of oxygen and flamed until the ache came alive inside her. Time to get as far away from Joel as she could. “I have to go.”
She didn’t wait for a response. Pushing past him, she wove through the crowded dance floor and headed for the main banquet doors, trying not to knock over any of the white-covered chairs as she went. Behind her, Joel called her name. The rough tone matched the agony coursing through her. Good, let him feel the pain too. Why should she be the only one to suffer all they’d lost together?
Lucy fled to the washroom, where she knew he couldn’t follow. She’d hide there until tomorrow if need be.
Escaping into an empty stall, she lowered the seat and sat heavily on top of it. Burrowing her face in her hands, she struggled to process everything that had happened in the last fifteen minutes.
Joel was here. She hadn’t seen him in four years. Okay, not entirely true. With her father working so closely with Morgan Construction, there were times she could not avoid his presence. But those few meetings always took place in a professional group setting, so neither of them had ever breeched the lines of corporate decorum. She’d avoided unnecessary eye contact and left at the first opportunity. The few times he’d attempted to draw her aside, she’d evaded him.
Until tonight. To say this was unexpected was the understatement of the century. She was supposed to be camouflaged between the cream puffs and tiramisu until enough time passed that she could inconspicuously leave—not confronting her husband in a ballroom full of Italians, where all of her world could witness her pain and report back to her parents.
“Luciana Barone, you have some explaining to do!” As if on cue, her aunt’s high-pitched voice echoed through the bathroom, piercing the sanctuary of her toilet stall. Graziella Barone, who everyone in the family called Zia Ella, banged on the door, rattling it. “Natalie is saying your husband is here. And Matilde said you were getting cozy with Nico and then Joel Morgan dragged you into his arms like a man possessed. People are whispering Luciana, and I have no idea about what.” She pummeled the door again. “What in God’s name is going on? Open the door.”
“Zia,” Lucy grumbled, knowing the futility of resisting. “It’s not a good time. Can we talk about this later?”
“We will not talk about this later. Maria put me in charge of you when she sent you here to represent your side of the family. She would be horrified if anything happened to you and I did not offer support.”
Right . More like Maria—Lucy’s flu-ridden mother—would be horrified to know that her eldest daughter was the center of family gossip, and Ella hadn’t done her utmost to find out every single detail in her absence.
Lucy sighed. Another pair of fancy stilettos appeared under the stall door, signaling the arrival of another relation. She mentally kicked herself. This was why the bathroom was never a safe place to hide out. Joel might not be able to follow her in here, but every other female member of her family certainly could.
The toilet seat slammed down in the stall beside her before someone climbed on top of it.
Hot-pink manicured nails appeared over the top of the stall rim, followed by her youngest cousin’s cherub-like face. “She’s not taking a leak,” Natalie confirmed from her bird’s eye view. “No excuse not to come out, Lu.”
“Ugh, fine.” Lucy groaned, getting up and unlocking the stall door.
It swung open to reveal her aunt and five other relatives .
Her Zia Ella placed her fists on her ample hips. “Now, what is this about you being married?”
Lucy’s mind raced. No way could she tell them the truth.
First, they wouldn’t believe it. Second, she’d never hear the end of the insult she’d brought to the family by not inviting a single soul to what should have been the real wedding of the century. It wasn’t every day a Morgan married a Barone. Especially not that Morgan, to this Barone.
“Of course I’m not married,” Lucy lied, deliberately not following up the statement. Let them draw their own conclusions. They would anyway.
The moment of silence that followed was loaded with nosy expectation, but Lucy stood her ground.
“So why would people say you are then?” her aunt finally demanded.
“And why is Joel prowling the hall outside this washroom like a caged lion?” Her cousin Matilde jerked her thumb behind her toward the door.
“The way he was looking at you, all possessive and Christian Grey-like. So hot. I didn’t think you had it in you, Lu. I mean a guy like Joel Morgan. How’d you do it?” Natalie asked.
“Agreed. The way he was acting, if you aren’t married yet, you will be,” Matilde said with a self-satisfied smirk.
“I bet you’re secretly engaged!” a woman in a green dress, who she’d never seen before, exclaimed.
A collective gasp filled the room.
Zia Ella’s eyes widened like saucers. “Luciana,” she whispered-shouted. “Is it true? Are you engaged?”
Crap. This wasn’t going how she hoped it would go. Then again, she hadn’t a clue how it would go, because she hadn’t expected—well, Joel .
“It’s complicated,” she said for the second time that night. They were beyond the point of believing her if she said it was nothing. Besides, it wasn’t nothing. It was something. She and Joel were something, and she’d had years to do something about it. She just hadn’t.
And neither had he. Until tonight.
Zia Ella gathered Lucy’s hands and gently guided her to a velvet-covered chair in the corner of the bathroom. The tribe of women followed, the satin of their gowns crinkling as they moved in unison.
“Luciana, how complicated can it be? We’re family. Just spit it out. You are either engaged to the man or you’re not.” Her aunt’s glare homed in on hers with the accuracy of a lie detector.
She couldn’t tell the truth; she couldn’t lie. She was trapped. Trapped in this bathroom, trapped by her ginormous traditional family, trapped by the wallflower reputation she’s created for herself. Just trapped. And the only time she hadn’t felt that way was when she’d been with Joel.
Then, like she’d conjured him, his voice echoed through the bathroom.
“We’re engaged.”