Chapter Fourteen
Everett
“Wow, this is beautiful,” Mila says after we’ve been seated at an intimate table for two in an elegant, high-ceilinged dining room.
I called in a favor and got us a reservation at Wardwell House, one of the big, old Victorians along Cottage Row, where millionaire lumber barons, railroad tycoons, and business magnates from Chicago and Detroit built summer homes over a century ago.
Most of them have been converted to bed-and-breakfasts by now, and a few, like Wardwell House, have excellent farm-to-table restaurants.
There’s always a waitlist on weekends, but I know the chef pretty well since he buys fruit from us.
“Am I dressed okay?” Mila glances at her sneakers.
“Better than okay,” I assure her. “You look perfect.”
After listening to the server go over the specials, we order drinks and peruse the menu. At least, I try to look at the menu. But my eyes keep drifting to Mila across the table. Nothing on this menu could possibly taste as good as she looks.
Odds are she’d taste better than anything on this menu, too.
Her chin has a little dimple in it—I never noticed that before—and her hair cascades down her back in loose, shimmery waves.
That notch at the base of her throat? It’s killing me.
I bet if I put my nose right there, I’d smell orange blossom, which is now the sexiest scent in existence.
My gaze travels over the curve of her shoulder and skims across the tops of her breasts, barely visible above the scooped neckline of her dress.
Jesus.
I drop my eyes to my menu again, trying to redirect my thoughts to a more appropriate track. The last thing I want is for Mila to catch me staring at her chest.
The server returns with our drinks and takes our orders. When we’re alone again, I take a sip of my old-fashioned and lean back in my chair. “So you were a dancer.”
“I was.”
“And obviously a good one.”
She shrugs modestly. “Not as good as my mom.”
“She was a ballerina too?”
“She was a principal with New York City Ballet before I was born,” Mila says with reverence. “She gave it up when she got pregnant with me.”
She smiles ruefully. “I remember discovering an article on the internet when I was twelve that lamented how ‘her career had been cut tragically short by unfortunate life circumstances.’”
“The writer actually said that?” I frown. “What a dick.”
She blinks. “Those were her words. A direct quote.”
I’m not sure what to say. I try to imagine being a kid and seeing proof that my mom hadn’t wanted me. It seems less a matter of if that would mess you up, and more a matter of how much.
The server appears with a bread basket, and Mila reaches for a slice of fresh-baked sourdough. I watch her butter one side and take a bite. I want to lick the butter off her lips, which is not an impulse I’ve ever had at dinner with someone before.
Quit acting like your dog at the table. Be cool.
To distract myself, I pluck a roll from the basket, tear a piece off, and toss it into my mouth. “So tell me about living in New York. What are your favorite places?”
Her face lights up as she talks about the Botanical Gardens, Hallett Nature Sanctuary in Central Park, a museum called The Cloisters in upper Manhattan. “Have you ever been there?”
“I’ve never been to New York City at all.”
“Really?”
“I’m more of a country boy,” I say, giving the words some added drawl.
She laughs. “I can see that. But I still think you’d like New York. We have beautiful green spaces hidden like secrets among the skyscrapers. You should come visit sometime. I can show them to you.”
I take a sip of my drink, letting the bitters and smoke roll over my tongue.
I think about what it would be like to walk down a crowded Manhattan street with my hand on Mila’s low back, keeping her close.
What would it be like to take her somewhere no one knows us?
Where no one expects her to be the girl who burned down the bakery, or me to be the mayor?
Where she might take my hand and show me secret, beautiful places that matter to her? “Maybe I will.”
Our salads arrive, and we talk more about Hart’s Landing, things that have changed, things that will never change. She laughs when I tell her about the ongoing feud between Yasmine and Ripley.
“He drives her crazy,” I say, tipping back the last of my old-fashioned.
“He always has.” She gestures to the cherry in my glass. “You gonna eat that?”
I slide the glass toward her. “It’s all yours.” Watching it disappear between her lips is so hot, my cock jumps.
“Okay. Let’s see if I can still do this,” she says with what I can only call a mischievous twinkle in her eye.
She places the stem in her mouth and sits up straight.
Her jaw works as she manipulates the stem with her tongue, and her eyes slide to the side as she concentrates.
Finally, she takes the knot from her lips and smiles. “Ta-da!”
I laugh and give her a few slow claps. “Very impressive.” And hot as fuck, but I will not tell her that my brain is wondering what other talents her tongue might possess.
Guiltily, she hides the knotted stem under her bread plate. “I probably shouldn’t do that in a nice place like this.”
“I’m glad you did,” I say. “Perfect manners are boring. Want another glass of wine?”
She thinks for a moment and shrugs. “Sure. Why not?”
“So, can I ask you a personal question?” I swirl the remains of my second cocktail around in my glass.
“Uh-oh. Should I be scared?”
“You don’t have to answer if you don’t want to.”
“Okay. Shoot.”
“Why aren’t you dating right now?”
She pokes at a green bean with her fork. “I need to work on myself before I get back out there again.”
“After your divorce, you mean?”
“Yes.”
“What happened?” I ask, then immediately worry I’ve gone too far. “Sorry—you don’t have to talk about this if you don’t want to.”
“It’s okay.” She sets her fork down and pats her mouth with her napkin.
“So, Connor, my ex, is the perfect example of the kind of guy I fall for. Charming, successful, good-looking, but runs hot and cold. He could be incredibly attentive to me one moment, saying and doing all the right things, and completely disconnected the next.”
I know the type. My father subjected my mother—and all of us—to his unpredictable moods. For years, every bender or beer-fueled outburst would be followed by flowers and flattery, until he just didn’t care anymore. “Go on.”
“He worked in finance, which meant a lot of late nights. There were trust issues.”
Of course he worked in finance. I picture a suit-and-tie guy with a trust fund and a frat-boy grin. I bet he was a Yankees fan, too. Fucker.
“And I have this…thing I do, when it comes to relationships.” She picks up her fork again and rolls the green bean around on her plate.
“I like to please people. So when someone I like shows me affection, I become very invested in trying to be exactly what he wants. I prioritize his needs. I diminish my own. I ignore all red flags. Whatever keeps the validation coming.”
“You put up with his bullshit because you liked his attention?”
She nods slowly. “A lot of bullshit. So much that he felt guilty enough to propose. And I actually thought the rings and vows would mean a higher level of commitment. I convinced myself that marriage would bring emotional security. Things would get better.”
“But they didn’t.”
“Nope. He worked even more than before. When he was home, he was distant. The harder I tried, the more he pulled away.” She stabs at the green bean a few times, but not hard enough to pierce the skin.
“And then I saw the texts from a female colleague at his firm that were definitely not work-related.”
Beneath the table, I crack the knuckles of my left hand. “Did you confront him?”
“No.” She stares at her plate.
“Why not?”
“I don’t like to pull on loose threads. I’m always afraid everything will unravel.”
As she speaks, something happens inside my chest. A sensation of breaking open. All my protective instincts are exposed. “I want to fucking lay this guy out, you know.”
A tiny smile. She peeks up at me. “Thanks.”
“So how did it finally end?”
“A few weeks after I saw the texts, he said he’d made a mistake and didn’t want to be married. That I made him feel trapped, and he couldn’t live like that.” This time she spears that green bean with enough force to impale it on the tines. “We were three days away from our one-year anniversary.”
“And when was that?”
“Six months ago.”
“I’m sorry.”
She shrugs it off. “We weren’t meant to be. He hated my cat.”
“You deserve a lot better. You and your cat.”
“She hissed every time he entered the room.”
“I like her already.”
Smiling, Mila sets her fork down and lifts her wineglass to her lips. “Anyway, that’s pretty much it. Connor said the divorce would be easy—his family lawyers would take care of it. All I had to do was sign some papers saying he didn’t owe me anything. Which was fine with me.”
Sawing off a piece of my steak, I stick it in my mouth and chew hard, angry with her ex for a thousand different things. Toying with her feelings. Taking her for granted. Cheating on her. Leaving her. Making her feel like any of it was her fault.
A man who mistreats the people who love him always sets me off.
“Want to hear the end of the story?” she asks, sounding surprisingly upbeat.
“Sure.”
“As I was packing up to move out of his apartment, he told me in this stupid magnanimous tone that I could keep the ring.”
“Did you throw it at him?”
She shakes her head, a gleam in her eyes. “I sold it and donated the money to a cat rescue.”
Her resilience makes me smile, but I still hope that someday, somehow, I’ll have the opportunity to punch her dipshit ex in the mouth.