Chapter 33 Olivia
Chapter thirty-three
Olivia
The question lands like a pebble in a still lake, small, then ripples everywhere.
What would I want?
Financial freedom is a dream I’ve never really thought possible, definitely not in the form of a man.
But that’s not what this is.
My mind shuffles through the lists of things I’ve never been able to buy, own.
I can feel him watching me, thumbs resting at my jaw like he’s holding the moment steady so I don’t have to. It should be easy. People always have answers for this, right? A dream, a plan, a list.
“What do I want…” I echo, and hear my own voice drift in the high, honeyed light of his gallery.
Back home, wants were practical. Fix the porch steps before they swallow another ankle.
Stretch rent into groceries. Keep the lights on at the inn.
In the city, wants were smaller still—quiet, manageable.
A coffee I didn’t have to do mental math to justify.
A pair of black slacks without a shiny seat. Survival wants. Never dream wants.
I pull back a little and War lets me, his hands sliding down to mine, fingers lacing like he’s content to hold the question with me. No pressure. No rush. Just… space.
“Can I…” I swallow, suddenly embarrassed. “Can I think about it?”
His mouth tilts. “You can take forever.”
The knot in my chest loosens, just a notch.
We wander.
He shows me every room, but we stop at the library last. It’s not fussy or dark or male on purpose; it’s small, tucked away, quiet.
I touch the spine of a book I’ve only ever checked out from a library that smelled like lemons and old wood polish.
Here it smells like paper and wool and the faintest echo of cedar from the built-ins.
“Pick something,” he says. “Anything.”
I run a hand across the shelf until my fingers land on a slim collection of letters. “This one.”
“Read me a line,” he says, settling on the window seat like a man who can bear to be still.
I open to the middle and read whatever my eyes find first: “I don’t know what to do with a day that isn’t spent searching for the exit. But if I stand still long enough, perhaps a door will appear that opens somewhere softer.”
The words hit too close. I close the book and press it to my sternum like that might keep it from cracking me open.
He notices. He always notices.
“Tell me, what’s going on in that beautiful mind,” he says. Not an order. An invitation.
“Like I said I’ve been in survival mode so long,” I say, staring out the window at the lawn where the light turns the grass to coin-colored silk. “It’s like my lungs don’t remember how to hold anything but panic.”
He nods once, like he recognizes the ache by name. “Me too.”
I look back at him. “You?”
His jaw works, and something unguarded flickers. “Until you,” he says simply.
Something inside me goes warm and heavy, like a soft stone I want to keep in my pocket forever.
I exhale and place the book back on the shelf.
“I think,” I say finally, choosing my words like thread, “when you grow up counting pennies and favors, your wants get small on purpose. You don’t ask for the big things because you learn not to want what you can’t carry.”
“And now?” He ask, his eyes watching me, patient.
“Now…” I breathe out. “Now my life is bigger. You are a very big thing in my life. And it’s terrifying and beautiful. I don’t know what I want yet. Not exactly. I just know I want to want. I want the chance to figure it out without worrying if the floor will disappear.”
His eyes go molten at that. Not hungry. Proud. Like I’ve said the bravest thing I could say.
“Then that’s your first want,” he says quietly. “Room to breathe.”
I huff a small laugh that turns into something wetter than I intend. He doesn’t call me on it. He stands, reaches for me, cups my face, and kisses me soft. Not a brand, not a claim. A promise.
“Let’s have dinner,” he murmurs against my lips before taking my hand and leading me to the dining room.
Marta, the chef has laid the table like a postcard, linen that begs for elbows, silver that catches candlelight instead of scolding it. The seat beside mine holds a sprig of rosemary tucked under the napkin ring.
And to my surprise the staff sits with us.
Like a family.
Like this is his family.
The conversation is easy. Thomas tells a story about a fox who keeps stealing gloves from the gardener’s shed and War pretends to be scandalized, which makes Ana, the gardener laugh hard enough to wipe her eyes.
Someone mentions the first frost coming early this year, which segues into preserves, which segues into the time the generator failed and the entire house ate ice cream for dinner rather than let it melt.
It’s ridiculous and real and I’m so full of it I could cry.
After dinner, War brings me on to the terrace, the air is colder.
I tuck myself into War’s side and he tucks me tighter, like he’s been rehearsing the motion in his sleep for years.
The hedges breathe. The stars blink. Somewhere inside, music plays, the soft, old kind that knows how to live in a house without disturbing it.
He kisses my hair and doesn’t speak. He just walks me through the dark by staying close.
The silence is perfect, intimate, freeing.
“Olivia,” he murmurs, fingers brushing my waist. “One day soon, I’m going to marry you.”
My breath stumbles, sharp and uneven, like his words knocked the air out of me. Marry me? It sounds absurd, impossible, something girls like me don’t dream about. Survival, yes. Scraping by, yes. But this? To a man like him?
I look up, ready to laugh it off, to shield myself with disbelief.
But his gaze doesn’t waver. It’s steady. Fierce. Certain.
And suddenly the ridiculous weight of it shifts, sinking into my chest until it feels less like a fantasy and more like a promise. Terrifying. Beautiful. A vow already carved in stone.
***
Weeks blur, fast and golden.
The kind of golden that tastes like honey and sex and warm coffee War never lets me finish.
I’m curled up on the couch, laptop balanced on my thighs, catching up on the mountain of emails he’s neglected.
The morning is still on my skin. My thighs ache from the way he wouldn’t let me up, from the hours he kept me caged under him, moving inside me like the world could burn and he’d still be buried there.
He’d ignored it all.
His meeting. His calendar. An investor call he should’ve taken.
Now he’s at the dining table, shirt sleeves rolled, the very picture of control—as if he didn’t spend half the morning fucking me senseless on that same table, ignoring the phone that lit up again and again.
He only came up for air when I started shaking. And even then, it wasn’t to stop.
Now I’m the one answering his neglected emails, my inbox window bright with tasks that should’ve been his. He can talk strategy with associates later. For now, I send polite words in his name, cleaning up his mess.
I snort quietly to myself and refocus on the inbox.
No distractions. My fingers fly over the keys, one email, then another, while the clatter of his keyboard behind me fades to background noise.
I’m dressed today. On purpose. Jeans. No skirts, no dresses, nothing soft for him to slide a hand under and distract himself with. Not after the way this morning went. I smirk at the thought, at the ridiculous lengths I have to go just to keep him contained.
I type fast, clearing out everything flagged as urgent. Drafting responses. Cleaning up the wreckage he leaves when he’s too obsessed with touching me to remember his own business empire.
The last email flies out with a soft chime just as a shadow cuts across the screen.
I jolt, glancing up.
He’s standing over me.
No sound. No warning.
Just presence.
Heavy. Possessive. I hadn’t even noticed he’d ended his call.
He doesn’t clear his throat. Doesn’t announce himself. He just stands there until I feel it in my bones, that heat he carries everywhere, pressing down on me.
“Make me peanut butter cookies,” he says. Not asks. Demands.
I look up arching a brow at him. “Make you cookies? No please? No thank you?”
His gaze locks on mine.
Dark. Direct. Possessive.
Then, flat as stone:
“You made Broderick peanut butter cookies.”
The laugh punches out of me before I can stop it. “Oh, so this is about—”
His mouth claims mine before I can finish, hard and hot, the kiss stealing the rest of the sentence, erasing the name.
When he pulls back, his breath scorches mine.
“Don’t say his name.”
His words hang there, rough and final, and I’m still half breathless from the kiss when I snap my laptop shut with a click.
I tilt my head, eyes narrowing. “How do you even know I made him cookies?”
His stare doesn’t flicker. No games, no dodge. Just brutal honesty.
“He told me.”
I blink. “So now you want them?“ My laugh is half incredulous, half teasing. “Are they even your favorite kind?”
“No.” His jaw flexes, his gaze burning through me. “But I want to be the last man you ever make peanut butter cookies for.”
Something in my chest flips, heat tangling with ridiculous amusement. I can’t help the chuckle that escapes me. “Okay… but what’s your favorite then?”
He hesitates in the way he does when he’s about to give something away.
Finally, low: “Oatmeal chocolate chip.”
The laugh bursts out of me, softer this time, warm. “That’s my favorite too.”
His mouth curves, sharp and smug, like he’d been waiting for me to say it.
I push up from the couch, brushing past him toward the kitchen. “Fine. I’ll make them. Both.”
His hand snags my wrist, pulling me back into the weight of him, lips ghosting my temple before he lets me go.
“Good girl.”