Chapter 38
Chapter 38
They kiss right as the sun emerges from the water.
A truly cinematic moment that would have made for a perfect picture. No one takes any, but it doesn’t matter. Neither Eli, nor Rue, will ever forget.
“We just want to be married,” Eli told us, at once deeply relieved and outrageously happy. “I need to be married to her. Everything else—I’m sure there was a time when I gave a fuck, but that’s so long gone, I can’t even recall it. I’m ready for this woman to be legally mandated to never leave my side—”
“ Not how the law works ,” Rue murmured, unfazed.
“—until the day we both die in our sleep, surrounded by our immortal dogs and millions of plants.”
Conor and I exchanged a look. Then a smile. Then he said: “ Solid choice. I approve. Signor Salvatore? ”
I watch Rue’s arms close around Eli’s neck, but the glare of the rising sun turns them into little more than contours, dark shapes against the horizon. Maybe this is what relationships are. How people’s lives unfold. Opaque from the outside, the layers and depths impossible to grasp.
I will never fully understand Rue and Eli’s odd, mismatched love, but they fought for it. They made this happen. This happiness, it didn’t just fall into their lap. They compromised, and—
It all happens at once. Tears streak my cheeks. Conor’s arm draws me into the warmth of his chest. “Hush,” he murmurs against my hair. “It’s all good.”
Rue and Eli break apart. My brother beams, looks in our direction as if to say, Maya, Hark, did you see this? Did you see me marry her? Do you see my wife? Rue, though, tugs at his hand, asking for one more second of his undivided attention.
“Just,” she says, and it’s so oddly out of character for her. The hesitation. The way her voice carries to us. “Thank you. For not giving up on me, even though I had given up on me.”
Eli’s reply is an extended murmur in her ear. The tears rear back, flooding my eyes.
“That’s not like you,” my brother tuts, turning in my direction. “Bawling at a wedding.”
I wipe my cheek with the heel of my hand. “I’m not bawling.”
“Of course not, pumpkin.” He hasn’t called me that…God. Since I was twelve, maybe. Dad’s funeral. Gently, he coaxes me out of Conor’s arms and into his own.
“I’m so happy for you. I don’t know why I’m making such a scene. It’s just—things were so shitty for a while, and we were so alone, and I’m…really, really happy that you have this.”
“I know.” His palm travels up and down my back. And then it’s Rue’s turn, which…doesn’t happen a lot. In fact, it may be our first hug. She’s much taller than I am, and despite her softness there is something rigid about this, a sense of discomfort on her part. It makes me love her even more.
“I’m sorry about coming to your wedding in my overalls with little strawberries embroidered on them. If Eli had told me where we were going, I’d have worn my tripod shirt.”
She pulls back, but holds on to my hand. A smile tugs at her lips. “The second best thing about meeting Eli, is that it led to you becoming my family.”
“Second after Tiny, or second after Eli?”
She considers it. “May I amend my previous statement?”
“Third, huh?”
She nods somberly, kisses me on the forehead, and I think my heart explodes.
Next to us, Conor and Eli just exchange one of those one-armed hugs, even as Tiny tries to get right between them. “Congrats on not letting a natural disaster fuck with your wedding, man.” Then we’re all heading back down, the trip much less quiet this time around. Salvatore leaves the gates of the park open before leaving, explaining something about how time is not so important in Italy. When the others head for the car, I stay behind.
“Hey, is there a party planned for when we get back to the villa?” I ask. Eli and Rue turn to each other. And never look away. “Gross, guys,” I laugh. “Get a room, please.”
“That’s precisely what we’re about to do.”
“Okay, well, since you’re going to be breaking headboards or something, I’ll stay here. Explore the follies.”
Eli frowns. “Would it be dangerous? There aren’t many people out yet—”
“I’ll stay, too,” Conor reassures him.
“Hark? You sure?”
“Yeah. We can walk back to the villa.”
I wave goodbye to my brother and Rue. Seeing them happy just cycled me through a lot of emotions, and my anger at Conor is…not forgotten, but set aside. Blunted to a dull pain that comes from defeat and resignation. From finally acknowledging that I’m going to move forward without him.
Maybe he was the love of my life. No, I am certain that he was. But happy endings are not the rule. Sometimes you give it your all, and things still don’t turn out well. Sometimes A for effort looks just like an F in a funhouse mirror.
It’s okay. I’ve survived a lot of bad shit, and I know the trick to pull through.
Breathe. Just breathe. And then breathe again.
“I’m gonna check out the follies,” I tell him once the Fiat has driven past us. “I know you were just trying not to worry Eli. You don’t need to stay.”
I wait for his face to flood with the relief that, for the first time in years, I’m not chasing him. I’m not flirting, or charming him, or attempting to lure him to my general proximity. But he’s still wearing those damn sunglasses. In the brightening light, I’m actually a bit envious.
“I have my phone with me, in case anything happens,” I add.
Conor says nothing. Moves closer, though, catching me off guard. I take an instinctive step back, even as my chin tilts up to him.
“Seriously,” I say. “It’s fine.”
Silence, and I frown, confused. I spy intent in the set of his jaw, serious determination in the angle of his cheekbone. But he’s looming, little room between us, and if only I could see his eyes, then maybe I would understand.
This feels like another game, and I’m all played out. “I’m sorry, Conor. I’m really tired, and frankly, I’d love to be alone for—”
He kisses me.
He leans forward. Takes my head in his warm hands. Then his lips are pressing against mine, and he kisses me.
It’s hard. And also sweet. Openmouthed and lingering and a little messy. And if someone had asked me to take a guess, to say what a kiss from Conor Harkness would be like, I would have described this one: endless, careful, deep. He coaxes my mouth into opening wider, then licks the inside of it like this is all he wants from me. I strain upward, all tendons and shaky muscles. Feel his body brush against mine, rock-hard, muscles and heat and safety, the scent of his skin mixing with the flowers in the air. Out of all the lucid dreams my brain could have conjured, this one is the cruelest. But I don’t wake up. He kisses me forever, and even when he stops, his hands stay around my face. In my hair.
I blink. The world is the same as it was before, but the corners are not quite as sharp. A kinder, gentler place, where breathing is easier.
I might be going mad.
“Maya.” Conor’s voice is deep enough to reverberate through my bones. It reshapes me from the inside. “Everything you said last night was right, and—” He breaks off. Shakes his head. The hand grasping the back of my neck lets go, and finally he’s taking those damn sunglasses off, and I can see that in his gaze there’s—Oh.
Oh.
All of…that.
“I’m doing it wrong all over again.” His throat works. “I should have led with the only thing that matters.”
“Which is?” I hear myself ask, surprised at my ability to form words.
He brushes his thumb over my lower lip, and says: “I love you, Maya. And no. It’s never going to pass.”