Chapter 54
PAIGE
I wake up to a giant glass of water, a roll of milk chocolate buttons and a note with two pills on top of it. Written in half-scrawled handwriting: Out for an hour. Back soon. Take these two when you wake.
I reach for the chocolates and look at the beautiful new watch on my arm. It’s past three in the afternoon. I can’t remember the last time I slept this long.
My joints hurt, my head hurts, and by the general soreness in my body, it feels like I’ve worked out for hours nonstop. But I know for a fact that I haven’t.
My phone is charging on the bedside table. There’s a text from Nora telling me to get better soon. Rafe must have spoken to her. The red gala dress is hanging on the back of the suite door. I’m in a t-shirt instead. The soft cotton material is becoming very familiar.
I shove a few chocolate buttons into my mouth and pull myself upright.
Ugh. More pills. But I take the ones he’s laid out for me.
The last twenty-four—or is it more like thirty?
—hours feel like a blur. I remember Rafe.
Murmured words and protectiveness. What we spoke about, I can’t remember. But he slept in the same bed as me.
He held me, too. No cuddling. That was our rule when we started having to share a bed. But we broke that one spectacularly last night.
I leave the warm layers of covers behind and stumble into the shower on weak legs. I stay beneath the warm water for what feels like forever, washing off sweat and sickness, and when I emerge again, wrapped in a towel, Rafe has returned.
He’s standing with his back to me by the desk.
We were meant to have driven back to Como by now. He had dinners with investors… I had online meetings with the Mather & Wilde team…
But here we are, stuck in Lausanne at three p.m.
“Thanks. For the pills,” I tell him.
He turns to look at me. His hair is messier than usual, and there’s a tired look to his handsome face, his stubble strong. The chiseled perfection giving way to humanity.
“You thanked me last night, too.” His eyes drop over my body. There’s nothing sexual about it. It feels oddly caring.
“Don’t get used to it,” I say, but the words hold no bite.
His lips curve. “How do you feel?”
“Like I’ve been run over by a truck. Was there… a doctor here last night?”
“Yes. I called someone. She gave you those pills.”
“It feels weird that I can’t remember what she looked like.” I sit down on the side of the bed, still only wrapped in a towel. “Should we drive home? This hotel room is nice and all, but I think I’m ready to leave.”
Rafe’s eyes linger on mine without answering.
“Or… what?” I ask.
He shakes his head. “Nothing. Yes, if you feel up for it. You can sleep in the car. But only if you feel strong enough.”
“I do. I feel better.” I reach for the chocolate buttons. He bought those for me, and if I dwell on that too much, I’m afraid that feeling inside me again, the one that feels like I’m about to break, might come back.
“Are you hungry?” he asks.
“Yes. Weirdly enough.” I cock my head. “Can we stop at a drive-through on the way? Do they have those in Switzerland?”
“Yes, we do. I can make that happen.”
“Thank you.” Then I wince. “I said it again, didn’t I?”
“Yes,” he says, but the curved smile on his face doesn’t disappear, and it’s hard to look at. It makes me want to smile back. “Don’t worry. I’ll annoy you soon enough, and we’ll be even.”
We check out and the valet brings around his car. I’m wearing another one of his T-shirts, having grabbed it out of his suitcase, and my navy sweatpants. The shirt smells like him.
I hate that I like that, too. The list of things I truly hate about my husband seems to be shrinking by the day. I have to remind myself of the way I ended up here, wearing his ring and doing his bidding. Of the deal we made and the fate of my company.
But I shouldn’t have to remind myself.
It’s getting harder and harder to find the anger.
Rafe sets off through Lausanne, and we stop at a drive-through. We both grab a burger and fries, and it’s the best meal I’ve ever had. I tell him that, so enthusiastically that he laughs.
Laughs.
The novelty of seeing him drive stick has worn off, but I still watch his hand shift gears every so often.
Maybe he could teach me someday, I think, half asleep.
In a world where we have endless amounts of time and can be something more akin to friends.
Friends who occasionally help each other out with orgasms and kiss in ways that leave me breathless.
I doze off for the first hour, and when I blink my eyes open, we’re in the countryside. We pass by lakes and roads that wind around greenery, fields and tall mountains. There are snowcapped tops way up high, even in the middle of summer and fields of flowers.
Despite the heavy cloud coverage, it’s pretty, in a dramatic sort of way. Looking like it might rain over paradise.
“It must be wonderful to hike here,” I say.
“Yeah. We did that sometimes, as a family.”
“Have you done it since? As an adult?”
He’s quiet for a few seconds. “No. I haven’t been in the Alps much in the last decade or so.”
“Oh.” I turn to look at him. “Como, Switzerland or Paris?”
“That’s not fair. I can’t answer that. And even if I did, it would be very bad PR if it ever got out.” He glances at me. “You know that, as the PR expert.”
“Are you afraid I’ll tell on you?”
“I’m always afraid of you,” he says in a voice that says the absolute opposite. The clouds look thunderous above us, dark and moving swiftly across the mountains.
I close my eyes again, just for a moment, against the heaviness in my head.
But I must slip into another bout of sleep, because when I come to, the car is pelted with pouring rain. It makes rhythmic sounds against the steel above us. Rafe is driving at a slow pace, both hands on the wheel.
“Wow,” I say. “Did this… how long has this been going on?”
“The rain started half an hour ago. Weather report says it won’t stop anytime soon.” He glances at me. “We’re taking a detour. We’re almost there.”
I look around. We’re on a smaller road now. “Where?”
His voice is tight, and he turns the car in an almost crawl around a bend. The heavy water is making it hard to see. “The family has a chalet here. We can stop there for a few hours. It’s not safe to drive with this weather.”
“Your family’s place?”
“Yes,” he says.
“Do you have the key on you? This wasn’t… planned.”
“No,” he says, “but it has a keypad.”
“Oh. High tech.”
“Yeah.” The windshield wipers are moving furiously over the front window, and above, thunder crashes. It’s oddly cozy, and terrifying, and I wrap my arms around myself.
He notices. “Are you cold again?”
“No. I’m fine, I think.”
“You slept for another two hours.”
“I did?”
“Yes.” The road takes us into a small mountain village, and we pass by wooden houses on either side. Wrought iron lampposts line the street. The downpour makes it hard to fully appreciate the cuteness.
We pass a small roundabout with pink flowers that are being decimated by the rain. Rafe drives up a winding road and stops by the gate of a huge wooden chalet. His arm gets wet when he types in the code, and then we’re inside, the car pulling to a stop.
He turns the engine off, and the sudden quiet is immediately broken by another bout of thunder from above.
“Stay here,” he says. “I’ll get you an umbrella from inside.”
That makes me laugh. “I can handle some rain.”
“You shouldn’t have to. You’re sick.”
“And they say chivalry is dead.” I unbuckle myself. “You’re doing so much for someone you don’t even like.”
I expect him to smile. Snark back. Find the groove again in our familiar banter, the one we’ve always had, even back when we couldn’t stand each other. But he doesn’t. He looks outside and then back at me.
“Stay here,” he tells me again, and disappears out into the rain.
There’s a part of me that wants to rebel. I can handle myself. But I’m tired, and my head has started to hurt again, so I wait in the car and watch him unlock the door. He carries our bags in and then returns with an umbrella.
That thing in my stomach again, that unsettled feeling, returns.
The inside is gorgeous. Stone fireplace, large wooden furniture, faux-fur throws. It feels homey and grand, a combination you’d think wouldn’t work but somehow does.
I end up on the couch with the fireplace roaring and more pills to take. The rain continues to pelt outside. It’s a good thing we stopped. And by the time it’s nearing sunset, there’s no point in continuing on.
He’s sitting in the armchair opposite me. He’s been quiet since we arrived, like there’s a thunderous cloud of his own over his head. For long stretches of time, I lose him entirely to staring into the fire.
“We’re staying here for the night,” I ask him, “aren’t we?”
“Yes,” he says. “There’s some food in the freezer. We can heat it up.”
“That’s great.”
I lie back against the couch. The tiredness has returned, and with it, my headache. He’s holding that book he’s reading, but he’s not paying it much mind. “You really called in a doctor?” I ask. “For… the flu?”
“I’m thorough. And we didn’t know it was the flu last night. Now we do.”
“It was the logical conclusion.” I turn on my side. “Your sister told me that you’re overprotective.”
The second it’s out, I regret it. He’s not overprotective of me. He wouldn’t be.
But he lowers his book. “She said that, did she?”
“Yeah.”
“So you two have discussed me.”
“I asked her for some advice once, yes.”
His eyes land on mine. “That’s unfair. There’s no one I can ask about you.”
“Yes. Me.”
“You’re an unreliable witness,” he says, and looks back down at his book. There’s a stillness to him tonight that I don’t entirely recognize. If I didn’t know better, I’d say he was uncomfortable.
“So are you? Overprotective?” I ask.
“I would remove the over from that word.” He puts the book away and walks into the adjoining kitchen. I hear him rummage around in the freezer. Conversation over. We eat, and when I’m close to passing out again, he helps me into one of the guest bedrooms.
I collapse under the covers. “Funny,” I tell him, standing by the wooden doorjamb. He fits in here, too. Just like he does in Italy, and just like he did in Monte Carlo. Ever malleable.
“What’s funny?”
“I slept for so long, but I’m still exhausted.”
“You’re sick,” he says. “Sleep.”
I turn onto my side. “You’ll sleep in here, too, won’t you? I know we don’t need to. There are other rooms. But…”
“I’ll keep an eye on you,” he promises. “The doctor told me to.”
“Right. Good.”
“I told you, I can’t have you die on me,” he says, and there’s an odd note to his voice that makes me think that’s not entirely a joke.
I’m asleep before he slips beneath the covers beside me, lost to a dreamless fever that knocks me out entirely.
But he dreams again that night.