Chapter 61 Paige
PAIGE
It’s deeply confusing to have feelings for your enemy-turned-husband and not know where to place them. He feels like the only person in the world I can talk to about it, and also the absolute last. How would I phrase it? I barely understand it myself.
We sleep in the same bed that night. Again.
After talking it through more, I understand what he said about the potential layoffs. It was something I knew might happen one day, and flagging for it early and giving all employees a timeline is the responsible thing. I’ve been assured I’m going to be involved in the process.
But still. It hurt that he didn’t tell me himself, didn’t run it by me, and it hurt a surprising amount.
Without me realizing it, he’s slipped beneath my skin. Between the arguing and the bantering, the pretending and the posturing, we’ve developed something real.
And that terrifies me.
The next day, I leave my balcony-turned-office to go for a drive. I need to clear my head and I’ve yet to go to an Italian grocery store. It feels like an oversight.
On the few international trips we went on when I was a child, my parents and I would always make time for a grocery store. We’d go aisle after aisle and pick out things we’d never heard of to try.
So I do the same here. I spend almost an hour in a grocery store before heading back to Egeria. I have to take two trips from the car to the kitchen to carry in all the bags.
I set them down on the kitchen island. The plastic is flimsy, and the corner of a cardboard box has already pierced it.
I’ll pack tote bags next time.
There’s a small radio in the kitchen that Antonella keeps on when she’s in here. I turn it on, and Italian music starts to play. I sway along as I start unpacking. There are at least three things I want to try right away.
Italian grocery stores might be the best I’ve ever been in.
“Where,” a voice asks, “have you been?”
I turn to see Rafe standing in the doorway. He looks over the kitchen island at the veritable banquet of things I’ve bought.
“I stole your car again,” I say.
“It’s not stealing. You can use whichever car you want.” He lifts up a box of a cookies I’d never seen before. “You bought these?”
“Yeah. Are they good?”
“They’re fantastic. We used to take these out on ski trips. They were individually wrapped back then.” He puts the box back down. “Did you buy the entire store?”
“No. But I just realized I hadn’t been to a single grocery store since I came here, and I want to… well, buy Italian food. Eat my way through the country.”
He holds up a bag of chips with a smile. “So you started with this?”
“That’s a flavor I’ve never heard of before! And I’m not only doing snacks. Don’t complain, or you won’t get one of those nostalgia cookies.”
“Nostalgia cookies,” he repeats. He looks over the haul, turning a few things over. “And you’re listening to… is that Volare?”
“I’m embracing the culture.”
“You’re married to a Swiss man, not an Italian one,” he says. Something about those words makes my stomach warm.
“Yes, and when we go back to Switzerland, I want to do this too,” I say. “I only got to try a little bit of chocolate last week.”
He comes to stand beside me, close enough that our hips almost touch. I’m sorting through the fruit I bought and he watches me do it.
“You’re wearing my vest?”
“Yes. Told you I wanted to try one. Doesn’t it look good with shorts?” I smile at him. “Are you terribly annoyed at me?”
“Yes,” he says easily. “I’m livid. There’s not a single part of me that finds the idea of you walking around in my clothes a turn-on.”
The music picks up, and my heart with it. “That wasn’t the desired effect.”
“I know. That’s why I’ve kept it to myself.” He reaches past me to grab a small black jar. “You bought squid ink?”
“Yes. Anything that was new for me, I bought.”
“I could use this for pasta.” He turns it over and then looks up at me. There’s something in his dark-green gaze that makes me feel light. Like I could do anything. “Will you have dinner with me tonight?”
“Here?”
“Yes. Outside, on the terrace.”
It’s the music. That’s the reason I feel like dancing. “Yes.”
His smile widens. “Good.”
Is it a date? I think, as if it’s possible to go on a first date with your legally wed husband. I can’t ask it. Shouldn’t even think it. But then he’s tipping my head up, and it’s impossible to keep my thoughts in order.
“You can cook?” I ask.
“I can. There are lots of things you don’t know yet.”
I feel breathless. “Probably because I didn’t hire a private investigator ahead of our wedding.”
“Such an oversight,” he says in a voice that’s half smile, half smirk.
I find the collar of his shirt. My stomach is buzzing. It’s the kind of feeling I hate.
Usually.
“I’m not fixing your collar because I need an excuse to touch you,” I tell him.
“Good,” he says. “Because you don’t need an excuse anymore.”
My fear is like the lake outside. Narrow and terrifyingly deep. “I’m not… good at emotions. I’ve done my best to run from mine for years.”
“I know you have, darling. It kept you alive.”
His easy matter-of-factness makes my eyes sting. I blink rapidly to clear them. Maybe the only way forward is through. To fall into the deep lake and see if I’ll be able to float.
His eyes search mine. “What is it?”
“You called me darling again.” It’s so dumb, of all the things, but it’s the only thing I can say.
“Yes. I did.” Rafe brushes over my cheek, face close to mine.
To think I used to find him too handsome to look at.
Now I can’t look away. There’s intelligence and kindness in those eyes, and complexity and anguish.
Full lips that are quick to a smirk and sometimes, just sometimes—when he’s truly happy—break into a fully-fledged smile.
“It’s just… I can’t bear it sometimes, when you’re kind to me. When we blur the lines like this. I can handle you when we’re fighting, or when we’re… intimate. But I don’t know how to handle kindness,” I tell him.
His smile fades. What remains is just him, honesty etched onto every line of his face.
“I don’t think I can stop,” he says. “If you want us to go back to hating each other every minute of the day, Paige…”
I shake my head. But I can’t find the words either, and maybe he sees that, because he just brushes his thumb over my cheek and keeps talking.
“I hated you. For forcing my hand. And then I hated you for being so frustrating.” He wipes away something wet on my cheek. Am I crying? “And then for being so damn interesting. You’ve done a good job at it, you know.”
I smile. “I tried very hard.”
“Do you know what I thought when you walked into the courthouse?”
“That you had to get me a watch, and quick, because I was late.”
His lips tug. “Yeah. That too. But I thought that it was just my luck that you were the most gorgeous woman I’d ever seen, and we were on opposing sides.”
“You didn’t.”
“I did. You saw through me, too. Saw that I wanted you earlier than I was willing to admit.”
“That was a fun button to press.” I shift in his arms and slide my hands beneath the collar of his linen shirt. “What do we do now?”
“Now?”
“Yeah. I’m not sure I can pretend to hate you anymore either.”
He leans forward and presses a kiss to my temple. “I don’t know. I’m not an expert at relationships.”
“Me neither.”
“And there are things… I don’t know if I’m…” His voice trails off, broken and pained. I think of his nightmares and his guilt. I shouldn’t have survived. He’s a man used to being an island, just like I’m used to drifting alone at sea.
“Just let me take care of you, okay?” he asks. “Let’s start there.”
I nod and breathe in his scent. It’s been a long time since anyone took care of me. Starting there might be hard enough.