Nicholas (South Beach Desire #2)
1. Olivia
Olivia
Olivia leaned in closer to the vanity mirror, seeing a woman skilled at pretending.
She finished applying her rose lipstick just as the bedroom door opened, breaking the quiet.
A chill ran through her—a warning she couldn't ignore, prickling down her arms. Mark was supposed to be downstairs, drinking his coffee, getting ready for work.
For a moment, uncertainty and unease made her feel exposed.
Was it the weight of their marriage, his watchful eyes, or the truth of her own unhappiness?
She looked up and caught his reflection in the mirror—he was standing in the doorway.
His stare made her stomach twist, shifting her from confusion to sharp discomfort.
His eyes had that same hungry look she knew too well.
It wasn't love, or even the kind of desire she wished for that she read about in her novels; it was ownership.
He looked at her as if she were something he owned—a reminder of how small she felt in their life together.
There was a time—she was sure of it—when he looked at her differently.
When his eyes had hunger in them. Real hunger. Not the mechanical, impatient kind she'd grown used to, but something that made her feel chosen.
She'd believed it back then. Every bit of it.
God, how naive!
Before the ring, before the vows, Mark had been someone else entirely. Or maybe he had just been performing. She couldn't be sure anymore, and that uncertainty alone was its own kind of wound.
He'd brought her flowers. Stargazer lilies, once. Tulips in that deep, bruised purple she loved. Small gestures, maybe, but they'd meant something. She had meant something.
And in bed, he had taken his time with her. Slow hands. Soft mouth. He had learned her, or at least pretended to. Foreplay that felt like he actually wanted her, not just a body to use for his own gratification.
Then came the wedding.
And then came the man she didn't recognize.
It hadn't happened overnight. That was the cruelest part. It crept in quietly, a little more impatience here, a little less tenderness there, until one day she looked up and the man who used to trace her collarbone like it was something worth memorizing was gone.
Replaced by someone who took what he wanted and rolled over.
She had made excuses for him. Of course she had. Newlywed stress. Adjustment. He's under pressure. She wrapped his coldness in every soft explanation she could find, tucking the sharp edges away so they wouldn't cut her.
But they cut her anyway.
The first year passed. Then bled into the second.
It didn't stop.
It got worse.
She sighed quietly, her shoulders tensing under her dress.
She was already running late and didn't want to deal with the attention his stare demanded.
Mark walked over with his usual confidence, wrapped his arms around her from behind, and pulled her close.
He leaned in, looking at them both in the mirror, his breath warm and smelling of coffee, and he leaned next to her ear.
“You look exceptionally sexy this morning in that dress and those heels,” he whispered, his hands moving over her hips to her stomach.
“Maybe when I get home tonight, I can help you take it all off.”
Her lips curled into a practiced smile—one perfected over five years of emotional survival.
Outwardly, she wore this mask with ease, but inside, her relief at getting through Mark's scrutiny dissolved into cold resignation. “Let’s see how I feel later,” she murmured, voice light and airy.
But the effort of pretending felt heavier than ever.
Inside, a stark truth settled: there was no chance.
The thought of him undressing her now triggered only dread, replacing what little anticipation had once existed.
Passion was something she desperately missed—a passionate, consuming connection.
Instead, she felt only the obligation of routine.
The fire was long gone, if it had ever truly existed at all.
On the surface, their five-year marriage looked idyllic.
It began smoothly, marked by neatly scheduled milestones.
Both focused on their careers, their lives dictated by office hours, meetings, and deadlines.
Saturdays meant upscale dinners, a bottle of wine, and safe talk of travel and work—polite topics that avoided anything real.
Alone in the bedroom, reality never matched her dreams. Romance novels teased her with the promise of deep intimacy. With Mark, there were flashes in the beginning, but never a fire.
In the deep, hollow quiet of the night, lying beside him while he slept in apparent contentment, Olivia's mind often shifted from resignation to yearning. She wondered if she was missing something she couldn’t name—aching for a dangerous, intoxicating intimacy that left her undone and alive.
Her acceptance of "contentment" was fading, replaced by a restless hunger.
Mark seemed blind to her needs, unbothered by the screaming silences she offered him. The shift was irreversible: where she once settled for contentment, she now recognized its insufficiency. He seemed oblivious, but she could no longer ignore what she needed.
At first, she had used her career as a sanctuary.
As a high-pressure television producer for WFTS-TV, the ABC affiliate in Tampa, her days blurred into her nights.
Off the set, she was glued to her phone or laptop.
She wrangled difficult guests, repaired broken segments, and hunted the next big headline.
It was easier to bury her heart in work than to face the hollow ache awaiting her at home.
Easier to deceive herself, to pretend she was too busy to notice the gulf widening between them.
By the end of their first year, the distance was a steady current.
Mark found his own refuge on the golf course.
He spent every weekend chasing a ball with his friends while she wandered their large, silent house like a ghost, drifting through rooms that felt increasingly like a museum of a life she didn't want.
She had begun to measure her days by the success of her avoidance tactics.
As she drove home that evening, only one thought consumed her: get inside before he does.
If she could scrub the makeup from her face, twist her hair into a messy ponytail, and trade her fitted professional attire for a shapeless, oversized T-shirt, maybe she could sidestep the hunger she’d seen in his eyes this morning.
She wanted to disappear into plainness. Hide in the safety of being unattractive.
When she turned onto their manicured block, a wave of relief washed over her.
His car wasn't in the driveway. She exhaled a breath she hadn't realized she had been holding.
Still, her eyes instinctively flicked to the rearview mirror, half-expecting his headlights to appear.
She hit the garage door opener and slid her car inside.
His side of the garage was a graveyard of abandoned hobbies—practice nets, rusting clubs, and boxes he refused to sort through. His hoarding habits had claimed half the space years ago. A small but constant reminder: her need for order and space never came first.
Bolting the door behind her, she hurried upstairs.
She kicked off her heels, stepped out of her skirt, and unpinned her hair, catching a glimpse of herself in the full-length mirror.
For a fleeting, traitorous second, she admired the way her matching lace bra and thong hugged her curves.
A whisper stirred in her mind. It was soft but agonizing—I wish someone truly saw me.
Not as a wife to be managed or a body to be claimed, but as a woman to be celebrated and adored.
The weight of the thought nearly brought her to her knees. Shaking it off, she pulled on a pair of baggy shorts and an old shirt. It was a suit of armor against the eyes that only ever saw her as a vessel for his own satisfaction.
In the kitchen, beginning to prepare dinner, the only sound was the microwave's low hum, which she had just turned on.
For a moment, she allowed herself to feel calm.
Then came the sound—the metallic clack of the garage door chain moving.
Her shoulders went rigid. Minutes later, Mark stepped inside, a triumphant grin sharpening his features. He didn't even look at the food.
“You got home early,” he said, his gaze sweeping over her with possessive heat. “I was hoping to catch you in that dress and heels. I wanted to help you out of them.”
She forced a hollow, tinkling laugh. “I couldn’t wait—I was starving and wanted to get dinner started. I wasn’t sure when you’d be home; I thought you might stop for drinks with the guys.”
“Not when you leave looking like you did this morning,” he said, voice thick as he closed the distance. He wrapped his arms around her, pressing her against him. “I’ve been thinking about it all day.” Her pulse spiked with anxiety, but her smile held firm, sheltering her discomfort.
“You’re going to ruin dinner, Mark,” she said softly, straining to keep her tone easy. Internally, her mind shouted with rejection, panic rising with each of his advances. She knew he wouldn't stop; he had been counting days since the last time he got his way.
She knew it had been over two weeks. Probably closer to three.
Her anticipation collapsed into resignation as she braced for the inevitable.
“Dinner can wait. Let’s go upstairs,” he murmured, already steering her toward the stairs.
She nodded, the smile never quite reaching her eyes. “Okay.”
In the bedroom, the efficiency with which he stripped was chilling.
"What are you waiting for?" he asked, his voice thick with expectation.
She offered a look that was half-amused, half-dead, then stepped out of her shorts.
Sitting on the edge of the bed, she watched him approach—bare, eager, entirely assuming her compliance.
She had no intention of pleasing him in the way he felt entitled to.
No mouth. No extra effort. She simply tugged him down.
Allowed her underwear to be discarded. Braced for the inevitable.
He used a lubricated condom—a small mercy, as she wasn't ready for him in any sense of the word.
When he entered her, the sensation was mechanical, familiar, utterly suffocating.
He shoved her shirt up to her neck, groping at her breasts with clumsy, hurried intensity.
She knew it would be over quickly; it always was. She gave him just enough of a performance, just enough moans, to keep his ego intact. And within minutes, he was finished. He rolled onto his back with a heavy, satisfied sigh.
“Wow, that was great. We really needed that,” he said, sounding both proud and entirely oblivious.
She forced another smile. “Yes, we did.”
On the surface, she mimicked release and contentment, but inside, a bitter emptiness seized her.
Each encounter left her more hollow, confirming how little she gained.
To him, it was a connection—a job done, a need met.
For her, it was isolation and a tax she paid for peace, each instance deepening the emptiness within her.
It wasn't as if she lacked experience before Mark, but her previous relationships had been unremarkable. There was a boyfriend at seventeen, another at eighteen. They hadn't been skilled, but they had at least tried to care.
At first, she thought Mark might be different. During their courtship, he had made an effort to be attentive. It wasn't earth-shattering, but it was enough to give her hope that they could build a real sexual language together.
At her suggestion, he would occasionally attempt to use his tongue, but he was always clumsy and visibly impatient.
By the end of their first year of marriage, he made it clear that oral sex "wasn't his thing.
" He spoke of it as a chore—something he didn't enjoy and certainly didn't look forward to.
Over time, the shift became permanent. His focus turned entirely inward. Every time she suggested something new, something that might awaken her own pleasure, he brushed it aside as unnecessary.
She remembered one night with agonizing clarity.
She had been desperate for the friction she needed to reach climax, so she had nudged him back and moved to her hands and knees, hoping the change in angle would finally do the trick.
For a heartbeat, she felt a spark of genuine excitement as he entered her from behind.
But within minutes, he climaxed and rolled away.
When she asked to try it that way again a few days later, he refused. He told her the position wasn't “ladylike.” When she pressed him, his words were a knife to the heart. “That’s not what wives do, Olivia. That’s what prostitutes do.”
She had stared at him in stunned silence, realizing that the man she had married was gone, replaced by a stranger who saw her as nothing more than a vessel for his release. From that point on, their intimacy rotted from the inside out.
It went from "conventional sex" once a week to a monthly chore. The last time she had actually reached a climax with Mark was over three years ago, and even then, she’d had to beg for the attention required to get there.
Since then, she had relied solely on her vibrator, her secret plastic companion. It was the only proof she had left that her body was still capable of feeling, and that she was still alive beneath the surface of her own skin.