44. Mia
Chapter forty-four
Mia
“This afternoon, I was thinking you and I head out with Wiremu on the four-wheel drives. We can get most of the way around the—” Georgia stops mid-sentence, looking up over my shoulder.
“What?” I ask, twisting around behind me. A man is behind me, almost silhouetted in the summer sunshine streaming in the window. I return my attention to Georgia, dismissing the man. Wait. Is that Will towering over me? Will? Here?
“I’m sorry to interrupt. Mia, when you have a moment, can we talk?” Will looks exhausted. He has dark circles under his eyes, and his normally well-manicured beard looks decidedly messy. But he’s here. In the flesh.
I turn back to look at Georgia, who smiles in her easygoing Kiwi way, and pushes back her chair. “I’ll be at the front desk—it’s light out until nine or so, so no rush on the four-wheel driving, Mia. Your friend is welcome too, of course. I’ll leave you to it.”
A rush of gratitude floods through me. Thank god I don’t have to explain to her what’s going on. Not that I have any idea myself, even if I wanted to.
Why is Will here?
Will settles into the seat she has just vacated, giving me a ghost of a smile. Georgia takes our empty breakfast dishes away with her.
“How did you get here?” My voice cracks. “Why are you here?”
Will runs his hands through his hair, leaving it spiked up and floppy. Unlike he usually would, he doesn’t bother to smooth it down. “I’m here for you, Mia.” I knew that the moment I saw him, but there’s something about hearing it that solidifies things for me. Maybe he hasn’t given up on me after all. And maybe I haven’t either.
“You’re here.” A statement, not a question.
He nods. “Yeah. I’m really here.” Nerves flood through me as he fiddles with his watch strap. I hope he’s come to talk this out. To find a way to make it work. “I’m sorry about how we left things.” He runs his hand over his beard, and I notice it’s trembling. He doesn’t look nervous, but his body is betraying him.
“I’m sorry too. I should have been a big girl and just talked about it.” I scratch at my thumbnail with the thumb on the other hand. “I just couldn’t cope with you saying no.”
Will’s eyes go tense, his lips thin. “But that’s the thing, Mia. I wasn’t saying no. Not to all of it, at least. And definitely not to you. Not to us.” His voice cracks, full of pain. “All I wanted was to be able to think about and talk about the idea of working together.” He grabs at his neck, digging his fingers into the muscle, then releasing. By the look of him, he came straight from the airport. He must be as sore as I had been when I got off the plane.
“You don’t want to work together?” I wish it hadn’t come out so harsh. It sounds like I’m angry, but I’m just lost.
“Can we talk about that in a moment? I want to separate these two conversations.” Will looks as if he’s about to drop. I doubt he slept on the plane. For someone who is such a good traveler, he struggles to sleep on planes. He reaches over the table, offering his hand. “You, Mia. I want to be with you. I want to do this relationship thing. I want you so fucking bad.”
I take his hand and he holds me tight. The eyes boring into mine demand a response. “I want to do this too.” I let out a heavy sigh. “I’m just so worried.”
“Remember I told you I needed you to be all in? I still need that from you Mia. Because I’m all in.”
Slowly, the pieces start falling together in my head. His eyes searching my soul when we played ‘never have I ever’. Him admitting he’d been into me since university. How it felt in Switzerland waking up in his arms. How magical it was when he recreated our first kiss. I clear my throat.
“I’m all in. I’m scared. But I want to do this.”
The smile spreading across his beautiful face is contagious. He pushes back his chair with such ferocity, it almost topples over. Placing his hands on either side of my face, he kisses me. We come up for air, and he brings his forehead to mine. “I love you, Mia. I’ve loved you since our first kiss.”
“Have you thought any more about whether you’d be willing to work for Starlight?” I ask Will one sweaty afternoon as soon as my breathing returns to normal. The air conditioned suite is a perfect place to avoid the heat of the middle of the day.
Will rolls onto his back, pushing the sheet down his sweaty chest. “I don’t want to work for you.” He gives me a look which I know means ‘shush, I have more to say’. “I didn’t say I don’t want to help—of course I’ll help. I want to help. But remember how we had that conversation about how the dynamic with you being so rich and me being a regular guy feels strange? Me working for you and being paid by you doesn’t sit right with me.”
The panic of rejection rises in me. I take some big deep breaths to calm myself before I reply. The last thing I want is to blow everything out of proportion again.
“That makes sense,” I say slowly. And it does.
“It’s important we’re our own people. Besides, I’ve spent seven years building up my reputation and client base, and it’s really starting to take off.” Despite the heat and his exhaustion from his performance this afternoon, he’s animated. Excited. “It’s not that I don’t want to work with you, or help you, because of course I do.”
Some of my anxiety loosens its hold. I’m starting to see that this is less about me, and us, and more about Will and his own dreams.
“I guess there’s two parts to it. I don’t want to only be tied to you and the resorts—and before you say anything, not because I’m even the tiniest bit worried about this relationship. I just need to achieve something for me. ”
“I understand that. Maybe that’s part of what I’ve been worried about with the resorts too. I’m nurturing something Craig and my parents did. And because I didn’t start it, it’s hard to imagine it could ever be mine. But I’m starting to see that maybe one day, it could be my vision too.”
Will nods. “That’s what I mean. I’d help you anyway, right? But there’s a part of me—maybe it’s a selfish part, maybe it’s the patriarchy, I don’t know—but there’s a part of me that wants to help, rather than doing it for money.” He leans forward to kiss me. “I want to help because I can. Because I love you.” Our sweaty bodies slide against each other as he pulls me close, and finally, I feel like I’m home. “I love you, Mia.”
“I love you too,” I say, wrapping my arms around his neck, and sliding myself tight against him.
The warmth of his hand burns my neck, then my hip as he pulls me so close it squashes the air from both our lungs. I snuggle even closer, resting my head on his chest and not letting go.
“There’s my Limpet.”