Chapter 31
Chapter Thirty-One
LIVIANNA/LILY
Two & A Half Weeks From Now
Couches & Confessions
Sometimes the safest place in the world is the arm of the man who listens, even when you say nothing at all.
“It’s beautiful out here, Jax.” The sun bleeds gold across the Pacific as we stroll barefoot along the shore, my hand tucked into Jax’s while the waves chase our footprints into oblivion.
“So are you.” He shoots me an earnest smile.
The sand is still warm from the day’s heat, and I can taste salt on my lips from the ocean breeze that tangles through my hair.
“This will always be our special place in California.” I pause as a pelican dives into the surf, its wings cutting through the air. “When everything else gets complicated, we’ll have this.”
Jax stops walking and turns to face me, his dark eyes reflecting the amber light that paints everything in shades of honey and promise.
There’s something in his expression I can’t quite read. He looks like he wants to tell me a secret but doesn’t know if I can handle the weight of it.
“Our special place.” He lifts our joined hands and presses a kiss to my knuckles. His lips are warm against my skin. “I like the sound of that, mon trésor.”
The French endearment rolls off his tongue as if he means it. Something in my chest flutters at the intimacy of it.
But it’s the way he’s staring at me that steals my breath. Not with the heated desire I’ve grown accustomed to but with something deeper, more reverent. Like I’m a piece of art he’s trying to memorize before someone takes it away.
“What?” I laugh, suddenly self-conscious under the pressure of his gaze. “Do I have seaweed in my hair?”
But he doesn’t even smile. Instead, his free hand comes up to cup my cheek, his thumb tracing the line of my cheekbone with a gentleness that makes my knees weak. The touch is worshipful, like he’s caressing something sacred.
“You’re so fucking gorgeous it hurts to look at you sometimes.” His voice is rough, edged with something that almost seems like pain. “Standing here with the sunset behind you, looking at me like that... Christ, Livianna.”
The raw honesty in his words makes my throat tighten with emotion I’m so close to exposing. There’s something broken in the way he says it, like beauty is something that brings him sorrow instead of joy.
“Jax…”
But he’s already pulling away, his walls snapping back into place so quickly it gives me whiplash.
“Come on.” He tugs my hand and walks again. “Let’s keep going before the sun sets.”
I don’t move. I stand there in the sand, studying his profile as he realizes I’m not following. The muscle in his jaw ticks with tension, and his shoulders are rigid. It tells me he’s fighting some internal battle I’m not privy to.
“What was that?” I ask quietly, my voice barely audible over the sound of waves crashing against the shore.
“What was what?”
“Don’t.” The word comes out sharp, making him turn to face me fully. “Don’t start doing that thing again where you shut down the moment something real happens between us.”
He runs a hand through his hair, the gesture frustrated and weary. “Livianna, it’s nothing. I was just—”
“You were looking at me like you were saying goodbye.”
Something flickers across his features. Fear, maybe. Or guilt.
My insides twist. “Jax, you were memorizing me for when I’m not here anymore.”
The silence stretches between us, filled only by the rhythmic sound of the ocean and the distant cry of seagulls. He stares out at the horizon, his jaw working as he seems to wrestle with words he can’t or won't say.
“Jax, please talk to me.” I step closer, close enough to touch him, but I don’t.
Something tells me he’s balancing on a knife’s edge right now and the wrong move could send him tumbling back behind those walls he’s spent years perfecting.
When he finally gazes at me, there’s something devastating in his dark eyes. Something like longing mixed with resignation, like a man watching something precious slip through his fingers. It’s heartbreaking, even if I don’t understand it yet.
“You want to know what I was thinking?” He pulls me into his arms, his voice dropping to that low register that makes my spine tingle. “I was thinking about how this moment feels like borrowed time. Like we’re living in a bubble that’s going to pop the moment the real world intrudes.”
The confession almost knocks me down because it’s the same fear I’ve been trying to ignore for months. That whatever this is between us is too good to be true, too perfect to last.
“Why does it have to be borrowed?” I curl my fingers into the soft cotton of his shirt. “Why can’t it just be ours?”
He covers my hand with his, pressing my palm flat against his chest where I can feel his heart hammering against his ribs. “Because my world is complicated in ways you don’t understand. There are parts of my life that would destroy this if they ever touched you.”
The cryptic warning makes my stomach clench with unease but also with determination. I’ve spent my entire life fighting uncomfortable truths, difficult and messy things I never should’ve been forced to. I’m strong enough for anything, and he needs to know it.
“Then uncomplicate it.” I peer up at him, willing him to see the strength in my eyes. “Whatever it is, we can figure it out together.”
“Can we?” His thumb traces across my knuckles, the touch gentle but somehow desperate. “When you don’t even know who I really am?”
“I know enough.” My declaration comes out fierce, protective of this delicate thing we’ve built between us. “I know you’re kind. You listen when I talk instead of waiting for your turn to speak. You make me feel safe in ways I didn’t know were possible.”
I’m about ready to tell him I love him and I’m willing to take on the world if he’ll let me. But he steps back.
Something cracks in his expression at my words, like I’ve found a weakness in armor he thought was impenetrable. He stares at me for a long moment. I can practically see him fighting with himself, caught between the desire to tell me everything and the need to protect me from it.
“Livianna…”
“I’m not fragile, Jax. If you knew everything about me, you’d know that.” I inch back into his personal space. “I’m not going to shatter if you let me see the real you. All of you.”
He closes his eyes and when he opens them again, there’s something haunting in his gaze that takes my breath away. For a moment, I think he’s going to do it. I think he’s going to tear down those walls and let me in.
Instead, he leans down and presses his forehead against mine, his breathing uneven as he struggles with words that seem too big for his throat.
“You have no idea what you do to me,” he whispers. “Looking at you, touching you, and having you trust me the way you do... It’s everything I never knew I wanted and everything I’m terrified of losing.”
My heart squeezes at the vulnerability in his admission, at the way his voice breaks slightly on the word “losing.” I lift my free hand to cup his face, feeling the slight roughness of his beard against my palm.
“You’re not going to lose me.” The promise falls from my mouth without conscious thought, but the moment I say it I know it’s true. Whatever he’s running from, whatever issues exist in his world, I’ll never leave his side. “I’m right here, and I’m not going anywhere.”
He shudders at my words, his arms coming around me to pull me against his chest in an embrace that feels desperate, like he’s trying to imprint this moment into his memory.
There’s tension in every line of his body, the way he’s holding me like I might disappear if he loosens his grip on me.
“Promise me something,” he murmurs into my hair.
“Anything.”
“Promise me that when things get rough, when my world tries to pull us apart, you’ll remember this moment. Remember how we feel right now, standing here with nothing between us but honesty.”
The request sends a chill down my spine despite the warmth of his body. There’s something almost prophetic in his words. It’s as if he knows something I don’t, like he can see a storm coming that I’m still blind to.
“Jax, you’re scaring me.” I pull back to study his face, searching for answers in the depths of his dark eyes. “What aren’t you telling me?”
“I don’t want to lose you, and there are—” But before he can finish, the wind shifts suddenly, whipping my dress around my legs with a ferocity that makes me shiver.
The temperature drops as clouds gather on the horizon, turning the sky from gold to pewter in the span of heartbeats.
“We should head back.” Jax’s shoulders go rigid, and it makes my chest tighten with unspoken questions.
I want to ask what’s bothering him, why his jaw keeps twitching like he’s grinding down thoughts too frightening to voice. But something in his posture warns me to let it be, to give him the space he needs to work through whatever demons are chasing him.
Instead, I squeeze his hand and let him lead me back toward the house. The glass walls glow like a beacon against the gathering storm.
“I’m taking you to dinner tomorrow night.” He opens the sliding door and ushers me inside, his palm hot against the small of my back. “There’s this little bistro tucked away in the hills where no one will find us.”
The promise in his words makes my pulse flutter. The idea of being completely alone with him in some hidden corner of the world where we don’t have to pretend this is just business sounds divine.
We can go to a place where I don’t have to worry about anyone who might want to dissect what we mean to each other. A place where I’ll let down my guard and tell him there’s no possibility that he’ll lose me because I’m in love with him and want to go public with our relationship.
“Sounds perfect.” I kick off my sandals as he wanders toward the kitchen. I already miss the warmth of his touch. “Should I dress up, or are we talking about the kind of place where they don’t care if I show up in jeans?”