Chapter Twenty-Seven
"You didn't have to come with me," Olivia said for the fourth time. She was sure Nico had more important things to do than shop for baby furniture.
He gave her a look, not bothering to answer her for a fourth time. Especially after telling her he wanted to come the first three times she'd said it.
She held up a hand. "Okay. Okay. I just know you still want to know the sex of the baby, and I didn't want to rub in that fact by making you decide about the decor."
"I thought you wanted primary colors and an animal theme?"
Olivia nodded. "If I don't see something I like..." Her voice trailed off as she zeroed in on a crib. Primary colors—yellow, red, blue, and white—with a circus motif of stars and stripes. A circus act was depicted on the front panel—horses, a lion, clowns, and men in high tops.
She ran a hand along the wood. Smooth as a baby's bottom. Nico and a sales associate arrived at her side at nearly the same time.
"Can I help you with something?" The sales woman was dressed in slacks and a silk blouse, fitting in nicely with the posh baby store.
"How much is this?"
"We'll take this one."
Both Olivia and Nico said in unison.
The sales clerk raised her brows, choosing to reply to Nico. "Very good. We have a matching changing table and armoire, as well."
"We'll take them, too."
Olivia spoke up, wanting her questioned answered. "How much for the crib?"
The sales clerk reluctantly pulled her gaze away from Nico and gave her a condescending smile.
Olivia gritted her teeth but remained silent. She wanted the answer.
"The crib is thirty-six hundred, the changing table forty-seven, and the armoire is eighty-nine." The clerk stated crisply.
Olivia quickly did the math in her head. Grabbing Nico's arm, she gave it a yank, saying to the sales associate, "Excuse us a moment."
She gave Olivia a small nod. "Of course. I'll get started on the paperwork."
Olivia waited until she was out of earshot before whisper-yelling, "We can't spend almost twenty grand on baby furniture."
"We can, and we did."
"No, we can't. Nico, that's insane. Nobody spends twenty grand on baby furniture."
"They must or this store wouldn't be in business," he logically returned—damn him.
Olivia took a deep breath. "Okay, fine, but we're not spending twenty grand on baby furniture."
Nico cradled her face, tipping her head back to look directly down at her. "Tesoro, I saw your face when you first saw the crib. You fell in love. And for that reason alone, that's the crib we're getting."
Olivia felt her eyes fill and she blinked quickly to keep the tears at bay. How did she argue with that? She placed her hands on his hips and laid her head against his chest. One of his hands slid to her nape, while the other rubbed down her back, pressing her into him as close as her belly would allow.
"Thank you," she mumbled against his shirt.
"You don't have to thank me, tesoro. Just tell me you love it, and that will make me happy."
She pulled away, looking up, making sure he was looking at her before she said, "I will always thank you for every big or small thing you do for me. And I do love it."
Nico kissed her on the forehead. "Then it's settled. Now, go pick out the bedding, so we can add that to the order."
Olivia sat at the side of her mother's bed. She looked a little better today, having some color in her cheeks and a smile on her face.
"Did you feel that?" Olivia asked, holding her mom's hand to her stomach, hoping the flutter could be felt by her mom, too.
At her mom's weak but happy laughter, she got her answer. "It must be a boy. He's a strong little sucker."
"Well, Nico will be happy to hear you say that. Between you and me, I think he's secretly afraid of having a girl."
Her mom gave her hand a small squeeze. "You're happy, my Livvy? Nico's good to you?"
She asked that all the time, but however many times she tried to tell her mom she was happy, she still persisted.
She squeezed her mom's hand in return. "He's very good to me."
"Then why do you look so sad?"
Did she look sad? She always tried to hide her feelings from her mom, knowing any added stress couldn't be good for her. But the truth was, mingled with the happy were moments of sad that seemed to occur more often over the last month.
Ever since Valentine's day.
Olivia put on her best fake smile. "I'm not sad."
"That smile says you're not, but your eyes say you are. You can't hide anything from me."
Olivia sighed, knowing that was true.
"Tell me what's bothering you."
"I don't want you to worry about me."
Her mother let out a surprisingly strong burst of laughter. "You're my baby girl. I'll worry about you regardless."
Olivia gave her a weak smile then shared with her mom something she was afraid to admit even to herself. "I'm in love with Nico."
Her mother gave her hand another squeeze, the force behind it weaker than the last and knew her mom was growing tired. "That's a good thing, sweetheart."
Olivia was shaking her head before her mom finished her sentence.
"Well, why isn't it?"
"Because he doesn't love me back."
Her mom tsked. "You don't know that."
"I do." If he loved her, he'd had the perfect opportunity to tell her so on Valentine's Day.
Her mom sighed. "Sometimes men don't realize what they're feeling is love. Give him some time, my beautiful girl. It will all work itself out in the end."
"And if it doesn't," Olivia reassured her mom, "I'll still be okay. He's sweet to me and promised to be faithful. I shouldn't expect more than that." She gave her mom a light kiss on the cheek. "I'm just overly emotional right now. I knew what I was getting into when I agreed to marry him."
She just never expected she would fall in love.
* * * * *
Nico leaned back in his chair, ankle crossed at his knee, looking at Marco who sat as casually in a leather chair across the desk from him.
"Valentina's books came back clean."
Nico grunted. Good. That was the last of his clubs. One less thing to worry about.
"Elena's gone."
Nico raised an eyebrow. "Gone?"
"She left the country. France, I think."
More fucking great news. But he had to be sure. "How do you know?"
"Priscilla."
Marco's sister and Elena's best friend. If anyone would know, it would be her. Nico grunted again. "Any news on Carmine?" A question he asked every day. The answer was always the same.
"Nothing significant."
Fuck. He should have just done what he'd wanted to do from the beginning and killed the bastard.
"Have you ever thought he's just letting it go?"
No. Nobody in their right mind would ever just let Olivia go. "Doubtful."
Marco shrugged. "It's been months."
Nico uncrossed his legs and sat straight in his chair. "And we'll fucking watch him for months more if that's what it takes."
Marco raised his hands.
Nico didn't lose his composure often, but fucking Carmine pushed all his wrong buttons. He stood from his chair. "We done here?" He had the urge to find Olivia.
Marcos stood, too. "Yeah. I'll see if I can find out more details on Elena."
It wasn't a subtle conversation switch, but Nico appreciated the effort. He dipped his head in acknowledgment and left the room.
Olivia wasn't in their bedroom. He looked at the connecting door and saw it was ajar and knew that's where he would find her. They were converting her old bedroom into the baby's room. Last time he'd checked, everything had been removed, waiting on the arrival of the new baby furniture.
Opening the door, his anger from a few moments ago that he'd finally managed to contain, resurfaced tenfold. In two long strides, he hit the center of the room. "What the fuck!"
He watched, as if in slow motion, Olivia's back go rigid, and she started to lose her balance on the tall fucking ladder she was standing on. His body was moving, his top half preceding his feet, which seemed as if they were moving at a snail's pace. One of her arms flew out, trying to counterbalance her shift in gravity, the paint roller she held leaving her hand to sail in an arc and land somewhere to the right of the room. Her knees bent, banging into the top platform of the ladder with a hard crack as her other hand came down, catching herself from the fall.
And then the ladder started to tip, and miraculously somehow he was below her, his arms reaching up, grabbing her waist, and pulling her away as the ladder fell to the floor.
"I've got you." His voice came out in a gruff whisper as he plopped himself to the floor, Olivia tucked safely in his lap.
It took them both a moment to reset. Olivia recovered first. "What the hell, Nico?"
He was taken aback by her tone. He set his jaw and ground out, "What the fuck do you think you were doing?"
Her eyes squinted. "Painting."
"Are you crazy? You almost fucking fell."
"I was perfectly fine until you showed up and started yelling."
He opened his mouth about to yell more but... stopped. She was absolutely fucking right. His jaw snapped shut, and he buried his face in her neck, holding onto her tighter. He didn't say another fucking word.
She didn't say anything either, but she wrapped her arms around his neck, tangling her fingers in his hair. He felt the baby kick against his stomach, making his presence known and Olivia giggled in his ear.
And although there was nothing fucking funny about what had nearly happened, he found himself chuckling, too.