CHAPTER SIXTEEN
OLIVIA
OUR NIGHT IS AN ECHO OF the ones we used to spend together. We doze for an hour before pulling ourselves from the allure of sleep and back toward each other. Our lips meet lazily, I run my hand down Dean’s chest, and he tugs my bare leg over his hips. We make love again but slowly, a marked contrast to the rawness of our previous encounter.
In a drowsy haze, the air scented with lust and cherries, I let Dean pull me on top of him and position his cock at the opening of my body. I slide down onto his shaft, welcoming the faint twinge of pain because it reminds me of how completely I’ve been taken.
“Oh.” I lower my head to kiss him, my hair falling into a veil on either side of us, cocooning us in our own private world.
Tension coils through Dean’s body as he grips my hips and thrusts inside me, the head of his cock hitting the sweet spot that makes me burn. I curl my fingers against his chest and ride him, feeling every inch of his stiff flesh, the exquisite friction on my clit, the powerful strength of his body beneath me.
“Come on, beauty.” He captures my lower lip between his teeth, his fingers digging into my hips. “Work yourself on me, nice and hard. Ah, fuck, that’s it. Sit up. I want to look at you when you come.”
I pull myself to sitting, a hot flush sweeping over me as his gaze rakes down my naked, sweaty body. Any self-consciousness I might have felt dissolves in the face of his desire.
It’s so fucking hot—the burn in his eyes, the intensity of his expression, the way he looks as if he wants to devour me. I shift my hips up and down, faster, my breasts bouncing and my whole body saturated with shivers.
“Dean, I’m going to… oh, God…”
“Yeah. Show me. Fucking tell me.”
“I’m going to come,” I gasp, bracing my hands on his chest as our eyes clash through the lust-drenched air. “I feel you so deep inside me, so big. Oh, it’s so good, I want more… more… oh!”
The instant I start to come, Dean grabs the length of my hair and pulls me down to him, our lips crashing together. I moan into his mouth, still pumping up and down on his cock as the orgasm shudders through my body, waves flooding and peaking.
Before the vibrations have ebbed, I sit up and start moving faster again, my gaze on his face as the urgency builds inside me with increasing force. An intense, heady sense of power fills me as I work my husband to an orgasm, feeling his muscles flexing and tensing, his hoarse groans breaking through the air.
“Ah, fuck, Liv. So close… faster, baby… yeah, like that… ah!”
Hot splashes of seed fill me as his body arches upward, pushing deeper inside me. I squeeze my inner walls, milking the final pulses from him as he crests the wave and slides down the other side. There are few things more beautiful in the world than making my husband come so hard that I’ll feel him inside me for the next day.
I sink against him, and we fall into another light doze, our bodies wrapped together like the entwining vines of a plant. We wake again in early morning only to order a delectable room-service meal of coffee, eggs, a basketful of flaky croissants, and fresh strawberries, which Dean feeds to me in bed before we indulge in a hot, soapy shower together.
After another drowsy nap, I look at the clock and almost laugh when I see that it’s past noon. Noon on a Saturday, and Dean is still sleeping. My body feels delicious—warm, sated, and loose, like melted honey is running through my veins, like I’ve been soaking in bubbling hot springs and lying naked in the sun.
Or like I’ve been intensely and exquisitely fucked by my gorgeous husband. I press a kiss to his smooth shoulder and slide out of bed carefully so as not to wake him.
The purple silk scarf falls to the floor. I pick it up and wind it around my neck before going in search of something to wear that isn’t my crumpled lingerie or raincoat.
I use the bathroom and tug my hair into a ponytail. There’s a travel bag on the bathroom counter. Inside, there’s a clean pair of yoga pants, a T-shirt, and slip-on shoes. Of course Dean would have thought of everything.
I dress and go into the main room. The curtains are still drawn, revealing a bright, sunny sky and the glittering expanse of the lake. I find my purse on a chair near the front door and rummage around for my cell phone, which I haven’t even looked at in close to twenty-four hours.
I hadn’t even thought of checking it. Heck, I hadn’t thought of anything except how incredible it was to be alone with my husband again.
A slew of texts runs across the screen of my phone. My heart stutters with fear in the instant before I remember Kelsey or Archer would have contacted Dean if anything had happened to Nicholas.
My initial panic eases a bit and I scan the messages, which are mostly from Allie and Sheryl, the head waitress at the café.
Liv, get over here now. Where are you? She says you approved this… omfg, a police officer is asking for our permit.
WHERE ARE YOU?? Can’t reach Dean, cell not working.
Am getting worried!
What the…?
My heart plummets with a sickening sense of dread. I look at the date on the screen. I think frantically, pulling up my calendar and schedule.
Oh, no.
Becky Harrison’s birthday party. Becky Harrison’s fifth birthday party—which I assured Allie we could handle and I would take care of—started at eleven o’clock this morning.
Oh my God.
Not only did I forget, I was thoroughly occupied.
Without even bothering to check my voicemails, I hammer out a quick text to Allie. I have no good excuse, so all I can do is admit to my hideous mistake.
I am so sorry. On my way right now.
I scribble a note for Dean—Had to run to the café. I love you madly—then I race downstairs to the parking lot.
I force myself not to speed too much as I drive to the café. All the pleasure of the past fifteen hours disintegrates as the weight of embarrassment, regret, and responsibility crashes over me. I park at the curb and run across the street, yanking open the front door.
A barrage of noise hits me—children yelling and crying, the clatter of plates and silverware, a customer’s angry voice, the stomp of footsteps on the stairs. Parents are clustered around the front counter, apparently trying to collect their children.
I drop my bag and run upstairs to the Castle Room, which is a disaster of raucous children, messy tables, and spilled food and drinks. Allie is standing near the serving station, her hands up in a placating gesture as a blond woman shouts angrily at her.
I hurry over. “Allie.”
She turns, her eyes widening at the sight of me. She’s red-faced with stress and near-panic. A new wave of regret slams into me so hard I almost can’t catch my breath.
“Excuse me.” I step between her and the angry woman, feeling the tension tight enough to break. “Are you Monica Harrison? I’m Liv West.”
“Liv.” Monica’s mouth compresses, her furious gaze darting from Allie to me. “Where the hell have you been? You told me you’d be here to run Becky’s party.”
“I’m terribly sorry.” My chest constricts. “I’m… I’ll handle everything, I promise.”
“It’s a little late for that now,” Monica replies bitterly, spreading her hand out to indicate the chaos. “This is a disaster. You’d better believe I’m not paying you a dime, and if you don’t refund my deposit, I’m suing you.”
“Of course we’ll refund your money. I’ll get things straightened out right away.”
Monica hardly looks placated, but she turns to another frazzled-looking mother who is trying to drag a resistant five-year-old toward the door.
I face Allie, whose eyebrows pull together with concern. “Liv, where have you been? Is everything okay? Nicholas?”
“Yes.” I press my hands to my cheeks and close my eyes. “Everything’s fine. I just… I’m sorry. I fucked up. I completely forgot about the party.”
Silence falls. I open my eyes to look at her. Her expression hardens with anger.
“You forgot,” she repeats.
“I forgot.”
“You told me you were planning everything. You told me we could handle it.”
“I know.”
“Where were you?” she asks.
“I was busy,” I confess. “I forgot, Allie. I don’t have any other excuse.”
“Why didn’t you answer my calls and texts?”
“My phone was off.”
“All morning?”
“Yes.” I hold up my hands in surrender. “And Dean got a new cell number that I forgot to give you. Allie, what happened?”
“A fucking disaster, that’s what happened,” she hisses. “Rachel is outside with the police officer and the band, who refuse to leave unless they’re paid even though they haven’t performed.”
Allie waves her hand toward the window. “You’d better do something about the officer now. I’ve been trying to corral the kids and get them to their parents, not to mention dealing with one seriously pissed-off mother.”
I shut off the guilt buffeting me like a storm and hurry back downstairs. Outside, a few children are chasing each other on the grass while their parents watch from the terrace. The band equipment is stacked to one side, five musicians standing with their arms crossed, their expressions sullen and mutinous.
I go to where Rachel is talking to a police officer and a curly-headed young man who looks like the Pieman.
“Excuse me.” I take a deep breath and extend my hand to the policeman. “I’m Liv West, officer. I apologize for the confusion.”
“No confusion, ma’am.” He frowns at me. “Pretty clear you needed a permit for the band, and you don’t have one.”
“I’m sure we can straighten this out,” I tell him, though at the moment I’m not sure about that at all.
“You Liv?” the musician asks, jerking his chin up. “I’m Marty Groman, aka the Pieman. Look, we came here to play and thought you had everything set up. The police officer won’t even let me play my guitar, and now we’ve got a ton of disappointed kids. That’s not how we work. Slice of Pie makes kids happy, you know?”
“I know. I’m sorry.” If only sorrys could fix everything. “Look, could you guys please get your equipment packed up? I promise, you’ll be paid the full amount.”
“It’s not just about the pay,” Marty says, hitching his guitar over his shoulder. “I mean, it’s bad for our rep if we leave a place with a bunch of upset kids.”
“You’re also going to need to pay a fine,” the police officer informs me, writing something on a pad of paper. “I’m citing you for violation of city ordnance five three one. You’ll need to come down to the courthouse and talk to the judge.”
Great. Nausea surges in my stomach. The band starts to shuffle their equipment back into their van. I sign the violation notice, write out a check to the band, and rush to help settle the rest of the chaos.
Inside, the noise level is starting to decrease as mothers haul their children toward the door and other customers walk out. I return to the Castle Room, which is now empty.
In addition to the mess of overturned chairs and crumpled paper plates, the murals of black mountains and flying monkeys have been smeared with yellow and blue paint, several of the crystal ball centerpieces are cracked, and there’s an entire cake smashed near the stairs.
With my heart feeling heavy as an anvil, I pick up a trash can and start to clean up the plates and cups.
“The Alice in Wonderland room took a hit too,” Allie says from behind me. “But this is the worst of it.”
I shake my head. “What happened?”
“Everything,” Allie says, her voice tight with frustration as we start to straighten the chairs. “First Brent had to go out of town, and Sarah called in sick. Then in addition to the invited party guests, Becky thought it would be fun to tell all her friends to bring their friends. So over fifty five-year-olds showed up, and I knew we couldn’t turn them away so we had to scramble to get enough food for them because we hadn’t placed that big an order.
“Then the band was late, and they had way more equipment than we’d been expecting, so it took them forever to set up and by then the kids were getting impatient and wreaking havoc in the café because most of their parents had left. A bunch of them were yelling that they wanted cake, which wasn’t supposed to happen until after the band, but then Becky saw it sitting on the sideboard and decided to carry it downstairs to the terrace.”
She waves toward the cake smashed and trampled on the floor. “Well, of course she dropped it and then got hysterical, but she didn’t want any of the café desserts as a substitute. So her mother went out to buy another cake, which meant she wasn’t here when the kids started ripping open all the presents.
“I managed to get the band to start, but someone must have complained about the noise, because the police officer showed up asking for our permit—which you assured me you’d take care of—and the band had to shut down, which made all the kids upset, and then one little boy thought it would be funny to eat the cake with his hands… and next thing you know, they’re throwing cake at each other, Becky is crying, her mother is yelling at me to fix things, the band is complaining about how they came here to play, and the police officer is telling me I have to pay a fine.”
She whirls around to pin me with a glare. “And you weren’t answering your stupid phone.”
“Oh, Allie.” Tears flood my eyes, and I sink onto a chair. “I am so goddamned sorry.”
“I don’t get it, Liv!” She spreads her arms out. “What happened? Where were you?”
Embarrassment scorches my face.
“I was with Dean,” I admit.
Allie blinks in bafflement. “With Dean?”
“Sort of a date night. Or day. Whatever. We haven’t spent much time together since Nicholas was born, and he took me out and… well, I usually have every other Saturday off and I completely forgot about the party.”
“I’m not begrudging you a date night with your husband,” Allie says. “But it’s so unlike you to be so irresponsible.”
The word hits me like the tail end of a whip. I’ve spent my life trying to prove I’m anything but irresponsible.
“You were the one who pushed for us to have this party,” Allie continues sharply, “and not because you knew we could handle it, but because you were trying to do some tit-for-tat kind of thing with Edison. But you know that’s not what the Wonderland Café is about.”
“What can I do?” I ask, shame filling my chest. “How can I fix it?”
“I have no idea. I already gave Monica her deposit back. The band is upset because this hurts their reputation for making kids happy, and now we’re on record as having been fined. Plus we had to turn regular customers away because we were too busy, and now there are at least three grandmothers out there pissed off because we couldn’t provide the high tea they had promised their granddaughters. That’s going to mess with our business too, as if our grand opening disaster wasn’t enough of a hurdle to overcome.”
With that parting shot, she stalks out of the room and down the stairs. I stare at a cracked crystal ball, feeling as if Allie just slapped me. Or as if I just tripped on my own feet and face-planted on a concrete floor. I rest my head in my hands and indulge in a good crying jag.
Of course it was all too good to be true. I finally have everything I’ve been working for—an incredible husband, a beautiful son, a successful business, a good reputation—and when the final piece of my marriage gets put back into place, all the other balls I’m juggling come crashing down.
I wipe my eyes on a napkin, my insides suddenly aching with longing to see Nicholas. I text Dean that I have to “finish up” some things at the café, then I get back to work cleaning up the mess and trying to patch up the damage I’ve done.
Allie doesn’t talk to me for the rest of the afternoon, and by the time we close the café I’m starting to wonder if I’ve permanently damaged both our friendship and our business partnership.
“Allie, I don’t know what else to say or do,” I tell her, as we turn off the lights and lock up.
“Nothing right now, Liv.” She turns away from me, her back stiff. “I’ll see you Monday.”
I watch her walk away, guilt simmering like acid inside me. I get into my car and head back to the Butterfly House.
I leave my purse in the foyer and go into the sunroom, where Dean and Nicholas are building an intricate, towering structure with the blocks Dean brought back from Tuscany. Twilight shines through the picture windows. The song “All Around the Kitchen” drifts from the speakers, loud enough that neither of them glances up from their task.
For a moment, I stop and look at them—Nicholas in a blue sweatshirt with his hair a mess and dried jam on his cheek, and an unshaven Dean, wearing an old T-shirt and jeans, his reading glasses on as he studies what appears to be a diagram of the tower they’re constructing. He makes a notation on the picture and hands a triangular block to Nicholas, who places it carefully on top of a stack.
“Mama!”
Nicholas pushes to his feet and waddles toward me, his arms outstretched. I drop my bag on the kitchen island and crouch to pull him against me, inhaling his toddler smells of baby shampoo, sour milk, and strawberry jam.
“Hey, you get everything done?” Dean approaches, rubbing his hand over Nicholas’s head as he bends to kiss me.
“Yes.” I lift Nicholas into my arms and straighten, not yet wanting to tell Dean about my egregious mistake.
I lean closer to him, squishing Nicholas between us in a group hug as I breathe them both in. The scents of my husband fill my nose—coffee, laundry detergent, and chocolate mint.
“You found my secret stash of peppermint patties,” I remark, rubbing my cheek against his chest.
“You need to work on your hiding skills, lady,” he replies. “Did you really think I wouldn’t find them behind Nicholas’s yogurt bites?”
“Next time I’ll hide them behind the organic kale chips.”
A chuckle rumbles through his chest. “Well, I guarantee I won’t bother to look there.”
“Tower!” Nicholas shouts, squirming in my arms.
I lower him to the floor, and he hurries back to the unfinished tower. Dean reaches out to twist his hands around the ends of the purple silk scarf, which I’d forgotten I’m still wearing around my neck. He tugs on the scarf, pulling me to him for another kiss.
“I missed you,” he remarks. “I had more plans, you know. Dirty ones.”
“Oh, I know.” I slide my arms around his waist and squeeze, loving so much the solid strength and heat of his body. “Sorry I had to leave so suddenly.”
“S’okay.” He rubs my back. “Just gives me more reason to whisk you away again for another night of debauchery.”
If only it were that easy…
“Mama, tower!” Nicholas calls.
I pull away from Dean, and we join our son on the carpet. We spend the next hour building, reading picture books, listening to music, and refereeing a toddler fuss that is soothed with a sippy cup of milk.
Our evening routine is a striking contrast to last night, but comfortably familiar—after a dinner of leftover tacos, I get Nicholas ready for bed while Dean cleans the kitchen.
After I return downstairs, I shuffle through the day’s mail. There’s another postcard from my friend North, this time from Cambodia:
Liv,
Sandcastle temples, sugar palms, monks in saffron robes, crowded markets with pungent scents of grilled seafood and fried insects, brutal scars of the past and yet, when you look, evidence of a bright, serene awakening.
My adventure continues.
North
I join Dean on the sofa, where he’s sprawled out watching the news. He extends an arm and I snuggle against his side, letting the warmth of him ease away the lingering tightness in my chest.
“Postcard from North.” I hold the card out to him.
“Cambodia, huh?” He reads the card and turns it over to look at the printed photo of the elaborate Angkor Wat temple complex. “I went to grad school with a guy who specialized in Southeast Asian architecture. He spent a year in Cambodia studying Angkor Wat. He invited me to visit any time, but I never made it over there.”
For some reason, I don’t like the idea of Dean not having done something. I stroke my hand under his T-shirt to touch the flat, hard ridges of his abdomen.
“Hey, you okay?” Dean pats my hip.
“Yeah, I just forgot I was supposed to do something at the café, and it sort of screwed things up. I’ll straighten it out, though.”
“What happened?”
I know he’ll find out sooner or later, so I take a deep breath and confess my colossal fuck-up. He listens in silence, his brow creasing with concern.
By the time I’m finished, the tension in my shoulders has eased somewhat. Sharing my burdens with Dean has always made things easier, and I fully expect him to reassure me everything will work out.
“Liv.” His expression is somber, his mouth turning into a frown. “I think the universe is trying to tell you something.”
I blink. “Like what?”
“Like you’ve been trying to do too much for too long. Sooner or later, something was going to give.”
Though that’s exactly what I just told myself, it hurts extra hard hearing it from Dean—especially considering the reason I forgot about Becky’s party.
“You wouldn’t have said that when we were getting busy in the hotel room,” I mutter, pushing away from him and getting to my feet.
His frown deepens. “I won’t apologize for wanting you all to myself for one damned night. You’ve had every other Saturday off at the café for the past year, and you had it written on the calendar that today was your day off. I’d never have made plans if I’d known you had other commitments, but I can’t even remember the last time we were alone together for an entire night. I’m not apologizing for it.”
“I’m not asking you to apologize,” I retort, tossing North’s postcard on a table. “I know I fucked up. But I don’t need you making me feel worse.”
Remorse flashes in his eyes, but his jaw tightens. “I don’t want to make you feel worse. I want you to stop thinking you have to do everything. You don’t have to tackle every single project on your own just because people ask you to or because you feel you have to. You don’t have to prove you can do it all, Liv. Everyone knows you can.”
My insides twist. Why don’t I know that by now too? Why don’t I believe it?
“Look, I know some people over at Edison Power,” Dean continues as he stands and approaches me. “So does Kelsey. Let me call them and—”
I hold up my hand to stop him. I know—I know—the easiest way to deal with this mess is to turn everything over to my husband. Just like the night when he effortlessly rescued me and Nicholas from chaos, he would do the same thing now. He’d smooth all the rough edges, negotiate the conflicts, make everything right. He would fix it.
But why shouldn’t I be responsible for cleaning up my own messes? I’m the one who wanted to do it all, so I’m the one who has to fix it. Yes, it’s a rotten leftover of life with my mother—who never took responsibility for a fucking thing, including her own daughter—but that doesn’t give me a free pass. I won’t make excuses for myself.
“No.” I shake my head. “I’ll figure it out.”
Dean exhales a sigh of frustration. “Liv, it’s okay to ask for help. To accept help when it’s offered. It doesn’t make you weak or irresponsible.”
“I don’t think it does.”
“Then let me help you, dammit.”
I look up at the hard note in his voice. He’s standing with his arms folded across his chest, his mouth tight and eyes dark.
I suddenly wonder what it has cost him over the years to stand back and not intervene in my problems when there is nothing he wants to do more. Being passive, especially in regards to his family, goes against the very core of who Dean West is. He’s always been the one to make things happen—to win the game, save the day, find the treasure, lead the battle.
But for me, because I asked him to, he has put himself on the sidelines and watched me try, fail, and try again. He’s forced himself not to jump in and rescue me, and because of his restraint, I’ve grown and changed in ways I’d once never imagined I could.
“Thank you,” I say.
“For what?”
“For letting me make mistakes. For not trying to fix things, even though I know you always want to.”
He’s still frowning. “That sounds like you’re going to turn me down again.”
“No, I’m not turning you down. I just need to figure out what the fallout of all this is going to be and talk to Allie. Give me a day or two. I promise I’ll tell you if I need you.”
Dean looks at me for a long moment, his expression shuttered. He reaches over to brush a lock of hair away from my forehead.
“I thought you always needed me,” he says.
My heart stutters at the idea he would ever think otherwise.
“Of course I do.”
A faint, resigned smile tugs at his mouth. He turns away, picking up a stack of papers from the kitchen counter before he goes upstairs to his tower office.
I have a sudden, sharp longing to return to the hot intimacy we’d had in the hotel room. I want cherry pie and champagne again. I want lacy lingerie, silk blindfolds, the burn of lust. I want to feel Dean’s hands sweeping over my naked body. I want to hear his deep voice whispering commands in my ear. I want to close the door and shut the world out so we can focus on each other again.
But even if we could, it wouldn’t be the same. All our efforts, both mine and Dean’s, to find that place again have either failed or created a disaster.
Maybe because that place no longer exists. Maybe we’ve been trying to recreate something that can’t be recreated because it belongs to the past. Maybe it’s now just a memory. And if not even Dean can bring it back to stay…
My heart aches. I’m tempted to follow him to his tower and curl up on his lap. The sensation of my husband’s strong arms tightening around me in a warm, secure circle is, perhaps, the only thing in the world that can banish my sense of hopelessness.
Instead, I turn in the opposite direction, walk up the stairs, and crawl into bed alone.