If his intent was to make me uncomfortable, it was working. I knew I needed to tell him I’d gotten his point. The moment he’d left my office the day before, I’d wanted to call him back and promise him I’d try harder. But his stoicism tonight made me self-conscious and a little flustered. “Are you having second thoughts?” I asked finally.
“Me?”
I nodded hesitantly, put off by his clipped tone.
He dropped his forehead in his hands and sighed irritably. “You’re the one hitting the brakes, Olivia. Not me.”
“You just seem . . . distant.”
He glanced up at me. “Can you blame me?”
The waiter appeared, and David gestured at me. The man poured me a taste from the wine bottle. Without removing my eyes from David, I swirled, sniffed, and took an uninspired sip of red wine. When I nodded, the waiter filled our glasses without a word and walked away.
“I spoke to Andrew,” David said. “Apparently, you and Dani had a confrontation? He wouldn’t tell me any more. Care to explain?”
Heat crept up my neck. “Bill’s concerned about your past. He thinks you’re using me. He said you slept with Dani and then never called her again.”
David suddenly looked as red as I felt, but it wasn’t because he was embarrassed like me. It was an anger that hit me hard, like the night of the masquerade ball, when he’d seen me dancing with Bill. Now that he was feet away, though, it was more palpable.
“I told you exactly what happened between Dani and me. A kiss that I stopped,” David said. “But you believed Bill instead?”
“At first, I questioned whether it could be true,” I said, hoping honesty would be the fastest way to fix this. “You had her hoodie in your car, and plenty of opportunities to sleep with her. And you would’ve been within your right to.” I set my elbows on the table. “But I always knew in my gut that it wasn’t true, David. Bill lied. Dani confirmed the truth.”
“You should have come tome,” he said, fuming. “No one else. Haven’t I told you repeatedly that I won’t lie to you? Under any circumstances? If I said I didn’t touch her, I didn’t. I don’t like having to fucking repeat myself.”
Oddly, his anger comforted me, an improvement from his indifferent silent treatment. “I’m sorry I doubted you,” I said, nodding. “It’s partly why I pulled away yesterday.”
“Why can’t you trust me?”
“I do.”
“You don’t. It took all this investigative work before you could finally come to me? That’s bullshit, Olivia. I should be the first person you come to. This is a bullshit relationship.”
My heart dropped. That stung. I’d had a setback, yes, but I’d made a lot of progress with him over so little time. “It was Gretchen’s idea to call Dani, not mine,” I said. “I told her I didn’t need that because I believed you.”
“Next time, you come to me. Understand?” Finally, his expression softened. “You got your answer from Dani. So why are you still holding back? What happened on the call?”
“Dani called Gretchen a slut, and she blames me for you and her not working out. She said you’re going to throw me out like trash.”
He stared at me a moment. When the waiter approached, David clipped, “We’re not ready,” and the man quickly rerouted away from the table.
David’s narrowed eyes never left me. “And?”
“I called her a judgmental bitch and told her you loved me in a way Bill never could.”
After a beat, David asked, “Do you believe that? Or were you just saying it to hurt her?”
I picked up my water glass, thankful for how it cooled my suddenly sweaty palm. David had proved enough times that he was in this for good. He’d been chipping away at the walls around my heart before I’d even known it was happening, and it was working. But that brought on new fears and complications. He could spend the time breaking down those walls, but what would it cost me to pick up a hammer and help him? If I fell, he’d catch me, but was I evencapableof giving complete, all-in, head-over-heels unconditional love? The kind I’d seen as an affliction of my mother’s? It wouldn’t be easy after a lifetime of trying to limit myself.
It started with telling him I loved him. He knew, of course, but he deserved to hear it. Then what would come next? David said he’d marry me. And I knew better than anyone—with marriage came certain expectations. Ones I wasn’t sure I could deliver.
As I tried to come up with the words, a dull, angry buzzing filled my ears. “Yes, I believe what I said to Dani. I believe that you love me, and I believe in us.”
“You can’t just tell me. You have to show me,” he said. “Months ago, I promised I’d leave you alone if you said it and meant it—if youtrulywanted that. Now, I need the opposite. I need more than promises. You’re not all in with me yet, and I don’t know how to get you there. But the deeper I get in this, and the more I risk my heart getting broken.”
As the vibrating started again, I rubbed my temples and looked around. “I’m trying,” I said. “I came to your bed last night because I couldn’t spend a night away from you—”
“Afteryou told me you needed space.”
