She holds up her phone.
I lean over and take in the cancellations over the next week…and month and further. For a restaurant which is always booked for months, we’re looking very thin.
"It’s a temporary blip. They’ll come back." I want to reach over and touch her, but the vibe she’s giving off borders on aloof, so I stop myself. "The food speaks for itself. No matter what the owner’s reputation is.”
“That may be so. But you and the restaurant need to survive in the short term."
Her gaze intensifies. Her chest rises and falls. She looks at me with a plea, with need, with love in her eyes.
She loves me.
The realization dawns, not as a shock, but like soothing summer rain flowing over me, and heals a gaping hole in my soul I didn’t realize I had.
My shoulders muscles bunch. I grit my teeth and feel the veins onmy neck pop. I’m so frustrated with myself. So fucking angry that I’m losing the woman who means everything to me, and despite knowing where I’m going wrong, I’m unable to put it right.
The pulse pounds in my ears. My thoughts threaten to spiral out of control. How I wish I could show her the affection she deserves. How I want to bare myself to her, so she can experience the feelings I have for her.
Despair lashes through me.
Every part of me wants to take her in my arms and make her understand that nothing about what I feel for her is convenient. That it feels completely alien to me. That it threatens my equilibrium. My control. It undoes me.
But I stay still. And I say nothing.
And I hate myself for it.
I feel her steeling herself to leave the restaurant.
To leave me.
My chest seems to have turned into a block of ice.
I feel like I’m underwater. Sinking by degrees. Unable to save myself.
I was sure I could talk her out of leaving, but the look in her eyes tells me I may be too late.
Tristan clears his throat. “You should take what Miller’s offering.”
I forgot my uncle was in the room.
I manage to get myself together long enough to ask her, “What do you think?”
Surprise flickers on her features before they close further. "Let Tristan wrangle the best possible apology from him. Let’s put this to rest and move on."
I hold her gaze for a few seconds more, then turn to Tristan and nod.
"Good." He rises to his feet. “I’ll be in touch."
He heads out of the office.
For a few seconds, neither of us speaks.
Then she grips the arm of her chair, a cold expression on her face. “No matter how much you deny it, all people will remember is that our marriage is a sham.”
I can’t let her think that. I can’t. "It’s not a sham." I round the desk and lean a hip against it, next to her.
She stiffens. Hope blooms on her face. She tips up her chin and stares into my eyes. "Are you saying you love me?"
I sensed it earlier, but to hear her say it feels like a bomb went off in my chest. It also feels right. And that…scares me more.
