“Can I ask you something?” She turns to face me again, head propped on her hand and elbow digging into the mattress.
“Of course.”
“Why were you at the hotel this weekend?” she asks. “I mean, no one stays at a hotel for no reason and for you to just … whisk me away like you had nothing else better to do …”
I sniff, contemplating my response and turning my attention back to the TV to buy some time.
“It’s getting late, Olivia,” I say. “We should probably call it a night so we can get back in the morning.”
“So you’re not going to tell me what you were doing at the hotel?” she scoffs. “What, is it some secret? Are you not really a lawyer? Are you an undercover CIA agent or something?”
“Go to sleep, Olivia.” I grab the remote and click the ‘off’ button. “We’ll talk more in the morning.”
A few minutes later, she rolls over and the faint sound of her steady breathing signals that she’s out for the night. A sliver of moonlight slips between the curtains that cover the window, painting her in a soft, ethereal glow.
It’s the craziest thing in the world, but I wish so badly that she were mine.
If I’m lucky, she won't bring this up in the morning. We’ll grab breakfast, hit the road, and focus on getting her back to the hotel so she can gather her things and spend time with her family. I’m hoping my reasons for being at the hotel are the least of her worries by then because my reasons are … my reasons.
And they make sense only to me.
Chapter 5
Olivia
“How could you do this to me?” Dorian asks, his voice a stern but hushed whisper on the other side of the phone Sunday morning.
While Gabriel showered, I decided to use the hotel phone to check in with my mother … who happened to be in the presence of my former fiancé … who then happened to ask to speak to me.
“I beg your pardon?” I ask. “I believe you were the one who did this to us.”
“I’m not talking about that,” he spits back at me.
“That being the fact that you cheated on me with one of my best friends?” I ask.
“I’m talking about your little lover boy objecting at our wedding in front of hundreds of our closest friends and family. Do you have any idea how humiliating that was for me? Standing there like some jilted groom in front of all those people?” he asks.
I yawn. “Oh, God. I’m so sorry. You poor thing.”
“This isn’t the time, Olivia,” he says to me, speaking to me as though I’m a child in need of scolding. “How long have you been screwing him?”
I cough. “What? Who?”
“The guy,” he says. “The guy who objected.”
“I slept with him last night, if that’s what you’re asking,” I say, biting away a smile he can’t see.
It’s just semantics. He can infer whatever he wants to infer …
“Un-fucking-real,” he says. I’ve never heard him so agitated, and the number of times I’ve heard him swear in all our years together I could probably count on one hand. “You’re going to regret this someday, Olivia. I can promise you that.”
“Nah. I don’t think I’ll ever regret the fact that I narrowly avoided becoming some rich asshole’s starter wife,” I say, my tone bored and bland. “Are you done now?”
“Done?” He chuffs. “Hardly. Come back here immediately so we can have this conversation in person. Privately.”
I imagine my mother standing there, mouth agape, eyes averted. She’s never seen this side of Dorian before, and I’m sure she’s still in shock from yesterday’s events.
“I’m afraid there’s nothing more to discuss,” I tell him with a sigh.
The bathroom door pops open and Gabriel steps out in a cloud of soap-scented steam, a white towel wrapped low on his hips.
My heart nearly leaps up my throat at the sight, and a million tiny butterflies swarm my insides.
“Olivia ...” Dorian’s voice fills the earpiece of the phone. “Olivia, are you still there? Are you ignoring me?”
“Yes,” I say when I come to. “I am. I’m a little preoccupied at the moment. Anyway, good talk. And best of luck to you.”
“Don’t you dare hang—”
I return the receiver to the phone cradle and hope to God I never have to talk to that man again.
“Everything okay?” Dorian asks.
“Peachy.” I say with a smile, thinking of yesterday afternoon when he stood outside the ladies’ room to make sure I was all right. And this time I mean it. There’s no facetiousness.
“Shower’s all yours,” he says. “As soon as you’re ready, we’ll head back.”
I grab my Target sack of clothes and toiletries and head into the bathroom and start getting ready. My dress drops haphazardly from the hook on the back of the door, sad and pathetic. A symbol of a life that will never happen. I have half a mind to throw it out the window on the way home, but then I think of the woman at the dress shop who told me it took her seamstresses over a hundred hours to sew on all that tulle and all those intricate crystals, so out of respect for the fine craftsmanship, I won’t toss the dress out like yesterday’s trash.
When I emerge a half hour later, as ready as I’ll ever be to take on this day, I see he’s ordered room service for us: a standard breakfast of eggs, bacon, orange juice, coffee, and French toast.
I take a seat at the little table-for-two that happens to reside halfway between the heart-shaped bed and the jacuzzi.
“That was Dorian I was talking to earlier,” I say as I stab some scrambled eggs with the tines of a thin metal fork. “In case you didn’t put that together.”
“Yeah. I gathered.”
“He had the audacity to try to make me feel guilty. Can you believe that?”
Gabriel snorts. “Yes. Yes, I can.”
I roll my eyes. “Anyway. I don’t want to waste another minute on that asshole when I’ve already given him years of my life.”
Gabriel lifts his glass of orange juice, a silent hear-hear of sorts.
“Anyway.” I drag in a long breath. “You going to tell me what you were doing at the hotel this weekend? Were you there for work?”
I thought it was odd last night that he didn’t want to answer the question. I’d only asked because I was curious, and it seemed like an innocent enough query. I didn’t expect him to roll over and call it a night, to emotionally bristle as if I’d touched a sore spot.
He places his fork down before dabbing at his mouth with his paper napkin. A wash of concern covers his face and he stares down at his empty plate.
“It’s complicated,” he says.
I wait for him to elaborate, but all I get is a long pause.
“And?” I ask.
“And I’d rather not talk about it.”
Tossing my fork down, I lean back in my chair. “That’s not fair.”
He peers across the table. “And how is it not fair? Exactly?”
I mean, he has a point.
I’m not entitled to that information. I suppose it’s not exactly unfair that he doesn't want to share his personal business with me.
Exhaling, I glance out the window. As soon as I get back to the hotel and pack my things and talk to my parents and sister, I’ve got to figure out where I’m going to live and what my next move is going to be. We were supposed to honeymoon in Italy so I have the next two weeks off from work already, so that should give me plenty of time to get moving on my new normal.
“Yesterday was ...” he begins to say before pausing, “yesterday was an anniversary. My wedding anniversary with my ex, actually. And we were married there, in the very same rose garden.”
I’m speechless.
Didn’t see that coming.
Not at all.
I silence any commentary, hoping he’ll elaborate.
“I’ve spent the last seven years feeling bitter. Reliving our wedding day. Reliving the moment I found out exactly who I’d married. I
’ve been angry. And miserable. And that’s no way to live,” he says. “So I came back to the place where it all began … where I first met her. Where I proposed to her. Where I married her. And where I subsequently made the biggest mistake of my life. I came back to let myself be angry one last time, because I want to move on. I have to move on,” he says. His eyes hold mine. “And then I met you.”
I release a breath I didn’t know I was holding, and I’m not sure where he’s going with this.
“From the moment I saw you, Olivia, from the moment you sidled up to me at the bar and started chatting my ear off about things that were much too personal for two strangers to discuss … I stopped thinking of her,” he says. “I stopped feeling that anger, that bitterness. For the first time in years, I was able to focus on something else. Someone else. And that someone was you.”
“Wow.”
Gabriel bunches up his napkin and tosses it on the table. “It sounds silly when I say it all out loud like that, but there’s your answer.” He stands. “If you’re finished, we should probably get on the road soon.”
“I don’t think it’s silly at all,” I say, reaching for his hand so he doesn’t stray too far. “Thank you for sharing that with me.”
We have a moment, eyes locked, my hand wrapped around his. A burst of warmth blooms in my chest. I don’t know why, but the thought of never seeing Gabriel again after this sends a tightness to my chest.
“What are you doing after this?” I ask. “After you take me back?”
His brows meet. “Back to work, I suppose. Why do you ask?”
Rising from the table, I stand before him, studying his chiseled features, breathing in his clean scent, wondering what he’d do if I kissed him right now …
“I like you, Gabriel,” I confess. “I don’t know you, but I want to know you.”
“I like you too.” The way he focuses on me sends my heart into arrhythmia.
“I’m off the next two weeks,” I say, remembering the address on the business card he gave me Friday night. “You’re in Bedford, right?”
He nods.
“I’m in Manhattan,” I say. “At least … for now. I’ll be moving. Soon. But I’d like to see you again.” Swallowing the lump in my throat, I add, “Do you … do you feel the same?”
I’m not normally shy or apprehensive, but the fact that he’s everything I’ve ever wanted in a man coupled with his unreadable expression makes this moment that much more risky, emotionally speaking.
I’m laying it all out there, essentially telling a stranger I have a crush on him. But the way I look at it, I have nothing more to lose at this point.
Gabriel’s golden gaze softens and his full lips pull up at the corners. A second later, his hand cups the side of my cheek. It’s the sweetest gesture from a man with such a serious, ironclad demeanor.
He’s a good person.
I know it.
I feel it.
He holds this pose for what feels like an eternity, though I’m sure it’s no more than a few seconds.
“You’re an amazing woman,” he tells me. “And I absolutely want to see you again after today. I might have saved you from a miserable future, but you did the same for me.”
“Everything happens for a reason ...” I feed him back his own cliche line, and he grins. “Hey, can I ask you another question?”
“Of course.”
“When are you going to kiss me? Because I feel like I’ve been waiting a lifetime.”
Without so much as another single word, his soft lips come down on mine, crushing them with a claiming kiss. His breath is warm and sweet like syrup, and his hands circle my waist as he pulls me against him.
His tongue is velvet against mine and his hardness forms against my hips. A moment later, we stumble backwards, falling into the heart-shaped bed in the honeymoon suite of the Rain Drop Inn in some off-the-beaten-path township in upstate New York.
I straddle Gabriel as he gathers the hem of my t-shirt before lifting it over my head. His fingertips trail down my shoulders before veering to the small of my back. Sitting up, he buries his head into the bend of my shoulder, kissing my bare flesh before unfastening my bra.
He’s harder now, I can feel it between my thighs as I sit in his lap. Hooking my hands around the back of his neck, I lean closer, inhaling his masculine scent as I nibble his ear.
When he flips me to my back, I almost lose my breath. And when his hands slip beneath the waistband of my leggings and he tugs them down my hips, I know there’s no going back.
I want him in the worst way—and apparently the feeling is mutual.
I reach for Gabriel’s jeans, working the button and the fly until the warmth of his cock fills my palm. I stroke his length, and he moans before biting into his full bottom lip.
Every part of me is alive with want, humming with a kind of unrestrained desire I’ve never known in my life.
My hands travel to the small of his back, just above his hips, and I push him against me until we’re grinding. He’s not inside me, not yet, but he will be. Until then, I’ll enjoy the titillating torture mixed with unadulterated pleasure.
“I want you, Olivia,” he whispers into my ear as he grinds against me. “I’ve wanted you since the moment I walked into that bar Friday night.”
“Then I’m yours,” I tell him .”You can have me today. And if you play your cards right—and I have a feeling you will—you can have me the day after that ... and the day after that ...”
He peppers kisses down my neck, stopping at my collarbone between traveling between my breasts and down my stomach.
A moment later, he retrieves a condom from the wallet in his jeans pocket, tearing at the foil packet with his teeth before sheathing himself.
Already breathless and woefully impatient, I reach for him, pulling him onto me the instant he’s ready. He guides his length into me, inch by inch, taking his time. I exhale as he fills me, expanding everything I have with everything he has.
While this moment is certainly the last thing I expected to happen going into this weekend, everything about it feels right in a way I can’t quite explain.
Looking into Gabriel’s eyes, I find it hard to believe that I approached a random stranger in a hotel bar who ‘got’ me more than my fiancé ever did after years of knowing me. It’s like we both took one look and our souls knew something we didn’t.
“You’re amazing, you know that?” I ask him, a smile spreading on my lips as I play with his hair.
“How do you know that?”
“When you know, you know.”
He lowers his mouth to mine and I accept his kiss, relishing it like it’s the first time all over again. If I could bottle this moment and keep it forever, I would.
If the past forty-eight hours have taught me anything, it’s that my intuition is stronger than I give it credit for. In my heart of hearts, in the deepest parts of me … I knew Dorian wasn’t the one, but I was afraid to admit it, which was why I found myself confessing my worries to a complete stranger at zero hour.
But from this moment on, I refuse to be a prisoner to fear. I refuse to let fear run my life and commandeer my every life decision.
As Gabriel coaxes my body to the highest of heights with his gentle, undulating rhythm, taking his time and ensuring my pleasure is equally met (if not more so), I look into his eyes and I feel no fear.
Only the thrill of anticipation.
About the Author
Wall Street Journal and #1 Amazon bestselling author Winter Renshaw is a bona fide daydream believer. She lives somewhere in the middle of the USA and can rarely be seen without her trusty Mead notebook and ultra portable laptop. When she’s not writing, she’s living the American dream with her husband, three kids, and the laziest puggle this side of the Mississippi.
Winter is represented by Jill Marsal at Marsal Lyon Literary Agency.
Follow along on social media sites: Facebook & Instagram or at www.winterrenshaw.com.
The Objection: A Read Me Romance Novella Page 4