by Sabrina Sol
“There’s a rumor that there’s some woman in New York who actually lasted two months with Dante. But don’t worry, honey. He seems to really like you. Who knows? Maybe you’ll make it that long, too.”
Alexa had to will herself to close her shocked mouth. Then she excused herself and asked one of the servers for the nearest bathroom. Once inside, she leaned over the toilet, fully expecting various courses of food to reappear. But nothing came out.
Her face was on fire and her stomach was still doing flip-flops when she went to the sink to look at her reflection in the mirror above it.
“Get a grip,” she told herself.
And suddenly images of different women with Dante at the restaurant over the past two years played through her mind like a slideshow. The more she thought about it, the more she remembered that not one of them ever came in with him more than a few times. She dismissed the tightness clamping down on her heart. So what if Dante wasn’t a long-term-relationship kind of guy? Hadn’t she been telling him this whole time that she didn’t want a relationship in the first place?
She thought of the long looks he’d give her across the table or the way he grabbed her hand when they’d take Gomez for a walk. She’d been worried that those were hints that he was falling for her. Could she have misread everything as usual?
Come to think of it, those looks usually happened after he caught her staring at him. And the walks? There had been times when she’d been the one who grabbed his hand.
She’d been so focused on making sure they kept things casual, it never occurred to her that was exactly what Dante had wanted, too.
And she’d been so focused on keeping her emotions locked away that she hadn’t realized they’d escaped a long time ago.
Because as soon as the woman inferred that Alexa was just one week better than Dante’s last girlfriend, she’d realized she wanted to be more to him. Much more.
Natalie’s and Clarissa’s remembered voices whispered in her ear, “You always fall too fast.”
It was true. But this time, she could prepare for it.
“I’m not on the floor yet,” she told the voices.
It took another five minutes before she was calmed down enough to head back to the dining room. Dante offered her a sweet smile when she sat down, and Alexa took a breath. Then she picked up her fork and began course four.
Almost two hours later, she was regretting the wine and the seventh course. Her skin was still hot, and her head throbbed. She’d eaten way too much, so the simple black cocktail dress felt less fancy and more like a sausage casing.
In other words, she couldn’t wait to get home and get into bed. By herself.
“Thanks for coming,” Dante told her as they drove down the freeway.
“You’re welcome,” she said as she looked out the window.
“Are you okay?”
“Not really. I just need to get some sleep. It’s been a long day.”
“I know you’re worried about what happened today. But you don’t have to be. I’ll think of something—”
“We want to settle,” she interrupted.
His eyes widened. “What?”
She cleared her throat. “Brandon and I talked after you left and we think it’s time to start thinking realistically. We can’t win this.”
“Hold up. I still think we can fix this. The key is Carrie. She can help us prove that Nick is lying. We just need to convince her to help us.”
“And how are we going to do that?”
“I don’t know. But we have to at least try, don’t we?”
She shook her head. “It’s better we settle before we lose everything.”
“You can’t give up just because of one bad day,” he said, reaching for her hand. “We can still win this.”
Alexa pulled her hand from his grasp. “And then what? A trial could take months, even a year.”
“I realize that. So?”
“So, how are we going to handle being together for the trial after we’ve stopped seeing each other in other ways?”
“You’re not making any sense. Why would we have stopped seeing each other?”
“Because this was supposed to be—”
“Fuck casual,” he yelled. “You and I both know we crossed that line a long time ago. But what I don’t understand is why you won’t admit it.”
Her mind flashed back to the day at the beach when she watched Brandon and Dante with their friends from college. She’d never felt so out of place. So different.
She’d felt the same way tonight at dinner. Putting on a black cocktail dress didn’t erase who she was or where she came from. And it didn’t change the fact that she didn’t ever want to be a Gloria or that woman who thought it was perfectly okay to tell a stranger that she didn’t mean anything to the man she was with.
“It doesn’t matter if we crossed it or not. What I’m telling you is that I can’t do this anymore. The lawsuit. Us. Everything just needs to stop now.”
It was better this way, she kept telling herself as they drove in silence.
She knew he was angry, but she couldn’t care about that. She had to focus on getting her life back to the way it had been before men named Nick and Dante had turned it all upside down.
After pulling into her driveway, he turned off the car. But he didn’t turn to look at her.
“Did you ever trust in us, Alexa? Even for a moment?”
The question hammered her heart. So did his pained voice. Ironically, she had. That’s why it was killing her to do this.
“It’s better this way.” Her voice sounded so weak.
“If you say so.”
The hammering stopped. And now there were a million broken pieces floating around where her heart used to be.
“I’m sorry, Dante.”
Then, before any tears could fall in front of him, Alexa opened the car door and ran into her house.
Chapter Fifteen
It always amazed Dante how so many things came to an end with just a simple signature. A scribble on a dotted line could mean the uncoupling of a marriage, the dissolution of a partnership, the termination of a contract. The fact that the very existence of something that once held so much importance could be wiped away with a mere stroke of a pen was both scary and cool.
For his purposes as a corporate lawyer, it was usually the latter.
But as he watched Brandon sign the settlement papers, Dante only felt disappointment.
“So just have Alexa sign on the line next to your signature. Once that’s done, I’ll pick up the paperwork and send it over to Nick’s attorney.”
Brandon nodded and put the papers back in the manila envelope Dante had brought with him to the restaurant. He leaned back into his desk chair. “So that’s it, I guess. I can’t believe that son of a bitch is going to walk away with that much money.”
Dante shrugged. “I know. But it’s better than him owning a piece of L.A. Cuchara. It was the best I could do under the circumstances.”
“I know,” his friend said. “I also know that you still don’t believe we should’ve settled.”
“It doesn’t matter what I believe. Alexa made it clear that this is what she wants. When it comes down to it, that’s really all that matters.”
“Especially when the client is more than a client?”
Where did that come from? A flash of irritation clenched his jaw. “Wait a second. I never let my personal relationship with your sister interfere with my professional responsibilities. Or do you think that I did?”
“I’m not saying that, Dante. If I thought that was happening, you know I would’ve said something sooner. Truth is, my reservations about you and Alexa had nothing to do with business. It had everything to do with the fact that you’re my friend and she’s my sister. I don’t want to lose either of you.”
Dante relaxed. “I’m still here.”
Brandon arched his eyebrow. “Are you? I mean, you look like my best friend, but lately you haven’t been sound
ing like him. Since when do you walk away from a challenge?”
“Since when do you? We all have our limits, Brandon.”
“Maybe. But I’ve learned a lot about relationships in the past few months, and it’s time for me to give you some advice. If you feel even a quarter of what I feel for Daisy, you can’t let my sister bully you out of this relationship.”
“She’s not bullying me.”
“Oh, really? Why did you bring the settlement papers now instead of later? It’s because you knew she wouldn’t be here.”
Dante rubbed the back of his neck. “It’s better if we don’t see each other for a while. Even here.”
It pained him to admit that. He’d never thought in a million years that he wouldn’t want to see Alexa.
He hadn’t meant for things to become so serious. He’d fooled himself into believing that they were just hanging out. That’s why he hadn’t seen the fall coming. He knew she still had reservations about them being a real couple. That’s why he’d taken things so slowly. Perhaps he’d been too calculated about the whole thing. Romantic relationships weren’t like corporate mergers. You couldn’t do a risk analysis or predict returns on the investment.
Basically, love was more like a crapshoot.
Sometimes you won big and sometimes you lost it all.
“I know you love her. I can see it all over your face. You need to fix this,” Brandon told him. “And quick.”
“It’s out of my hands. I can’t make her love me back.”
Brandon shook his head. “My sister is a great chef, but she sucks at this love stuff. Not because she doesn’t have a big heart, but because she doesn’t know how to listen to it. You need to be the one to make her hear what it’s telling her.”
Chapter Sixteen
“So what exactly are these for again?”
Alexa held up a box holding about a dozen circular pads.
Daisy glanced up. “They go inside your bra in case you start leaking breast milk.”
Her stomach dropped. The more she learned about pregnancy, the more she was convinced it sounded like the worst thing a woman could do to her body. “Oh my God. Your breasts are going to leak? Like, forever?”
Her almost sister-in-law laughed and took the box from Alexa to set it back on the shelf. “No, silly. That only happens when you’re breast-feeding. The milk eventually dries up.”
She looked at Daisy in amazement. “How do you know all of this already? The baby won’t even be here for at least another month.”
They were shopping at a big chain baby store, and Alexa couldn’t believe the amount of supplies and knowledge needed to raise a child these days. The store simply overwhelmed her. How could Daisy seem so calm about it all?
“Trust me, I don’t know that much. But Brandon keeps bringing baby books home, and I’ve already read a few. Still, I’m sure I’m not going to know everything by the time our little guy—or girl—gets here.”
“Um, didn’t I already tell you that you’re giving me a niece and we’re going to wear matching outfits as much as possible?”
She absolutely loved the idea of being an aunt. Brandon and Daisy had decided to wait until the baby’s birth to know the sex, so it was a waiting game for all of them. Alexa was dead serious about buying matching outfits. And if she turned out to be a nephew instead, Alexa was still going to make sure he was the best-dressed baby in all of L.A. More than that, she was excited about her little family growing. She’d never seen her brother happier, and she already loved Daisy like a sister. The baby was just going to make everything more beautiful.
“Thanks for coming shopping with me. I know this probably isn’t exactly how you planned to spend your Sunday afternoon.”
Alexa looked through a bin of baby shoes. “Are you kidding me? You know I love shopping. You did me a favor by dragging me out of my house.”
Daisy cleared her throat. “Well, to be completely honest, that was kind of the point.”
She dropped the pair of tiny sneakers she was holding. “So this was all a ruse, concocted by you, to check up on me? Did you hope the smell of baby lotion would cheer me up or something?”
“Do you need cheering up?”
She had walked into that one. “No, I don’t. Besides, just because the smell of baby lotion does do something to my insides, that doesn’t mean I’m sad about Dante.”
“Who said anything about Dante? Brandon said you still haven’t signed the settlement papers, and I was going to ask why. What happened with Dante?”
Alexa groaned and took a seat on a nearby rocking chair. She was surprised by how comfortable it was. And it had a matching footstool? If it came in black or hot pink, she was definitely going to buy one for her bedroom.
“Hello? Are you going tell me about Dante or not?” Daisy eased herself onto the rocking chair next to her.
“We ended things. Or, rather, I did.”
“What? Why didn’t your brother tell me? Ooh, that man is going to get it when I get home.”
Alexa gulped a breath. “It happened a few days ago. And don’t blame Brandon. I told him I wanted to be the one to tell you, but I wasn’t ready to talk about it.”
“What happened? You guys were doing so well.”
She leaned her head back and closed her eyes. Why had she ended things? It was the question keeping her up at night. It had been a couple of days since the dinner in Beverly Hills. At first, she worried he’d show up at the restaurant or her house and want to hash things out. But he’d stayed away. No texts. No phone calls. She’d always told him that she hated the drama that usually followed breakups. She should’ve been happy he hadn’t caused her any.
Instead, she was miserable.
And, there in the middle of the furniture department of Babies “R” Us, Alexa broke down and cried.
Daisy reached over and grabbed her hand. “Oh, sweetie. I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you.”
She shook her head and took a gulp of air. “It’s not your fault. I think I’ve been holding it in for a while now. Do you have any tissues?”
“I’m a walking hormone. Of course I have tissues.”
Alexa smiled at Daisy’s joke. And by the time she’d handed her a tissue, the tears had stopped. She cleaned her face and took another breath before telling Daisy the one thing she’d been afraid to say out loud. “What’s wrong with me? Am I that horrible that men would rather run than be in a relationship with me?”
“Wait, I thought you said you were the one who broke things off?”
“Well, technically, yeah. But only because I knew he wouldn’t have the guts to.”
“So he told you that he was unhappy?”
The conversation with the woman at the dinner party ran through her head. Maybe he hadn’t said the words, but there had been signs he was ready for their relationship to end. Hadn’t there?
“Not exactly. But he was mad about what happened at the deposition, and I knew it was just a matter of time before he got bored and moved on.”
“Hold up. You didn’t answer my question. At any point, did Dante say that he was unhappy or wanted to break up?”
She didn’t appreciate the way Daisy was interrogating her. It hadn’t been that cut-and-dried. “He doesn’t stay with anyone for more than a few months. Our time was running out. I just ended it a few seconds early.”
Daisy stayed quiet. That wasn’t good, either.
“Spill it. I know you want to say something, so say it.”
“I love you, Alexa. But sometimes I just want to shake some sense into you!”
Daisy scooted out of the rocking chair and moved so she was standing in front of Alexa. Then she leaned down and gripped the sides of Alexa’s chair. A riled-up pregnant woman was definitely something to be feared. She waited sheepishly for Daisy to finish her rant.
“I think you ended it because you got scared. And when you get scared, you tend to do something rash—like break up with the one guy who could really love you.”
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br /> And, then, right there in the middle of the furniture department of Babies “R” Us, Daisy broke down and cried, too.
Alexa jumped out of the chair and hugged her. “Oh, honey, why are you crying now?”
“I don’t know,” Daisy blubbered into her shoulder. “I guess I’m just so frustrated for you. And maybe a little hungry. I swear, my emotions are all over the place these days. Trust me, when you get pregnant, you’ll understand.”
She smiled, and then it hit her. For the first time in her life, Alexa didn’t cringe at the thought of having a kid of her own. She wanted the leaky breasts, the crazy mood swings, and the big belly. Not tomorrow, of course. But one day. And immediately she thought of Dante. She wanted all those things with him.
Because she loved him.
Her own tears started falling again, and she finally said the words she’d been too afraid to even think. “I love him, Daisy, but what if he doesn’t love me?”
They stood there for a couple of minutes, crying into each other’s shoulders. It was a miracle no sales associate stopped by to see what was wrong. Perhaps bawling women were a regular occurrence at that particular Babies “R” Us?
When they were all out of tears and tissues, they sat back down on the rockers.
“You have to tell him, Alexa. You might be surprised at what he says.”
“I’m scared.”
“So what? I’m scared about pushing this baby out. But you know what? I’m going to do it, because when it’s over, I’m going to have a son or daughter. Some things are worth moving past your fear.”
Alexa sighed. “I don’t know. I don’t exactly have the best track record with him. I’ve pushed him away before. What if I messed up my second chance?”
“What if you didn’t? You just have to convince him that you’re in it for the long haul. Fight for what you want, Alexa.”
Dante had told her the same thing not that long ago. But how could he believe she was willing to fight for what she wanted when she’d given up on the lawsuit?
That’s when it became clear what she needed to do. She wiped her eyes and asked Daisy if she was ready to leave.