by Maise, Ella
“Yes.”
“How is your relationship with them?”
“We’re not close.”
“Oh? You had a falling out?”
“You could say that. I haven’t seen them in years.”
“Do they know you got married?” she asked.
“I didn’t inform them, no, but I’m sure they’ll hear it from someone soon enough.” I glanced at her and our eyes met for a brief moment before I looked away. “I’m afraid they wouldn’t approve of my choices, so I didn’t feel the need to let them know.”
“I understand.” There was an awkward pause. “Wow. I really needed that confidence boost, so thanks for that.”
I didn’t think she understood at all, but I didn’t correct her.
“And can I say two peas in a pod? Look at us, we don’t really have any family.”
“Looks like that.”
She huffed out a breath and leaned on the railing, mirroring my stance. After a peaceful stretch of silence between us, an ambulance passed with the sirens blaring and screeched to a halt somewhere down below us, interrupting my thoughts. Having a heart-to-heart conversation with my wife under the night sky was absolutely not the best way to keep my distance.
“When do you think you’ll be opening the coffee shop?” I asked, shifting the subject to something safer.
“I’m mostly ready, mostly being the operative word. When I finish painting, I’ll have all the big things out of the way. The chairs and the sign that will go outside are coming soon, and I need to buy a few more kitchen things.” She sighed and rested her chin on her propped-up hand. “I think three weeks? It depends on a lot of things. All the paperwork is ready, so there is no reason not to jump right in. Thank you for that, too—you know, for handling the paperwork stuff.”
I noticed her trying to cover a yawn.
“Don’t mention it. You can’t paint to save your life. You know that, right?”
“Excuse me? I paint beautifully,” she shot back with a frown on her face.
“From what I saw today, it was patchy. I could still see the red of the old paint underneath. That’s not an indication of beautiful painting.”
She snorted. “Again, excuse me, but that was a very bright red—it would show no matter what I did with only one coat of new paint over it. Everyone knows that. First coat is always patchy. I did the hard part then you came at the end and stole my work.”
“Everyone knows that?” I asked with an arched eyebrow.
“Yes! Ask any professional painter.”
“How many professional painters do you know exactly?”
“How many do you know?”
I met her eyes and shrugged. “A few.” Relaxing a little further, I waited for her comeback.
“Fine. You win that one. I don’t know any, but it still doesn’t change the fact that I paint beautifully.”
“If you say so.”
“I do say so. You did one wall, but I’m gonna paint the whole place. Say I don’t paint beautifully after you see that.”
“Actually, since you’ll be painting my property, I’d like to make sure you’re not ruining my walls. I’ll be there tomorrow to keep an eye on things.”
“You’re kidding.”
“No.”
“Fine. Keep an eye on things then. The property might be yours now, but those will be my walls for the next two years. I’m not letting you mess anything up.”
Trying to cover my unexpected smile, I cleared my throat. “Thank you for the permission. If you’re planning on doing more of your ‘beautiful’ painting, as you put it, you need to get some more rest.”
“Are you provoking me?”
“Why would I want to do that?” And wasn’t that the truth? Why the hell would I want to do that? Too bad I didn’t have an answer to my own question.
She faced me, and I was forced to return her gaze.
“You really think you can do a better job than me?” she asked.
I arched an eyebrow. “I did do a better job than you.”
“Right. Instead of just keeping an eye on things, pick up a paint roller then.”
Apparently, I was canceling my meetings for the next day or so. “We’ll see how it goes.”
She paused.
“I know it looks pretty bare right now, but wait until you see everything together. More importantly, I’m really good with coffee, and the pastries will be to die for. If I can manage to do everything that’s in my mind, it’ll look great in about a week or two.”
“What else is on your mind?” I asked, genuinely curious, her enthusiasm catching.
She smiled up at me. “I think I’m gonna keep the rest to myself, just in case I screw it up or can’t get it done in time.”
“Sounds like you have everything planned and under control.”
“There are so many more things I need to deal with though, a million little things. Are you going to be there on opening day?”
“Do you need me to be there?” It didn’t matter what her answer was—I knew I was going to be there anyway.
“I wouldn’t say need—”
When the wind kicked up, pushing at her hair, she lifted her hands to get it out of her eyes and the blanket started to slip down from her shoulders. I straightened and caught it midway to her waist. Suddenly we were standing too close and she was trapped between me and the damn blanket. My eyes met her surprised big, brown ones, and I halted, not so sure what to do with the blanket and her.
I cleared my throat. She dropped her hands after having pulled all her hair to one side, and I let her grab the edges of the blanket from me.
“Thanks,” she murmured as I took a step back.
Goddammit!
After a brief pause, she went back to answering my question. “It’s not so much a need, but it would be good just in case Jodi or Bryan show up. I don’t think they will, but after tonight who knows.”
“I’ll try to free up my schedule if you think I need to be there.” A quick glance at my watch, and I noticed the time: almost five. After not wanting to talk to her, I had spent an hour doing the exact opposite. I straightened up. “I’m heading back inside.”
“Oh, okay,” she mumbled, still holding on to the blanket I had almost reluctantly let go of just a few seconds earlier.
“If I’m going to paint an entire coffee shop, I need to get some sleep,” I added at her puzzled expression regarding my abrupt exit.
“Wait a minute—you were serious about that?”
“I’m not sure how many times I’ll need to repeat this, but if I say something, I always mean it.”
“I thought you were just…”
I raised my brows. “You thought I was what?”
“Never mind. You won’t be painting an entire coffee shop, though—I’ll be painting too.”
“We’ll see how you do first before I let you do that.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Fine. I’ll show you how it’s done tomorrow then.”
“Meet you downstairs at seven? Or would that be too early for you?”
“Seven is perfect.”
“Right. Good night then, Rose.”
“Good night, Jack.”
Chapter Five
Rose
Two weeks later
I had officially moved in with Jack Hawthorne, AKA my beloved fake husband, the night he had returned from his London trip, which could also count as the beginning of my sleepless nights. The next day, just as we had discussed, he accompanied me back to the coffee shop because he didn’t trust me with the walls of his newly acquired free property. While I did get him to agree—after a very convincing and long talk—that I could, in fact, do a beautiful paint job, he ended up painting most of the place himself, souring my victory.
He exasperated me to no end the entire time and I had no clue what to do with him.
He also wanted me to clear out my apartment in the East Village right away, but I ignored his wishes and slowly packed everything during the painting
business. The hell with Bryan’s threats.
Sitting alone in the middle of the coffee shop, munching on a sandwich I had put together in the back, I was waiting for the IKEA delivery guys to bring me my bookcase. Soon after, they arrived, but before I could tackle that project, the chairs were delivered.
When everything was said and done—the bookcase assembled, the chairs where I thought they should be—hours had passed, and I’d only just then sat my ass down for the first time. I groaned and leaned my head back against the wall. I thought closing my eyes just for a few seconds wasn’t a bad idea because my eyesight was starting to get alarmingly blurry.
Of course doing that only reminded me of how much I needed more sleep. Every morning, I quietly got dressed and, as if I were an intruder, tiptoed out of Jack Hawthorne’s little mansion to get to the shop. At night, I chose to disappear into my room the moment I stepped into his apartment.
All my attempts at talking with my husband had failed, one after another, so I had stopped after attempt number four. The more questions I asked, the more I tried to talk to him, either the quicker he annoyed me or the quicker he walked away from me. The short conversation we’d had on the terrace that first night had been our longest one.
Yet…yet, even after the painting was done, he had shown up every single night to pick me up on his way to the apartment. Was it to check on the property?
To say I was confused about my husband would’ve been an understatement. I had no idea what to think about the man.
He had been the one to make the marriage offer, but with the way he was acting, so cool and distant at all times, you’d think I’d held an invisible gun to his head to make him say I do.
I didn’t see things changing any time soon if I didn’t do anything about it.
I also had no idea how we were going to keep this charade up if we actually had to stand next to each other and talk to people as a married couple. If anyone had seen us working together at the coffee shop, or even on the terrace that first night, they would’ve thought we were out on a never-ending blind date, forced to endure every minute instead of making a quick escape.
I must’ve been on the verge of falling asleep because when I heard a loud knock, I leaped up and somehow managed to hit the side of my thigh on the edge of the table in front of me. “Jesus Christ!” Pressing my hand to my leg to ease the pain, I hopped over to the door just as another loud knock filled the coffee shop.
Feeling a little drowsy and maybe a little jumpy too, I lifted the side of the newspaper that was protecting everything going on inside from wandering eyes. My heart rate somewhat slowed down when I saw it was just Jack Hawthorne standing on the other side of the glass. Lifting my finger to indicate it’d be a minute, I taped the newspaper back in place and let out a long breath before I started unlocking the door.
Here we go, I thought.
When he stepped inside, I closed and locked the door behind him. “Jack?” Massaging my leg with my left palm, I let my eyes wander his body from head to toe. If someone had forced me to say one positive thing about my husband, it would be that he was born to wear suits. I would have been lying if I’d said I minded that. The black suit, white button-down, and black tie he was wearing at that moment somehow managed to make his ocean blue eyes stand out even more, and I stared at him a little longer than necessary or acceptable. “What are you doing here?”
“That’s a great question. I wondered the same thing, because it’s not like I come here every night or anything. I called you an hour ago. You didn’t answer.”
“What?” I asked, confused. Rubbing the bridge of my nose, I tried to snap out of my still half-asleep state. If I was checking him out and noticing how his suit accentuated his intense eyes, how his stubble looked so amazingly good on him, I must have still been in dreamland. Instead of giving an answer, he went with another question, looking all kinds of exasperated with me.
“Where is your phone, Rose?”
Taking care not to bump into him, I walked around his perfectly muscled body and perfectly stubbled face back to the counter and leaned over to get to my phone, which I had left on one of the lower shelves a few hours earlier. “I haven’t touched it since the chairs got here, and I must have put it on silent by mistake. Is something wrong?” I looked down at the screen and saw two missed calls from Jack Hawthorne and one from Sally. Sally was gonna have to wait while I dealt with my husband.
“Are you okay?” he asked with a frown on his face.
Glancing up at him, I was finally starting to get it together—only I still didn’t have it together enough to realize he’d asked a question, so I didn’t answer. I just kept staring. For several long seconds, I was thinking he’d somehow managed to look better at the end of the day, every day, while I looked worse as the day went on. Not one single light brown hair was out of place on his head. The longer I looked, the deeper his brows dipped, which added this weird appeal to him that I shouldn’t have noticed. He looked amazing when he frowned—which happened often, as I could attest to—and I was starting to like that expression on him more and more. He didn’t need the frown to make him look all intense and broody, but it definitely worked in his favor.
“Rose?”
“Hmm?”
“What’s wrong with you?”
Accepting the fact that I had long ago lost my mind since I couldn’t stop thinking about how truly attractive he was, I chose to act like nothing was wrong and nodded. Then I realized that was the wrong direction for my head to move and quickly shook my head instead. Flustered at being caught, I moved to stand behind the counter to put some space between us. I wasn’t planning on throwing myself at him, but still.
“I fell asleep for a few minutes so I’m a little out of it, that’s all. Why did you say you called again?”
“I was heading out for dinner and was going to ask you if you’d like to join me. I ate already.”
I yawned. “Oh, no. Was it a work thing? Did I miss the first work thing? I’m sorry if—”
“No, it was just me. I thought we could go over a few things and have dinner.”
That was a first—him voluntarily offering to talk and have dinner. “Go over things…like?”
“We’ll do it another time. I’m assuming you’re done here since you were sleeping?”
The guy didn’t budge. He didn’t smile. He certainly didn’t laugh or look happy or look…anything other than broody and serious, really.
“I didn’t mean to fall asleep. I was just taking a break, resting my eyes and I guess I dozed off for a little while.”
Looking around the shop with disapproval, he shook his head. “It’s not safe for you to be here alone at night, let alone fall asleep. What if you hadn’t locked the door, which you forgot to do before? It could’ve been anyone walking through that door and finding you sleeping.”
“But I didn’t forget to lock the door. It was just that one time. I’ve been making sure it’s locked no matter what time it is,” I countered. I wouldn’t admit that for a brief moment when I’d heard his hard knock, I’d been just a bit scared.
My reply earned me another disapproving look. “I see you finally got your chairs,” he commented, his gaze taking everything in.
“Yes. The delivery was delayed, but I finally got them a few hours ago. What do you think?” I asked. Even I could hear the hopeful tone in my voice. He was the first one to see the place filled with the furniture and so close to what it would look like on opening day. I was desperate to hear from someone that it wasn’t just my imagination and it actually did look good.
Our eyes met as I held my breath, waiting.
“About?” he asked.
I tamped down the urge to groan.
He couldn’t find any fault in them—there was no way. They looked perfect with the color scheme. Elegant, chic, comfy, inviting—all the good stuff. So, I smiled instead and tried again. “Everything. The chairs, tables, everything.”
He followed my gaze, but his har
d features stayed exactly the same, not a single smile in sight.
“Is it done?”
“Not yet,” I said slowly, my smile dimming. “I’m working on it, but it’s pretty close now.”
All eleven—I hated that it was an odd number—of my wooden round tables were exactly where I wanted them, and I’d placed the brownish nude cotton-velvet chairs that looked gorgeous with the flooring and the freshly painted walls in their places. I’d also taken out the black steel bar stools and the dark green cushions from the kitchen where I’d kept them stacked. They were the same material as the chairs, and I had put them all in front of the coffee bar I had running along the front windows. It already looked amazing, but apparently only to my eyes.
“Never mind,” I said, breaking the silence in an effort to avoid hearing Jack’s negative thoughts. His rigid body language and disapproving gaze were telling me everything I didn’t want to hear anyway. “I’m sorry, you don’t have to deal with this. If you need to be somewhere else, I wouldn’t want to keep you. I’m gonna be here for another hour I think, to put some stuff up.”
He opened his mouth to speak, but I got there before he could.
“I know—I’ll go to your place when I’m done here. You don’t have to keep coming back here every day. I know the way.”
His hands in his pockets, he walked toward the big archway that connected the two sections of the coffee shop and turned toward the back, out of my sight. I’d have bet money he was shaking his head after noticing my bookcase sprawled on the floor, or if not that, he was probably scalding the bookcase with a disapproving look. I’d assembled it just fine on my own, but I hadn’t dared to actually lift it and move it. That would be the next day’s job, or the next. It all depended on how my back was feeling.