Burn Down the Night (Everything I Left Unsaid #3)- Molly O'Keefe Page 0,56
literally had no idea what he was saying. I stared at him like an idiot.
“Can we use them?” he asked.
“What…what are you talking about?” Grills? The hell?
“The grills by the pool. That’s part of this condo right?”
“Yeah.”
He smiled, and goddamn, he was beautiful. The beard and the eyes and the white flash of his teeth.
It was so surprising that smile, so real and pure and not malicious or hiding some dark intent. He was just a really good-looking guy smiling because, for the moment, he was happy.
I nearly smiled back.
“I’m going to go get a steak,” he said. “And I’m going to cook it on that grill. And I’m going to get some beers. And I’m going to drink a bunch of them by the pool. You hungry?”
“Yeah. I…I could eat.” I was starving. Ravenous.
“And tomorrow I’m going to wake up and go down and sit by that pool in the goddamn sun. You should come with me.”
I blinked at him like he was speaking French.
“It’s our honeymoon after all.”
“You want to…”
“Sit in the sun for a few days. Drink beers. Look at you wearing that white bikini.”
He was telling me I could forget, for just a little bit. Or I could try. I could put down the load I carried and pretend for a little while that life was simple. Easy. I could take a breath. Make a new plan without the panic of not knowing where I was going to spend the night or how I was going to pay for gas.
Vacation.
Something easy. For once.
I was shaking my head no, I was pushing the idea away before the words were even out of his mouth.
Because I didn’t deserve easy. I didn’t deserve a vacation. Not while Jennifer was out there with Lagan.
“All right then, Joan,” he said, his face somber. “It was good knowing you.”
I turned around to face the door and all I had to do was pick up my garbage bags and turn the doorknob. But I couldn’t, somehow. I couldn’t.
“I don’t know how,” I breathed.
“To do what?” His voice came from just over my shoulder. I could feel him there. His living breathing sleekness. His danger and his charm. He was going to unlock me if I Iet him. He was going to pull me apart.
“Not…worry. Vacation. Sit in the sun in a bikini.”
I felt the gust of his laughter against my shoulder. “I’ve spent the last four years waiting for a bullet to the back of my head. So yeah, I’m not sure I know, either. But I’m gonna give it a try.”
Impossible, I wanted to say.
But instead, I opened my mouth and said, “Get dressed, I’ll drive us to the grocery store.”
—
And that was how I found myself sitting outside by the pool at midnight, eating a very rare steak and drinking a very cold beer.
With a very dangerous man.
The underwater lights were on in the pool and it glowed blue, illuminating Max’s hard face in eerie light.
He lifted the bottle to his mouth and took a long drink. He set the beer down in the grass beside his chair and cut into his steak with gusto. Relishing every bite like he’d never had something so delicious. He wore a pair of loose pajama bottoms and no shoes. His feet were crossed and every once in a while, his toes would curl, like the pleasure of a steak and a beer was just too much.
Watching him eat was like watching a commercial for beef. Or beer. Or masculinity.
Yeah, that was it. He was a commercial for how a man should enjoy the simple things: a good steak, a cold beer, a warm night.
“You don’t like it?” he asked.
“No, it’s great. It is.” I took another bite. Tiny. Like I had to ration out the meat, the pleasure. Too much at once and I’d choke.
I couldn’t stop staring at his toes.
I was a commercial for self-denial. I always had been.
“I feel like a caveman,” I said. There was nothing but meat on our plates. “We could have at least gotten the potatoes.”
“Waste of plate.” He took another bite and leaned back, chewing and very nearly smiling.
“You’re beginning to freak me out,” I said.
“That’s because you clearly don’t know how to vacation.”
“Honeymoon.”
He snorted. “I don’t think either of us knows how to do that. Unless…” He looked at me. “Have you been married before?”
“Well, I was the fifth bride of a fucked-up cult leader. Does that count?”