Page 154

The man she loved, who could never be a father to the child they’d made. The man she was very much afraid she still loved, despite everything—even though she wasn’t at all sure that she could or should ever forgive him.

The man who was still inside of her, like he belonged there—and the real tragedy was that he still fit her as if he’d been made for no other purpose than to be the key into her lock.

Maybe it wasn’t at all surprising that when she opened her eyes, she looked into his deep hazel gaze—this man who still didn’t remember who they’d been to each other or what he’d done, much less what she’d done—and burst into tears.

Chapter Six

Aeryn didn’t know how long she cried. What she did know was that Vesuvius held her, murmuring comforting-sounding words in languages she didn’t speak, there against her temple. He smoothed his big hand along the length of her wild, uncontrollable hair, and he didn’t seem to mind that she sobbed all over his neck and chest.

When she settled, at least a little bit, he moved. He picked her up with him as he rose from the bed with an ease that did not help anything at all and carried her into her own bathroom the way he’d used to carry her all over that villa she’d come to think of as theirs. Hating it and loving it in equal measure, with its view of the palace in the distance, as far away from her as if she was still back in Chicago even when he was right there beside her.

The last thing she wanted to do was look at herself in a mirror when he set her down beside it, but she took a glance anyway, and looked…wanton. Woebegone.

Both, perhaps.

He started the shower. When he found the water had gotten to a suitable temperature, he tugged her into the stall with him. Then he washed her as if she was some kind of rag doll and he was personally responsible for making sure she was clean. He took a cloth and smoothed it over every inch of her body, then he washed her hair, performing these tasks with an intense focus that, somehow, got her body stirring all over again.

In case she’d forgotten that she was nothing short of insatiable where this man was concerned.

When the shower was done, after he washed himself off as well, he tugged her out again. He took the time to towel her off. And then he sat her at her little vanity and dried her hair.

An intimacy she was not certain she could process fully, if she was honest.

“There must be food,” he said in his low voice when her hair was dry and they had been caught in each other’s gaze through the mirror.

And that was helpful. It reminded Aeryn that she was a whole person with an entire life that had nothing to do with the magic of his cock, the spellbound wonder of his touch, or the sheer, unbearable beauty of being near him again. She had a life, and part of that life involved this house that she kept well-stocked.

Of course there was food. She didn’t understand why she hadn’t offered him any before.

Well. She did know, but it was time to correct that.

She pulled on her silken nightgown again, but this time, she belted herself into her robe, too, and slid her feet into her cozy shearling slippers, an indulgence she had introduced her mother to last year and now they couldn’t remember how they’d survived the Chicago winters without them. When she started down the hall without a word, Vesuvius followed, but he went into the guest room. Then came out again a moment later, when she was still on the stairs, wearing only those sweatpants.

She supposed that when this ended, as she knew it would, she would have Vesuvius in a pair of gray sweatpants and nothing else emblazoned into her mind, like a brand.

There were worse things that a person might have playing on an endless loop internally, she thought. Much worse things.

“What kind of food would you like?” she asked him as he followed her past the gleaming Christmas tree and back into the kitchen.

“As it happens,” he said, right behind her as she turned on the lights and moved behind the long island that separated the kitchen’s working area from the polished wood table across the way. “I am outrageously hungry. I would eat anything.”

“I’ll just fix us some things, then.” This felt almost too domestic. She couldn’t tell if she was breaking out in hives or this was just a little too much like all the dreams she’d had where they were just…normal people doing normal things. Like talking about what to eat. “And you can see what you like.”

“Don’t you know what I like?” he asked, and there was something about the way he asked it. It hit her the wrong way.

Her gaze shot to his. “I have no idea what you like. Not now. A lot of things can change in two years.”

Vesuvius inclined his head in a way that she thought would have told her he was a king even if she hadn’t already known it. It had royalty stamped all over it.

And he might not know it, but this was a first. Every time they’d been together had been at some or other property he owned. First a variety, then the one specific villa. In every case, the refrigerators and pantries had always been filled with the kind of foods that she assumed he’d told someone they would wish to eat. All of it either fully prepared and needing only heating, or requiring very little preparation. And every single dish had been extremely fancy.

But tonight they were in Chicago. In the United States of America, where there was absolutely no need for fancy food catered by executive chefs. Aeryn toyed with the idea of whipping up a batch of Chicken Vesuvio, a Chicago specialty with a name that she would find amusing under these circumstances, but that would take too long.

So she gathered what she could. She pulled out a Garrett Mix, a mix of popcorn and caramel-flavored popcorn. Then she made him Fluffernutter sandwiches. She prepared hot dogs, not up to Chicago standard, but she doubted Vesuvius would know the difference. Just because it entertained her, and he had fed her all kinds of world-class pasta in their time together, she made him a bowl of SpaghettiOs, too.

“…what a delightful selection,” he said after a moment, gazing down at the set of dishes she set before him. “I’m not even certain what I would call all of this.”

“This is real people food,” she told him, with a smile. “Not a Michelin star to be seen.”