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“But—”
“Ben, please, let us do this. Let go a little, it’s only dinner.”
Damn, she knew how to call him out on his shit. He’d always have control issues, because he knew control meant sobriety. That part he couldn’t let go.
To let go with other people, that took trust. And with Liv, trust was harder. He had visible tread marks lingering on his heart, left by her. If he was honest about it, every morning when they woke up, he wondered if that day was the day she’d leave him again. He wasn’t sure if he’d ever get over it.
Jake and Liv made paella, along with other Spanish food. Liv also made an individual pizza for Luke. The kitchen was spotless because Liv insisted she and Jake clean as they go, the exact opposite of Ben’s approach.
Throughout dinner, Jake extolled the virtues of Liv’s style of food preparation at the expense of his father’s.
All Ben could think was how much he wanted this to be their lives, all the time. He wanted to spend every day with Liv, and Renie too, for that matter, and his boys. If this was his world, he would give up everything else in order to have it.
But it wasn’t their world. Soon the boys would go back to their mom’s, and then in January, Ben would be halfway across the world on tour. Renie would be back at school, and Liv would be out doing the thing that almost killed her only a couple of months ago.
Control? Shit. He had none over that. He wanted to wrap her up, and take her on tour with him, but then she’d be a thing, not a person, and her greatest fear, losing herself for him or anyone else would become a reality. Ben needed to figure out how to respect her independence, but not go insane with worry at the same time.
“Fret, fret, fret,” she whispered in his ear.
“You caught me.”
“Why the scowl?”
He hadn’t realized he’d been scowling. “I don’t want this to end.”
“None of us do. But that’s what makes it so special. Otherwise, diminishing returns, and nobody likes that.”
“What?”
“The more you have something, the less joy it brings you.”
“I don’t agree with that at all. I would be very happy to have your skin on mine all day every day, for the rest of our lives, and I would never, I repeat never, experience less joy from it. My joy will only continue to grow.”
“On the subject of skin on skin, what do you want to do for New Year’s Eve?”
Ben’s eyes roamed over the scene in front of him. “It may be what I want to do, but whether I get to or not, that’s another story.”
Liv smiled. “Blythe is flying into Gunnison tomorrow, and I’ve been meaning to talk to you about that. I’m glad you reminded me. She and Renie have been best friends since kindergarten, so the two of them are going to hang out and ski for a couple of days. Since we don’t have the room at the hotel any longer—”
“Yes.”
“You don’t know what I’m asking yet.”
“I don’t? You aren’t asking me if she can stay here?”
“No, as a matter of fact I wasn’t. I was going to ask you if you had any connections in town to help me get a room somewhere. I’ve called everyone, but they’re full.”
“I just said she can stay here, Liv,” Ben snapped.
“I didn’t want to impose, Ben,” she murmured.
He wasn’t sure why, but that made him angry. Something twisted inside of him. “Liv, for God’s sake. What are you, a guest here? Is that how you see yourself?”
She stood and walked toward the stairs.
“What are you doing now? Leaving?”
She turned back, her eyes met his, and he watched them fill with tears. She kept her hand on the stair rail as she slowly turned and sat on one of the steps.
