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And I always had a good time, even more so if the motel had a pool.
Yet here I was at this five-star hotel, staying with a man who was a millionaire. I’d paid the rate for the room with his card. I was well aware of how much everything cost. I knew that no one in my family, with the exception of my little brother, would ever stay in a place like this. And it made me feel slightly uncomfortable. Guilty. A little sad.
“You all right?” that gruff, low voice asked from behind me when I’d stopped just though the door.
I had to clear my throat and force myself to give him a nod and a smile, which was about as insincere as you could get. “Sure.”
Yeah, he read it on my face easily, his eyes swinging around the room in confusion. “You chose the hotel.” His tone was slightly accusing. “You don’t like it?”
“No.” I shook my head, now feeling like a dick on top of everything else. “I mean, of course I like it. This is the nicest place I’ve ever stayed.” That was saying a lot, because when I travelled with Aiden, we always stayed somewhere nice. “I was just thinking about how fancy it is, and how I never would have imagined when I was a kid that I could stay somewhere like this. That’s all.”
The fact I was staying here with Aiden, to marry him, just sent that nail straight home into my heart. Younger Vanessa, pre-twenty-six-year-old Vanessa, had no idea what she had in store for her.
There was a pause, and I swore we both looked over our shoulders to glance at each other. The tension between us was awkward and uncertain. The Wall of Winnipeg blinked those big brown eyes. “You could have invited your family if you really wanted to.”
“Oh, uh, no. It’s all right.” In hindsight, I realized I’d shot down his offer too fast. “I only keep in contact with my little brother, and he’s already back in school.”
Why was he looking at me so strange?
“I don’t…” Good grief, why was this flustering me so much? And why couldn’t I just shut up? “I only talk to my mom every once in a while and never my sisters. And my best friend works a lot.” I wrung my hands and finished up the spiel of stupidity. “I don’t have anyone else.”
Aiden stared at me for so long, I frowned. “You’re acting weird,” he stated so casually I almost ignored the actual words that had come out of his mouth.
“Excuse me?”
“You’re being weird with me,” Aiden repeated himself.
That had me slamming my mouth closed and my frown growing.
The man who didn’t keep things to himself kept on barreling through what he apparently felt he needed to say. “I told you I was sorry.”
Uh.
“Look, everything is fine—” I started to say before he cut me off with a shake of his head.
“It isn’t. You don’t smile anymore. You haven’t called me big guy or given me hell,” he stated.
Wait a second. I hadn’t, had I? And he’d noticed? The possibility that he’d noticed made me feel strange, almost uncomfortable. “I thought I annoyed you,” I mumbled, trying to figure out what was the right response and whether he was saying these things because he genuinely missed them or not.
“You do.” And there we went. “But I’m used to it now.”
Wait another second….
“You’ve never made me feel awkward before, but you look at me differently now. Like you don’t know me, or you don’t like me.” The fact he leveled an even gaze at me, without shame, without embarrassment, without playing games, hit me right in the solar plexus. “I get it if you’re still pissed, if you don’t think of me the way you used to, but I liked the way we were before,” he went on. With his face open and completely earnest, he only slightly made me feel bad for how obvious I’d been with my frustrations with him, especially since he seemed to not just notice, but also missed the way things had been despite going out of his way to ignore me for so long.
“I know.” I swallowed and bit the inside of my cheeks. “I know. Look, I’m just…” I shrugged. “We’ll be back to normal in no time, I’m sure. This has all just been a lot for me to handle, and I’m trying to get used to it. It’s hard for me to forgive people sometimes. I don’t know how to act around you any more, I guess.”
“The same way you used to,” he suggested evenly, as if it was the easiest answer in the world.
I swallowed, stuck between being stubborn and holding on to the fear and resentment I’d felt and unsure of how to move forward with this version of Aiden I was trying to get to know.
As if sensing I had no idea how to answer, he rolled his shoulders back and asked, “Other than that, you’re sure you’re fine?”
“Yes.”
“Positive?”
I nodded, letting out a breath that had somehow gotten stuck deep in the pit of my belly, bloating it with insecurity and anxiety and probably a dozen other things I wasn’t aware of. “Yeah. I, ah, changed my address on my bank statement a couple days ago. I’ll change my license as soon as I can,” I explained and suddenly felt a little awkward. “Are you sure you’re okay with all this? You’re sure you still want to be stuck with me for the next five years?”
That dark, almost caramel-colored gaze, landed on me, even, intense, determined. “Yes,” that smoke-wrapped voice replied effortlessly. “We need to go pick up the paperwork for the petition right after we sign the papers.”
