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Inclining my head toward his computer, I lean forward again and nod. “Right, so show me the possible locations for our offices. A word of warning, though, if you’ve gone full corporate douche, I’m taking over the location scouting.”
He laughs. “I don’t think I have, but see for yourself. None of them are situated right on top of a bar, but I think that’s a good thing. I think I managed to find a balance between fun and professional.”
As he scrolls through the listings of the places he’s made inquiries about, the last bit of doubt that’s been lingering inside me melts away. What Maxim and I are trying to do here is going to be a good thing for both of us. Forallof us. And I, for once, am really getting excited about it.
32
OLIVIA
“You’re asking me to move in with you?” I stare back at Vincent, shock keeping me frozen to the spot as we stand in the middle of our hotel room in Bangkok.
It’s a suite—and a nice one at that. We’ve got a great view of the city, a spa bathtub, and a gigantic bed. But none of those things are really even registering with me as I stand there looking into his aquamarine eyes. His extremely serious aquamarine eyes that are devoid of any traces of humor or laughter.
He nods in response to my question, squeezing my hands as he keeps his gaze locked on mine. “Yes, I’m asking you to move in with me. We were basically living together in Spain even before Justin attacked us, and we’ve already told Maxim to give up one of our rooms for the rest of the tour. In essence, that means we’ll have been living together for months before we get home. I want to keep doing it once we get there.”
“That’s… That’s a big step, Vince. I mean, I want to, but are you sure you’re ready for it? Because I’m not sure I am. As much as I want to, I just don’t know if it’s a good idea. As it is, we’re going to have to find our feet as a couple in the real world when we get home. Moving in together will just add an extra layer to that, and I’m not sure we’ll survive it.”
He squeezes my hands again. “I am sure we’ll survive it. Sure enough for both of us. But if you’re not ready, then we’ll wait. I just wanted you to know it’s an option I’ve been thinking about. I’m serious about you and about us, and I want to wake up next to you every morning and argue with you about what’s for dinner every night.”
My heart does a flip in my chest. “You do? I want that too, but what if—”
“If we live our lives based on what-ifs, we’ll never do anything. There are too many what-ifs in any given scenario. I’m not scared of this, but if you are, we’ll talk about it again when you’re ready.”
Rolling my lips into my mouth, I keep looking at him as I release a long breath, my mind going a million miles a minute. “I’m not scared, or at least I don’t think I am. I just… Can I think about it?”
“Of course.” He moves his head closer to mine to plant a small kiss on the tip of my nose. “Would you like to talk it through?”
“Yes,” I say immediately, launching into only the first of my questions so fast that even I almost can’t make out the words. “Where would we even live? My place or yours? What would we do about rent? And groceries? Do we split it? Do we create a joint account for joint expenses? Whose furniture would we use, and what would we do with the furniture we have that we won’t be using? Do we put it in storage? If we put it in storage—”
A soft chuckle comes out of him, and he lets go of my hands, pointing at the couch behind me as he starts walking backward to the kitchen, his eyes still on mine. “First, you’re going to sit down and take a few deep breaths. Second, I’m going to get us a drink. Third, we’ll sit down and talk about it one thing at a time, okay?”
“Okay,” I say after swallowing past the nerves threatening to close up my throat.
Moving back, I sit down once my knees hit the couch, and I kick off my shoes before folding my legs underneath me. While I’m breathing and trying to think, I watch as Vincent opens a small bottle of wine from our minibar and fills a glass for each of us.
We arrived at the hotel less than an hour ago, and as soon as we checked into our room, he told me we needed to talk. Knowing those words don’t usually mean good things, I braced myself to hear that he’d changed his mind about our relationship.
Instead, he told me he’s going into business with Maxim and outlined their plans for me. Before I could even begin to ask questions about that, he said he’s been thinking a lot about the future and then asked me to move in with him.
We haven’t even taken a damn shower to wash off the airplane grime yet. Not that I blame him for wanting to get it out of the way. I saw him speaking to Maxim and Emma on the plane. Now that I know what they were talking about, it’s a relief that he shared it all with me as soon as we had a moment to ourselves again, but…
Moving in together?I can’t say that I haven’t been giving our future some thought. In fact, as our days in Spain passed and the time came closer to hit the road again, I worried about what was going to happen to us once things started going back to normal.
Vincent and I both have to work during the day and sometimes at night. We might be on the same tour, but our jobs are very different, and we’re both pretty busy with them. I’ve also been thinking about the fact that while Vincent seemed happy to hang around the resort instead of going out and hitting the town, he’ll probably want to start doing that again now to blow off steam after work.
I’ve seen the way girls flock around him when he’s out. I can’t say I haven’t been worried about the allure of exciting hookups and anonymous one-night stands getting to him again now that the threat of the stalker has been eliminated.
In a way, it’s a huge relief that he’s been thinking about a future that’s still months away while I’ve been concerned about the more immediate future. The future we’re living right now. He hasn’t said anything about going out tonight, but I heard James asking about it as we were disembarking the plane.
As he carries our wine to the sitting area, the look in his eyes suddenly changes. There’s a flash of heat. Then his eyes are dragging over me slowly as his lips kick into a smirk.
“You know, I think we may need to relax you a little before we talk about this,” he says as he sets the glasses on the coffee table. “You look like your brain is about to explode.”
While he speaks, he lowers himself to his knees and then reaches for my feet, gently tugging them out from underneath me. Kneeling in front of me, he runs his hands up and down the bare lengths of my calves and toys with the hem of my skirt.
Since we were going back to reality when I got dressed this morning, I put on one of my knee-length pencil skirts and a button-down blouse.
I swat at his hands as he drags his fingertips over my skin, but I can’t even pretend he’s not already turning me on.
