Chapter 9

NINE

“ I brought these for you.”

Xavier had barely said five words by the time he’d paid for the ultrasound, left the office, and exited the building onto the relatively quiet street in the Village with me at his side. Which was why I was surprised when he turned to me suddenly as he opened the passenger door of the hired Audi and removed a canvas tote bag.

I took the bag and looked inside, finding a stack of nondescript black notebooks I recognized immediately—the memorandum books used by the dukes and stewards of his family for the last two hundred years or so, which I’d previously discovered on a dusty shelf in the Corbray Hall library.

I looked up with genuine shock. It was the very last thing I expected him to bring me. Most men looking to make amends would bring flowers. Jewelry, maybe. But not books.

Look who knows the bookworm, tittered Kate’s snarky voice in the back of my mind.

I blinked. “Why?”

Xavier gave a shrug. “You were working on something with those. I won’t pretend to understand why you found my family’s boring old journals about rain and blight and mining the slightest bit interesting, but it was important to you. Something about narrative records among the English gentry.”

I couldn’t help but smile. “You remembered the title.”

Another shrug, but his long nose turned slightly pink with something akin to embarrassment or maybe pride. The few times we’d talked about it, Xavier had seemed so distracted by his own affairs that I hadn’t even believed he could hear me, let alone remember what I was doing.

Apparently, I was dead wrong.

I was offered a lopsided smile that made my chest ache with want. “I should remember more. But I’d never forget something you need, you know.” He nodded. “That was your ‘something more,’ right? I wasn’t sure if you’d have the time to continue, but I thought I’d give you the option.”

Another surprise callback to one of our first conversations upon my arrival in Kendal. My desire to be more than just an accessory to his life. The need to have something of my own.

In response, Xavier had offered me yet another library and complete access to any family secret I could find. At the time, I’d thought maybe it was his way of saying “My life is yours to share.”

This felt like the same sort of token.

“I…thank you,” I said honestly. “But Xavi, I can’t take your family’s history. Not now, right?”

“You mean since you’ve brutally rejected me several times over?” he said lightly.

I frowned. I didn’t find it funny.

Xavier just sighed. “Just because you’re not there doesn’t mean you should give up your work. You wouldn’t ask me to stop cooking just because we broke up, would you?”

I swallowed. “Of course not.”

Xavier without a kitchen was like keeping Picasso from his paints. The man was an artist—I’d never deprive the world of his talents or him of his passion.

“If you don’t want them, I’ll take them back,” he said. “But if you’re still interested?—”

“I am,” I interrupted. “Interested, I mean. I don’t know when I’ll get to reading them again, but I’d love to. Eventually.”

He examined me for a long minute, like my response wasn’t quite satisfactory. He was looking for something, but I honestly didn’t know what it was.

Then he took the sack from me, put it back in the front seat, and closed the door. “Do you fancy a walk?”

I glanced at my watch. It was coming onto five o’clock, but Sofia was safe with Joni, probably having the time of her life over pizza and a giggle fest.

We had time. But what it would accomplish, I wasn’t so sure.

“I—all right.”

It was a relatively balmy day for mid-October. The last vestiges of summer had disappeared weeks ago, but sunshine still speared the multi-colored leaves overhead as we zigzagged around the streets of the Village, eventually finding ourselves on the west side. The ones that had fallen still crunched underfoot before the autumn rains began in earnest. The air was crisp and chilled but not uncomfortable as the sun started to sink below the buildings around us. A perfect day for a stroll.

“I always loved this neighborhood,” I said after two blocks of near silence on Perry Street. “Aside from how beautiful it is, I honestly think literally every building within a five-block radius has hosted at least one literary icon.”

“Like who?” Xavier asked, almost a dare.

“Too many to count. Thomas Paine. Ana?s Nin. Dylan Thomas. Henry James. Richard Wright. Edgar Allan Poe. Shoot, literally every Beat writer. I could keep going.” I shrugged, well aware I was babbling/lecturing in that way my sisters couldn’t stand. He did ask, though. “It’s amazing, really, to think of how many of the world’s talents came to this little patch of earth to follow their dreams and make art.”

I grabbed a red-streaked maple leaf from a tree we passed under and turned it back and forth while we walked. This part of Manhattan was oddly peaceful despite being only a few blocks from Washington Square Park. A few cyclists passed us, as well as a pedestrian or two, but it was far enough from the subway and the traffic of downtown or Washington Square that we didn’t have to shout to be heard. Almost as quiet as Red Hook.

“Would you want to live here if you could?” Xavier wondered. “Join your writers. Follow your dreams, too?”

I snorted. “Who wouldn’t want to live in a West Village brownstone? It’ll only cost me, oh, a casual twenty million or so. Give or take another five or ten mil. Chump change, right?”

Xavier gave me a queer look. “How much do you think a penthouse in Mayfair costs?” He peered around us curiously. “It’s a nice street. We’d get on well, although I’d miss our view.”

I didn’t know what to say. It almost sounded like he was serious. We? Our?

“We could do it, you know. Live here if you wanted.”

He stopped in front of one particularly beautiful townhouse made of gleaming white stone that called back to some of the Georgian houses around Mayfair and Hyde Park. Still built like a brownstone, though—it was the perfect blend of New York and London architecture.

Now he definitely wasn’t joking. There was none of the telltale humor gleaming from his blue eyes. Just eagerness, maybe. But mostly a serious question.

“You could go back to school, too,” he rattled on. “Quit teaching and write the book on those journals, or whatever else you want. Isn’t there a university close by?”

“NYU, yeah,” I said slowly. “It’s a few blocks that way. But Xavier?—”

“So you study there. Or Columbia, if you’d prefer. Get your PhD, learn more about all these writers. Live your own dreams, instead of always helping littles find theirs while you pretend to inhabit someone else’s story in your mind.”

He gazed back up at the white house, clearly entranced by the prospect. He had a look in his eyes that I imagined was similar to the one he probably saw in mine whenever I imagined myself an Austen heroine.

“Sof could have the run of a place like this,” he went on. “The little one too, once they’re born. Plenty of space for everyone. No more two to a room or sleeping on old couches or landings. It’d be perfect, wouldn’t it? No titles or estates or papers or mothers or anyone to interfere. Just us again. The way it’s meant to be.”

By the time he was done speaking, it felt like there was something very large and awkward lodged in my throat. He couldn’t know how many times I had imagined something just like that. Even walked up and down this very street, long before he’d ever come back, fantasizing about exactly that sort of life for myself. Right now, I was feeling an odd sense of déjà vu, of when I was pregnant with Sofia, letting myself pretend in my weaker moments that somehow Xavier would leave his betrothed, find me again, and we’d be a family.

But it was no less a fantasy now than it was then—for one very specific reason.

“It would be lovely,” I said. “If we were still together. But…we’re not.”

Xavier turned back to me so slowly that I thought he might be ossifying in motion. He watched me for a long time before glancing back at the house once or twice.

“Hmm,” was all he said. And then turned and continued down the sidewalk.

I followed him, as confused as ever. What was going on? Had he completely forgotten that I’d turned him down? Did he even care?

I was a quiet shadow to his looming steps until we’d crossed Tenth Avenue and Hudson, then zigzagged over to a streetlight in order to cross the West Side Highway and walk to one of the lonely piers that stuck out over the river and granted a view of New Jersey. The roar of traffic now competed with the sound of water sloshing against the pilings of the pier.

But Xavier’s deep voice still topped every noise when he spoke again. “So, what now?”

He turned to lean against the pier’s railing, casually balanced on his elbows while he raised a brow and examined me sardonically.

I frowned. “What do you mean?” It was obvious the question was loaded, but I rambled on anyway. “Joni is meeting us at the house with Sofia in about an hour, probably. Tomorrow, more work. Four more weeks, the echocardiogram, another scan. I’ll probably need to notify the school about taking maternity leave at the end of May. They won’t really care—the kids are basically useless after Memorial Day anyway. After that?—”

“I’m not talking about your bloody schedule, Francesca,” Xavier cut in sharply.

I broke from my contemplating and sighed. “I didn’t think so. But Xavi?—”

“I’m talking about us , Ces. I’m talking about our family.” He turned and gripped the rail so violently that his knuckles turned bright white. “In seven months, there’s going to be another baby.”

“Oh, I am well aware of that,” I returned. “Believe me, much more than you are at this point.”

“I doubt it.”

“Do you, now? Well, Your Grace, let me tell you—you have no idea what’s coming. Between not sleeping more than forty-five minutes at a time, cleaning up more bodily fluids than you can possibly imagine, and having to decipher twenty different cries for a being who won’t be able to speak for at least a year or more, it’s going to be a literal shitshow that will make you happier and more miserable than you have ever been in your life. Even I’m going to be blindsided, and I’ve already done this once before.”

Xavier worried his mouth a bit, taking it all in. “But this time, you won’t be alone,” he said stubbornly.

“I wasn’t alone last time either,” I cut back. “I was at Nonna’s, actually. I had a whole family around me. Sisters and my grandmother to step in when I needed them. Thank God one of us knew what we were doing.”

My voice warbled at the end. For the first time, I realized I was scared to do this on my own. The way things stood, Xavier and I would likely be living in different places, but it would be months, maybe years, before he would really be able to take both kids on his own, if I was even comfortable with that. I wouldn’t have Nonna’s capable hands at my disposal or my sisters as impromptu babysitters, or my brother ready to pay the mortgage so I could take a little extra maternity leave.

It was just going to be me.

And I wasn’t the slightest bit prepared for that.

“Well, this time, you have your baby’s actual father.” Xavier’s voice was starting to cut, the timbre rising like a threatening tide. “Who, if you’ve forgotten, can give you everything you need if you just accept it instead of being so stubborn. You can do whatever you want here, babe. Take the house. Go back to school. Just give me a bloody chance.”

“Xavi, I already said no?—”

“And I said I don’t care if we get married,” he broke in. “I just want to make things right. Let me try to make things fucking right!”

“Then stop pressuring me and give me some space!” I cried. “Stop yelling at me. Stop trying to give me the world. All I ever wanted was you, Xavi!”

“I tried to give you that, but I wasn’t fucking good enough, was I?” he said bitterly, as cutting as the wind on my cheek.

I swallowed. Suddenly my face hurt. “No, I—” I shook my head. I didn’t know what to say.

Xavier sighed and rocked back and forth on his heels for a moment. His chest moved up and down as he took several deep breaths. When he spoke again, his voice had calmed somewhat.

“Look,” he started. “Maybe I’m never going to be the man you want me to be. I can’t be the dukes in those bloody novels. I don’t ride a white horse. I can’t sweep you off your feet. I’ll never rescue you from a tower.”

Part of me wanted to smile. He was so close to those things—he really had no idea. True, he had no white horse. His favorite in Kendal was brown, actually. He had never technically swept me off my feet, but he’d picked me up more times than I could count. I had no tower from which to be rescued—but in a way, he had saved me from my landing in a shabby little row house.

As if any of that mattered at all, though.

“The thing is,” he continued, the South London edge of his accent sliding into his speech like a cool breeze, “that’s just fiction, isn’t it? They’re not real. But I am, Ces. I’m here, and I’m bloody well not perfect, but I’m real, and I fucking love you and Sofia. More than this life, more than the next.” He swallowed, as overcome with his emotions as I was. “But me and them fancy heroes, we got one thing in common. They never give up the chase, babe, and neither will I. I will come for you, and I will burn for you, and I will wait for you for the rest of my days if I have to. Because, Francesca Zola, we were created to love each other. I don’t know much, but I know that. I’ll always know that.”

By the time he was done speaking, my head was swimming. I didn’t know whether to kiss him or slap him. He talked so good, but every part of my brain was screaming at me to wait.

This man had hurt me more than anyone. He had proved to me over and over again that we weren’t right for each other.

That he wasn’t, just as he said, the man I wanted him to be.

Even if he was the man I loved.

What was I supposed to do with that?

“You can’t buy me a house,” I said at last, grasping for tangible things to manage. “I-I can’t talk about the rest. I just—I can’t. But there is no way I’m going to be able to go back to school with a three-month-old baby. It’s too much.”

“No, it’s not.” Xavier looked up from watching the river, like he really couldn’t believe that’s what I was choosing to focus on. “Women go back to work all the time after three months. You’re just scared, and you know it.”

“You’re damn right, I’m scared!” I broke out. “In ways you can’t possibly understand because you haven’t been around. For five years, my entire life has been about one little person. And I don’t care how much anyone loves their child. The truth is, you lose yourself as a new parent. Between midnight feedings, giving every extra cent to clothes and toys and diapers, being a slave to naps and finicky schedules, trying to decipher what kind of cry they are making at a particular moment, and not sleeping more than forty-five minutes at a time for potentially a year or more, you give up pretty much every semblance of independence you have for years . So I can’t dream for myself right now, Xavi. Not when I’m about to lose that self all over again!”

“Except you won’t.” Xavier pushed off the railing and, before I could stop him, had captured my face between his large hands, forcing me to look up at him and see whatever earnest truth was in his dark eyes. “Listen to me. You will not lose yourself. I won’t allow it. I’ll be with you every step of the way. If you’re lost, I will find you. I promise .”

“Like you promised this summer?” I mumbled.

And there it was. The gap between us that he couldn’t quite bridge. Not with rings. Not with fancy houses. Not with promises to be my hero and love me always.

Words couldn’t cover it any more than empty promises of the future.

I honestly didn’t know what would.

I wanted desperately to look away, but Xavier had me trapped. His blue eyes reflected the darkening sky back at me, plumbing my depths with tools of sorrow.

“I didn’t even know you were lost until it was too late,” he said in a low voice. “And fucking hell, Francesca, I will never stop regretting it.”

I shuddered. He couldn’t know how badly I had yearned for those words for more than a month now. When his eyes dropped to my lips, I licked them as if on command. Decision took him as he bent down and kissed me.

Home. I was home again. It didn’t matter that I’d run back to New York, the city of my birth, nearly six weeks earlier, intent on finding safety and refuge from the hurt the summer had caused. The reality was that for a central part of me, home was right here in this man’s arms, with those sure fingers molded around my jaw and neck, these soft yet firm lips seeking entry to mine, that tongue tasting every bit of me like I was the nectar of life itself.

I moaned into the kiss, opening to him, completely and fully aware of just how my very hormonal body was reacting.

Hormonal.

Pregnant.

Oh God , what was I doing?

“Xavier,” I gasped as he moved that wicked mouth across my jaw. “Xavi, please.”

“Fuck, my love, my love,” he murmured, stubbled chin causing goose bumps to pebble over my neck. “I need you, Ces, don’t you understand? I need you like a tree needs a drink after a long drought. I’m dying without you. I’ll die the rest of my life.”

His mouth found mine again, and I couldn’t quite stop my hands from slipping into the thickets of his black mane, pulling him closer, devouring him until, finally, my brain kicked in.

This wasn’t real. It was hormones. One kiss didn’t make everything he’d done disappear.

I broke the kiss, panting, then somehow managed to wrest my hands from his hair, set them on his chest, and push him away. “Xavi, we have to stop.”

His broad chest heaved as he stared at me, inky hair deliciously mussed, full lips even more swollen from the effect of our kiss. He looked somehow more edible than ever. I wanted nothing more than to consume him, body and soul.

“Why?” he demanded. “Why the fuck do we have to stop? You feel it. You love me. I know you do.”

I didn’t argue with him. By God, I couldn’t lie like that.

“It’s…complicated,” I said weakly.

Lord, I could barely think when he looked at me that way. Like I really was the oasis, and he had come wandering in from the desert.

“It’s not complicated,” he said. “It’s simple. I’m here. I came to New York.”

“You came because I had a scan.”

“I came for you ,” he repeated. “We have a family. Another on the way. But more importantly, I love you . Don’t you believe even that anymore?”

In a way, it really was music to my ears—but in the same way a siren’s song would pull sailors to their deaths in the sea. Xavier would pull me under all over again if I let him. And I had more to think about than just myself.

“I do believe you,” I said softly. “Honestly, I do, because I…I love you too.”

His shoulders relaxed a bit but tensed again once I continued speaking.

“But I also think there is still a big part of you that is figuring out just what that means. And I can’t risk Sofia and myself and maybe this baby getting hurt by it again. Xavi, I’m sorry. But I just can’t.”

“So, I’ve got to prove myself all over again. Is that what you’re saying?” he asked, unable to keep bitterness from lashing through his voice.

“I’m not saying anything.” My speech was weak. Almost as weak as my resolve. “I’m saying we have to stop.”

“Right back where we started, then.”

“No,” I said. “Where we started was with a future. But now we know what that future holds. We only hurt each other, and I won’t do it anymore. Xavi, I love you too, but it’s over .”

He stared at me for a long time, the muscle in his jaw ticking ferociously while he clenched and released dual fists over and over again. He looked like he wanted to tear the entire pier apart. Like he could actually do it if he had a mind to.

But to my surprise, he turned to walk back down the pier in the direction we’d come from, pulling his phone out of his pocket and sending a message as he strode on.

“Where are you going?” I called as I scampered behind him. “What are you doing now?”

“I’m trying not to yell,” he said, barely getting the words out through his teeth, though he had slowed so I might catch up. “Someone told me I was a bully a bit ago, that my temper gets in the way of things I care about.”

His eyes practically cut right through me with a quick shear of a glance.

Me. I was the one who told him that.

My jaw dropped, stopping me for a half-second before I caught back up to him. By the time we had exited the pier, his car had already pulled to the curb.

“I can take the train,” I said lamely, even as I allowed myself to be shepherded into the back seat.

“Don’t try me right now, Ces,” Xavier said as he got in beside me. “John, back to Francesca’s house, all right?”

The car took off down the West Side Highway, leaving Xavier and me to sit silently, if not sullenly, in the back together.

“Xavi,” I started, but he just held up a hand.

“I need a minute,” he said. “Just some quiet until we get there.”

I opened my mouth but decided to nod instead. This was…different. Certainly, not the hothead I typically had to deal with. Where it was coming from, I didn’t know. But if he needed space, I could afford him that. Perhaps take the ride to think myself.

“But, Ces?”

I turned back to find him studying me closely.

“This discussion is not closed,” he said.

Then he leaned in, so his stubbled jaw tickled my skin. His soft lips on my cheek sent a shiver down my neck and a flush over the rest of me while his deep voice rumbled in my ear.

“Love can’t burn this hot only to flame out in a single night. I don’t know much, but I do know that.”

“D-do you?” I asked. My voice was barely above a whisper.

Xavier took a deep breath, inhaling deeply just over my pulse. “Just like I know that I have loved you since the day I saw you in that bloody pub. I know that we are a family, whether you want to fight it or not. I know we belong together, no matter what anyone else says. And I know, without a shadow of a doubt, in the very depths of my soul, that we are far from over.”