Kaleidoscope Hearts (36 page)

He rubs his temple. “I was so mad at him. At first, because he went behind my back, and then the more I thought about it, the angrier I became. He’s a serial dater, you know? If you can even call it that. He likes women. He likes older women. I think in all these years, he’s only dated one girl our age, and that was in middle school, so when I found out about you I was just . . . at a loss, I guess.”

“I know. I get it. You see Bean, the player . . . the guy who has a different girl every month . . . so I get it. I grew up with him too, but I truly believe he loves me. Despite the fact that I’m younger than his usual,” I add with a laugh.

There’s a slight smile on his face as he shakes his head. “I think he loves you too.”

“But it doesn’t matter,” I add. “His profession comes first, and honestly, I don’t blame him. I get that, too.”

He closes his eyes for a moment and takes a deep breath. “He’s always been the planner . . . the perfectionist . . . the one who needs to have all his ducks in a row before he attacks. I don’t know anybody else who sets up a spreadsheet for a fantasy football draft.” He raises his eyebrows. “And I know a lot of nerdy guys.”

His secretary buzzing in the next client interrupts our laughter, so I stand. Victor goes around his desk and wraps his arms around me.

“I love you, and I’m with you, okay? If you want to be with him, I’m okay with it. I’m sorry I freaked out like that, because you’re right—if it weren’t for Bean, none of us would be where we are today. I wish you weren’t moving though.”

I kiss his chest and rear back to look at his face. “You just want me to stick around so I can cook for you.”

He laughs against my face. “Yeah, that’s part of it, but I like having you around.”

“I’m not moving far, Vic.”

“I know, I know. So this weekend?” he asks.

“This weekend,” I respond with a smile as I back away. “And for the record, I am really pissed off that it happened the day you admitted to hooking up with your friend’s little sister.”

Victor lets out a loud laugh. “Bean said the same thing.”

“I’m sure he did,” I reply, shaking my head as I leave. I bump into an older man in a suit and excuse myself.

“Did hell freeze over, or did I just hear you laughing?” the man says as I walk.

Vic’s secretary thanks me for putting him in a good mood, and I make a mental note to send these people a box of donuts or something for putting up with my jerk of a brother every day. Then I smile, because I know how lucky I am to have him.

I DON’T GO on the lunch date my mother sends me on because I want to. I go because she proposes it as a business opportunity. Really, it’s more of a delivery than a date, but Derek said we may as well eat while we’re there, so I accept. When I get to the place, I feel terribly underdressed, even if it is a Friday afternoon, and we are eating in a restaurant inside the mall. Everybody else seems to be wearing nicer clothes, and I’m in ripped jeans, boots, and an off-the-shoulder sweater. I set down the box with the heart his mother bought from me, take a seat, and look at the menu, while keeping an eye out for Derek. When my phone buzzes in my purse, I start flipping through the million items I have in it while my guest finally arrives and sits across from me.

“For a moment I didn’t think you were coming,” I say, without looking up.

“For a moment I didn’t think you would bite,” a voice says, and my heart just stops. I look up to find Oliver sitting in the chair reserved for Derek, and for a multitude of reasons, I’m confused by his presence. I don’t gasp because he’s there, though, I gasp because his mouth is still swollen, and he has a couple of stitches on his jaw. His green eyes scan my face, and his lips slightly part with the longing I see on his face.

“What are you doing here?”

“Picking up a heart,” he says, folding his hands on the table. I let out a sarcastic laugh. “I’m serious,” he adds.

“Okay. Well, it’s in the box,” I say, nodding toward it.

He leans down and lifts the box beside my feet, bringing it up to the table. When the waiter finally comes back, we both ask for more time and send him on his way. Oliver opens the lid and looks inside it, taking out the heart and the tag it comes with before he puts the box back under the table. I watch as he looks at the heart, turning it over and over, the light from outside bouncing off it with each twist of his hand.

“I took that job because I was thinking like my old self—like Oliver, the guy who tries to set up everything in his life because he needs it to be perfect,” he says, his eyes shifting from the heart to meet mine. “I’m sorry that I didn’t think to ask what you thought about all of it.”

“I wasn’t angry because you took the job, I was angry because you didn’t tell me that you did.”

He opens his mouth to say something, but closes it quickly before turning his gaze back to the heart in his hands.

“Is this your definition of love?” he asks, reading the little tag.

I swallow and nod.

“Love is beautiful, shattering, moving, haunting. Love is everything,” he reads. His eyes flicker to mine. “Who defines love?”

“People who have it. People who had it and lost it.”

“Which are you?”

“Both.” I pause and look around. “Is Derek really not coming?”

He picks up the heart and puts it back in the box, sliding the tag in and closing it. He looks at me again, folding his hands on the table, and smiles slowly. “He’s really not.”

“But I spoke to him.”

“And he lied, like he was asked to.”

I shake my head. “The people in my life know no bounds.”

“Go out with me tonight.”

My gaze cuts to his. “Why would I do that?”

“Because I’m asking you to,” he says quietly, reaching for my hands, which I quickly hide under the table. If he touches me, I’ll agree. I’ll probably agree anyway, but if he touches me, I’ll agree too soon.

The waiter comes by and asks us if we’d like to order something, and we both look at each other like,
are we staying? Are we leaving? Can you really eat in a time like this?”
We each ask for water to buy time.

“So I go out with you and then . . . ?”

He sighs. “Give me one date, Elle.”

I mimic his sigh and look away. “I feel like we’ve been here before.”

Oliver gets up suddenly and comes around the table, moving his chair with him until he’s sitting next to me. He turns my chair so that our knees our touching, and when he takes both of my hands in his, my heart starts to sledgehammer inside my chest.

“What are you doing?” I whisper loudly, looking around at the occupied tables with curious patrons who are now interested in this beautiful, crazy man playing musical chairs inside the quiet restaurant.

One side of his lip turns up, and for a split second, I get lost in the little dimple I see, finally not hidden by facial hair. “Relax. I’m not asking you to marry me . . . yet,” he says. All of my thoughts go haywire for a second . . .
Yet?

“What are you doing then?”

Oliver leans into me, his face inching closer to mine, and I hold my breath. My eyes flutter closed as his breath whispers over my face, slowly moving over my cheeks, my nose . . . my mouth. His air is everywhere. His lips touch the tip of my nose, my cheek, then the corners of my mouth, and when I no longer feel his breath on me, I open my eyes and seek him out.

“I know you’ve been patient enough with me in the past, and I’m asking you to be patient with me one more time.” I don’t move away when his hands close over mine.

“I can’t keep doing this, Oliver. I can deal with being second place to your job sometimes, because I know how demanding it is and how much worse it will probably get, but I can’t be continually thrown for a loop every time you decide to do something to better your career,” I say, searching his face for a sign of understanding.

He opens his mouth, then closes it, pausing for a moment as he lets his eyes wash over every single one of my features as if he’d forgotten them in the weeks we’ve been apart. “Taking the job was a knee-jerk reaction. I was thinking like the single, ambitious Oliver, and I screwed up. I do that a lot. I didn’t tell you about it, because when I saw you at that barbeque, I knew I wouldn’t go through with the job. I don’t want to move four hours away from you.” He pauses to search my face.

“You will never come in second place in any aspect of my life, Estelle. Yes, sometimes things will be difficult. Yes, some days I may have more work than others, but you will never come in second. I promise you that. What we have is so special. It’s so real. I don’t want to lose this ever again.” His fingers thread through mine as he speaks. “This is what people spend their lives dreaming about. I’m asking you to go out with me tonight,” he says, bringing my hands to his mouth and setting them there. “I’m
begging
you to go out with me tonight.”

He has a look I’ve seen on his face a million times before, when he’s changing a flat tire or when he’s reading a patient’s chart at the hospital. I realize it’s his determined look. His
I’m not going to stop until you say yes to me
look. And then he smiles, this sweet, charming, boy next door,
let’s pretend I’m not a wolf in sheep’s clothing
kind of smile, and I know I’m not going to turn him down.

“This is the last time I’m agreeing to this,” I say after a long pause.

“This is the last time I’m asking,” he replies, winking as he stands and brings me up with him. We gather our things and leave after I give him the address of my new place. Later, when I’m home, I wonder if part of his grand plan is to ask me to move to San Francisco with him. I honestly don’t know if I would do it, but I also don’t know how I wouldn’t. I feel like I’ve waited for this for . . . ever.

I shower and dress casually, as he asked me to. I wear jeans and boots and throw a scarf over my simple t-shirt. After I close the windows around the house, I sit outside on the porch to enjoy the view while I wait. The cottage is small, and the front door is really the back door, since the porch faces the beach, and where you park your car faces PCH. I’m not surprised when I hear the sound of his footsteps on the pavement on the side of the house, though. Oliver has never been one to use the front door.

He appears at the foot of the porch steps, but he hasn’t spotted me, and if he has, he gives nothing away. I see his eyes close as he faces the water, and I smile. His hands are tucked into the pockets of his jeans, his face is tilted back slightly, and the look on it is the embodiment of relaxation. He runs a hand through his light brown hair when a gust of wind flitters through it. After a moment of standing like that, he straightens and turns to face me, his green eyes flashing in surprise when he sees me sitting there.

“I got a little distracted,” he says with a chuckle.

“It’s hard not to,” I respond, standing up. Victor helped me bring the most important things over here, because once I got the keys, I didn’t want to wait until the weekend to move.

Oliver takes the two steps it takes to get to me and sighs when he looks down at me. “Ready?”

“You look like you’re regretting the date,” I say with a laugh.

He looks over his shoulder, and my eyes follow. The waves are slowly tumbling into the sand, dying down as the sun begins to dwindle. His gaze finds mine again, and he smiles.

“If I would have seen this place before, I would have moved the date here.”

I smile and take his hand, stopping when he starts to lead me down the steps. “Car’s that way,” I say, laughing when he gives the beach a final, forlorn look. “We can come back,” I whisper loudly, as if it were some kind of big secret.

His face is serious when he turns to face me again, walking me back a step until my back hits the closed door. Suddenly, as if he’s warring with himself, he rears back with a breath.

“Let’s go. Lead the way.”

I’m a little stunned. A part of me wishes he’d just kissed me and gotten it over with. Another part is glad he hasn’t, but that part is so tiny I can barely hear it. Turning, I open the door, lock it behind us, and walk through the cottage slowly so that he can look around as we pass through.

“You like it?” I ask.

“I think love is a better word,” he says, eyes on me. My stomach dips a little, and I smile.

We drive a very familiar route, and he ignores the questioning glances I shoot his way, but the ghost of the smile on his face lets me know he feels them. Although I want to ask, I am quiet, waiting for him to speak first. He doesn’t though; he stays silent until we get to a house on the hills. The car stops in front of a gate, and he clicks a button that opens it gracefully. He drives in slowly and parks the car in the circular driveway.

“I have to drop something off for Sander,” he says. “We’ll only be a minute.”

“Okay.” I’m not sure whether to get out of the car. I haven’t seen his sister in years. The last time I saw her, she was carrying baby Sander in a sling over her stomach, and from what Oliver has told me, he’s almost four now.

He pushes the button to switch off the ignition and shoots me a smile. “One minute.”

I smile and get out of the car, walking toward the trunk when he does.