Page 119 of No One Was Supposed to Die at This Wedding

But no, not this time.

“I’m sure being with you is what I want,” I say.

“Then why have you been flirting with Connor?”

Excellent question.

How come, Eleanor?

Don’t we hate Connor?

“I haven’t.”

“Eleanor.”

“Okay, I get it. We banter. It’s a thing we do. It’s an extension of the pattern we’ve developed on tour. You know how it is.Getting asked the same questions by a million people—it’s a defense mechanism. It doesn’t mean anything more than that. And it certainly doesn’t mean I want to be with him because I don’t. I swear to you. It’s the last thing on my mind.”

“It hurts to see you like that with him.”

“And you have trouble trusting me.”

He nods slowly. “And I have trouble trusting you.”

“I know I haven’t given you any reason to. Not historically. But everything that happened with him was when I was scared. I’m not scared now. I know what I want and it’s you.”

I reach up on my toes and kiss him for all I’ve got. Not with passion but with ferocity, holding the side of his face, willing my lips to convince him of what my words can’t.

I pull back and stare into his eyes.

Which is difficult for me. I’m working on my emotional intimacy issues.

But you try it. Tryreallylooking someone in the eyes for more than a moment.

It’shard.

“You’re very seductive when you want to be,” Oliver says, staring right back becausehedoesn’t have intimacy issues.

“That’s a good thing, right?”

He smiles. “That’s a good thing.”

“But?”

“But I don’t know if I can watch you with him. It hurts too much.”

My heart squeezes. A physical pain that might take me to the ER if we weren’t trapped on this island, and I hadn’t been here before. “We just have to get through today and tomorrow and then that’s it.”

“It’s not it, though. He’s in your life. He’s always going to be.”

“You knew that when we got back together in Italy.”

“You said you were ending the series.”

Ihadsaid that. When I was desperate to get him back and it was the only way I saw forward.

Not that I hadn’t plotted Connor’s death. Many times.

But it was only a fantasy, me taking him out of the picture. It wasn’t going to happen in real life.

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