Page 54 of Ambrosia Kisses
"Her mouth, you idiot." I shake my head. How are we even related? "Her kisses taste like ambrosia."
"You…" He chuckles. "You know what? I'm not even going to argue with you. Do whatever you want with the wine, man. Just, for the love of God, donottry to craft one that tastes like any other part of her body. Bastian will murder us all if you try that."
I flip him off before turning to resume my pacing. How long can an interview possibly take? It's been almost two hours already. I think I'm more nervous than she was when she left this morning.
It's like she's just…content with whatever happens. Whether she gets the job or not doesn't matter much to her right now.
"Do you think dreams change?" I ask Oliver.
"What?"
"Can a person's dreams change?"
"Yeah. Of course they do."
"Overnight?"
"Mine did."
I arch a brow at him, silently asking for an explanation.
"You think I had this whole future mapped out before I met Lucy?" he asks me, and then immediately shakes his head. "Hell no. That vision took shape the moment I met her. Before her, all I wanted was to help out around here, make something of what Dad was leaving us. I wasn't thinking about a wife and kids. The dream changed when I met her."
"Makes sense, I guess," I mutter.
"Your dreams didn't change when you met Paisley?"
"They did," I say softly. "The whole fucking world reordered itself around her. I just…" I mutter a curse. "I'm just worried aboutherdreams."
"Why?"
"Because they're changing."
"They're supposed to change, brother," Oliver says, his voice a soft rumble. "You think she worked so fucking hard to get through law school because she wants to be some badass lawyer? Hell no. She poured herself into it because it's what she had left. You were gone. She lost her brother. Law school kept her putting one foot in front of the other. It gave her something to channel her pain into, something that didn't hurt. She needed the structure and discipline and plan, otherwise, I don't think she would have gotten up in the mornings."
"You never told me that she lost him."
"I wanted to," he admits after a moment. "I considered it a thousand times when shit was really bad, but…"
"You didn't think I'd care."
"No, I didn't think you'd survive if I told you. She wasn't the only one just trying to make it through the day, man. You were, too. I didn't know why you left, but I knew it broke you, too. You tried to hide it, but everyone could see it. You didn't even want to come home, and when you did, it's like you couldn't wait to leaveagain. You never smiled. You never laughed. You just…existed. I didn't want to lay that at your feet when I knew how you'd take it."
"It fucking killed me," I rasp. "When she told me, I mean."
"Yeah, I figured it would." He sighs. "But honestly, man? Even if you had been here, losing him would have broken her just the same. Pierce was her hero. Nothing you said or did would have made it hurt any less. Shit like that isn't supposed to hurt less."
"Yeah." I swallow hard. "I still wish I'd been here."
"I know, but you were just trying to survive, too." He sighs again. "I wish we'd known the whole story. Maybe we could have brought you two back together a long goddamn time ago had we known."
"It's not your fault." I turn to glance at him over my shoulder. "And it doesn't matter now. We can't undo the past, so we're not dwelling on it anymore. We're moving forward."
It'll always sting a little bit. I'll probably always feel guilty as hell. But maybe that's what I need to feel. It's a reminder of what I stand to lose if I ever fuck up with her. It's a glimpse of what the future looks like without her. I lived it once. I know how much that shit burns. And I know damn well that I'll do whatever it takes to never end up back there again, living in the dark because her sunshine is missing from my life.
"You want to know what I've learned from loving Lucy?" he asks after a moment.
"What's that?"
