Maybe it would remind her that despite their ups and downs, the two of them were so good together. Their relationship may have been on and off over the years, but they always seemed to come back to each other. Wasn’t that all that counted? That in the end, they couldn’t stand to be apart?
Wasn’t that what mattered?
“I’m not hungry, Aidan,” she said. Her red curls hung loose around her slight shoulders. Her ivory skin looked a shade paler than usual. For a moment he thought it might be because of the stark black sweater she was wearing, but her beautiful sea green eyes lacked their usual sparkle. That had nothing to do with the contrast of ivory and black.
“Actually, if you don’t mind,” she said, “I’d prefer to not go anywhere tonight.”
When he arrived, he had been starving, but his appetite suddenly went south. “Are you still feeling bad?” he asked as he followed her into the living room of her bungalow.
Unsmiling, she turned to him and crossed her arms over the front of herself. “It is not that,” she said. “There’s no easy way to say this. So I’m not going to make small talk. I’m just going to cut to the chase and come out and say it. I’ve thought about our situation all day today—in fact, I couldn’t think of much else, and the only solution I keep coming back to is that we need to have the marriage annulled.”
His heart dropped into the vicinity of his ankles, but he managed to keep his stoic poker face firmly in place.
“Can we talk about this, Kate?” he asked. “I know you think you’ve made up your mind, but, I mean, don’t I at least get a say in this? It is my future, too.”
“Of course, you do, Aidan, but I don’t think there’s much more to talk about. Is there? The last time you and I talked about marriage, we both agreed it wasn’t for us.”
Her words packed a punch that hit him hard in the gut. That wasn’t exactly an accurate version of the story. She’d talked about how marriage wasn’t right for her. She had told him the thought of a lifelong commitment to one person scared her to death. He’d listened, but he hadn’t agreed. Because even though his first marriage had been a mistake, he wasn’t about to let that misstep rob him of finding his soul mate and spending the rest of his life with her.
Despite everything, now, more than ever, he believed Kate was his soul mate.
“No, the last time we talked about marriage, we ended up married,” he said. “Even if you don’t remember it, you’re the one who proposed to me.”
“You said to me that after you watched your grandmother marry Charles, the love of her life, you had decided that we just needed to rip off the bandage and go for it. We needed to stop overthinking and just do it because you told me I was the love of your life and you didn’t want to wait until you were eighty-five, like Charles and Gigi, before we could have a life together.”
It was true. She’d said it.
“Here’s another thing that I’m not sure if you remember, but when you first proposed your crazy plan, I said no. I wasn’t up for it. Not at first. When I objected, you basically hit me with an ultimatum. You told me it was now or never. You don’t remember that, either, do you?”
She dropped down on the sofa and buried her face in her hands, shaking her head. “I don’t remember it. I don’t remember any of it, Aidan.”
He sat in the chair across from her. They sat there without saying a single word for what seemed an eternity.
Finally she asked, “What are you thinking?”
Aidan shrugged. “I don’t know. Would it even matter if I told you my thoughts, Kate? It seems like you’ve made up your mind for both of us. It doesn’t appear as if you’re going to give me a say.”
“Of course, you get a say. I want to hear what you have to say.” Then her face crumpled, and the tears fell and the hardline resolve Aidan had mustered quietly disintegrated. He closed the distance between them and pulled her into his arms. This time the stiff resolve was gone and she melted into him and sobbed.
“Hey, come on,” he whispered. “I certainly don’t want you to stay in a situation that makes you this miserable.”
She looked up at him. Tears glistened in her eyes, making them look like sea glass. “Then you agree?”
No. He didn’t agree, but he knew he needed to choose his words carefully.
“Aidan, don’t you agree that this is no way to start a marriage?”
“I’m not sure I understand what you’re saying, Kate. Is it the fact that you’re married to me that has you so freaked out? Or is it the way it happened? A spur-of-the-moment Vegas wedding?”
She pulled away from him and stared at a spot somewhere in the distance. He let her have her space.
“Because you’re the one who wanted to get married Saturday night,” he said. “I don’t know if you were just caught up in the moment or maybe you had too much to drink, but getting married in Vegas was your brainchild.”
He knew he should have stopped and left it at that but holding his tongue when he should have spoken out was partially what had landed them in this predicament. Then she blinked and looked him in the eyes for the first time since he had arrived.
“I wasn’t drunk,” she said. “I had a couple of sips of one drink. That Love Potion Number Nine. You know me. I’m not a big drinker, but I’ve never blacked out. Aidan, it scares me that I can’t remember much of what happened that night. I remember dancing with you at Gigi and Charles’s reception. I vaguely remember us looking at rings, and that’s all. I know