“You didn’t want to do it, though, did you?”
No. She hadn’t.
You and I have the looks in this family, Marisa. Your father is the one with the talent. Don’t waste your time with that.
Her gaze slid away from him, tension gathering inside her. “It was fine. It’s not like I didn’t get anything out of it. I liked the dresses and the makeup and looking pretty. Winning was cool, too.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
Marisa bit her lip. She didn’t want to keep going down that path. Because wherever it was going to end up, she had a feeling she wouldn’t like it. “The past is the past, Luke. I made my choices and no, they weren’t good ones, but I can’t change them now.”
He was silent a moment. “So what about your dreams? Of being an artist?”
Relieved he wasn’t going to push, Marisa allowed herself a breath. “I’m getting there. I’m going to pay of all my Alistair debt with the help of your ingenious financial brain and then, one day, I’ll get myself a glass studio.”
A silence fell between them.
“What about you?” she asked finally. “What about your hopes and dreams? Your plans for the future?”
…
Luke shifted, leaning his elbows on his knees as Marisa’s beautiful face turned toward him. He’d almost gotten used to sitting here on the ground like this, but her question made him uncomfortable all over again.
“My plans generally involve my company. Growing McNamara Financial.” At least, that’s what he’d always thought whenever the issue of the future came up. Not that he let himself think too hard about the future when managing the day-to-day always took up so much of his time. Compared to her dreams, though, his sounded so…vague. And small.
“That’s it?”
He glanced at her. “What’s wrong with that?”
“Nothing but… You don’t have any particular dreams?
Luke glanced away, turning to watch a group of students playing a rowdy game of hacky-sack without a care in the world. Not like him. He’d never been one of those students. Unable to let go and enjoy himself the way they did. He hadn’t been able to. Sometimes it rankled. Hell, not sometimes. It had bothered him all the time. But then that’s what he’d been stuck with, wasn’t it? So he had to deal with it.
“Not particularly. I manage McNamara Financial, Marisa. That’s as much of a dream as I can afford right now.”
“Luke,” her voice was soft. “You have to have dreams. How else do you get through the day?”
He didn’t want to meet her eyes. The sympathy in her voice was hard enough to deal with as it was. Because he couldn’t tell her his secret, not after what she’d revealed about her ex and his lies.
What would she say if he confessed his own lie? That he’d deliberately concealed one of the most important things about himself?
She would be hurt, that seemed clear, and God knew, he’d already hurt her enough by being insensitive over the past few weeks. He didn’t want to hurt her again. He’d find another moment to tell her. Some other time.
He looked away. “How do I get through the day? One minute at a time.”
“No.” This time it was she who put her hand over his. And he felt the warmth of it deep inside him, touching a place he didn’t think was vulnerable. “There should be more than that.”
Of course there was more. Dreams of a wife, a child. Dreams of a family. Dreams of a normal life without the OCD. A life he couldn’t have, therefore never allowed himself to think about or admit to wanting.
But now you have her. Now you have the baby. That’s most of the dream already.
It was. Yet something was missing. He didn’t know what that thing was, only that it made him ache. An ache that only got more intense when she was near.
“There is no more.” He let out a breath and took his hand out from under hers on the pretense of looking at his watch. “It’s time for us to go.”
“Luke.”
“What?”
“Don’t you ever wish…” She hesitated, and the expression on her face made that ache spread out in his chest like a creeping frost. “Don’t you ever wish things were different?”
At last. A question he could give a truthful answer to. “Every day, Marisa. I wish things were different every single day.”
She turned abruptly away, but not before he saw the gleam of liquid in her eyes. “Yeah,” she murmured, her voice husky. “So do I.”
Tension filled the silence for one unbearable minute.
“Come on, then,” she said. “Let’s go.”