Page 37 of Love or Leave (Mapleton #4)

thirty-two

A ntonio arrived at the observatory, parked, and hopped out of his car. He zipped up his coat as he walked toward the front doors.

It was a cold, clear night, and the sky was brilliantly dotted with countless twinkling stars. He pulled open the door to the round room and spotted Cara immediately.

She was standing in the middle of the room beside a gigantic telescope. In front of her were rows of folding chairs, filled with people waiting for her lecture to start.

She looked beautiful, rosy. He hoped she wouldn't tell him to fuck off and go away. It was a risk, showing up, given her reaction to him at their poker game.

He knew the exact moment she saw him—she paused mid-sentence with the older woman in the front row, locked eyes with him for a split second, then let the pleasant expression slip from her face and rolled her big brown eyes at him.

He fought off the wave of sadness that came with knowing the woman he loved now hated him. All he could do was hope he could find a way to get them back to where they once were, and the only way to do that was to remind her how good they were together and hope she'd give him another chance.

He stood back at the edge of the crowd and waited, unsure what to expect. Would she march over and tell him to get lost? Call the police?

Nope.

She tossed her hair away from him and continued her conversation, ignoring him entirely.

He fucking hated the silent treatment.

He sat down in the third row and waited. The minutes ticked by slowly before she finally turned and addressed the crowd.

"We're ready to begin," she said. "Tonight, we're going to talk about the event horizon of black holes and look at the closest one to Earth, Gaia BH1."

Before she could say anything else, the older woman in the front row shot her hand up in the air. She didn't wait to be called on to speak.

"You forgot to introduce our new members," she said. "We always begin by introducing our new members."

Antonio unleashed a wide smile and suppressed a laugh.

There was no way she forgot. She just didn't want to address him.

"We have a lot to get to tonight, so I—"

"It'll only take a moment," the woman said. She stood and faced the crowd, putting Cara behind her.

"I'm Margaret, leader of the Niagara Chapter. We have three new members to welcome tonight. Please give a warm welcome to Maury, Kathleen, and Antonio!"

Antonio smiled and waved as his fellow members turned to him to say hi.

Becoming a full-fledged member of the Royal Astrological Society was probably a step too far, but now that he was there, he really wanted to check out that black hole.

And if Cara refused to give him another chance, at least he had some potential new friends.

Maury was probably cool.

"This is Cara," Margaret continued, gesturing toward the love of his life. "She's a PhD student of astrological physics at the university. She and Dr. Tanaka alternate leading our sessions."

Cara sighed out an obviously annoyed breath but seemed to shake it off. She waited for Margaret to sit, then carried on.

"Okay, black holes," Cara said, getting back on track.

"The event horizon of a black hole is the boundary where the gravitational pull is so strong that objects would have to exceed the speed of light to avoid getting sucked in. It's basically a point of no return."

She turned to a giant paper flip chart on a wooden easel and pulled out a thick marker. As she drew, she spoke about the physics equations that break down past the event horizon, and how it has evaded physicists so far because of how difficult it is to study something you can't see.

Maury raised his hand and asked what would happen if a person were to fall in.

She explained they would die immediately because of a process called “spaghettification,” then drew a diagram of a stick figure being pulled apart cell by cell in a long string.

It was gruesome and intriguing.

At the end of her talk she took questions, answered them, and then had everyone come to the front to look through the telescope.

Antonio stood at the back so he could be the last in line and waited. Cara took her time with each person, making sure they knew what they were looking at and answered their questions. She kept a polite smile on her face until the very last person in front of him left, then her smile dropped.

"Why are you here?"

Yeesh… Not a great start.

"I wanted to see you," Antonio said, then turned toward the gigantic telescope and peered in. "I also have a new fascination with black holes."

Cara huffed an annoyed breath. "Unwanted and repeated contact is an offense. Criminal harassment. Do I have to file a police report, or should I just call Max?"

He stopped and turned to her. "Cara," he said, and felt some hope when her angry face faded slightly. "I'm sorry about how things went."

Cara stared for a moment before the rest of her angry look melted away. She looked around the room, then back at him.

"Me too," she said. "Maybe we could just give this some time to settle and then we can go back to being friends."

"Friends?"

His heart split and he immediately shook his head.

Cara sucked in a breath and looked down at her toes. "Let's not make it awkward for our friend group. We have Adam and Chelsea's wedding coming up, and Willow was talking about having a friends Christmas party at the brewery. Let's just move on."

He looked at her for a long moment and wondered if he should take her lead and back off, but when he opened his mouth, he couldn't bring himself to agree.

"I can't be just friends with you, Cara. I love you."

She softly shook her head. "No, you don't."

"Yes, I do," he said, lifting a hand to the back of his neck. "You're like my black hole. I've moved past the event horizon.” He dropped his hands by his sides. “I'm spaghetti."

There was a long pause before she spoke.

"I'm not in your black hole, though," she said. "I escaped just in the nick of time."

Antonio forced his head to stay up, instead of letting it fall in disappointment. This wasn't over. Not by a long shot.

"I signed the divorce papers. Everything with Fran is completely over. We can start fresh, take it slow and—"

She shook her head, cutting him off. "It's too late."

She turned and walked away, heading for the group before he could say another word.

He'd lost the battle, but the war was still raging. She didn't feel like she could trust him, so he'd have to make her understand he was in it with her for the long haul. But how was he going to do that without becoming a stalker?

Back to the drawing board.