Page 20

By some miracle, things turned around pretty much immediately. No grudge, no glares, just a couple smooth, practically perfect weeks of wedded bliss. On top of Olivia’s good moods, I was still able to dodge my brothers successfully, and no one knew we were in Mexico.

Max thought I was in Geneva checking out a new business opportunity, and I had another fake location lined up for when I could no longer pull that off. So far no one was demanding I return, which meant everything was going well at home, or at least no wars had broken out between my family and the Kuzmins.

I would have been riding high if only I could have gotten a definitive answer from Benedikt about his state of things with our rivals. He finally started answering his phone again after almost a week of utter silence, but every time I spoke with him, he was babbling and incoherent. He flew into a rage and hung up whenever I questioned him about the debt, hollering that we were family now, and I should trust him.

I sure as hell didn’t, but I couldn’t get answers out of him over the phone. Bringing him to me wasn’t an option because I didn’t want the sack of shit anywhere near Olivia. Sending someone to “talk” to him on my behalf seemed overkill, especially since there was no sign of trouble from Aleks or my other brothers.

I wasn’t in any hurry to go back to San Diego, even if things were safe, so I let it go for the moment and had been enjoying time with my bride. Olivia was a whirlwind around the place, chatting almost nonstop with the contracted workers as she did her best to help out. Seeing her happy was nice, but I refused to have her think of herself as an employee, and offered up other forms of distraction instead.

We’d been going on almost daily hikes, beating back new paths that didn’t stray too far from the house or get too close to those cliffs we’d already encountered. Hanging out in the garden in the evenings and admiring how everything was shaping up around the pool was another of our favorite pastimes, accompanied by wine and music wafting out from the new stereo system I had just installed. We went into town two or three times a week for shopping or dinner dates, and it really started to feel like we were married.

I settled into a lounge chair with my laptop, taking stock of my new life as I kept Olivia in my peripheral vision. She was sitting cross-legged in front of a newly dug flower bed, carefully placing seedlings in precision rows.

I was surrounded by the picture of domesticity, which was completely different from what I was used to. Why the hell wasn’t I bored yet?

On the contrary, I was the opposite of bored. I would have spent every minute with Olivia if it weren’t for the fact that I was suddenly busier than ever. Someone in town must have tipped off a small-time organization that I was being free with money and didn’t seem to be leaving the area any time soon, and their leader had contacted me.

At first, it was an annoyance, but the group didn’t seem threatening, and were eager to go into business with me. They had been working to buy up some real estate just on the other side of the village, a rich swathe of acreage that was just begging for that resort I used to think about developing. The owners were eager to sell and the local guys swore we could easily get all the necessary permits with my influence and money. After checking it all out, it seemed like the perfect opportunity to branch out on my own, and if it meant Olivia and I could stay down here more permanently, I was all for it.

The only fly in the ointment was that it was taking up a lot of the time I’d been spending with Olivia, and as I waved goodbye and rushed off to my next meeting, there was a storm brewing in her eyes.

When I returned much later in the evening, she was definitely in a bad mood, even though she tried to hide it. It was the huff when she sat down for our late dinner that did it.

“What’s wrong?” I asked. We’d been getting along great, and dinners at home were fast becoming my favorite thing, even if my younger brothers would have laughed their asses off to learn it. “Don’t tell me nothing, either. I can see something’s bothering you.”

She set her fork down and took a long moment, as if deciding whether or not to complain. I fixed her with a look, and she sighed. “Fine. It’s because you’ve been paying the gardening crew overtime, and they're almost finished with the project. I barely have anything to do except for some weeding and trimming here and there. When you’re not home, I can’t go hiking because all of your stupid guards are afraid of snakes, and Senora Cruz has no patience for my beginner Spanish.”

I fought a smile at her rush of complaints, meaning to have a word with my so-called fierce warriors about the snakes. There wasn’t much I could do about our crotchety housekeeper, a relative of the old caretakers who were visiting their kids further south. She was the only one who wanted to come out this far, no matter how much I offered to pay.

“So, you’re bored,” I guessed, thinking wryly how I’d just been wondering how I could be so enamored with our new life. And she was withering away.

“I’m just used to being busy,” she said. “Why don’t you let me be your assistant? You know I’d be great at it, and now that you have so much new stuff going on, you can probably use the help.”

She was right about both things. She did an amazing job for Max, and I was up to my eyeballs in administrative crap I would have loved to hand over to someone else. But that wasn’t what I wanted from Olivia.

“You’re not my employee,” I said, more gruffly than I meant to.

The very idea that she might feel beholden to me for getting her away from her father, so that she thought she had to work for me, pissed me off. And then I felt like she punched me in the gut when her shoulders slumped and she looked to the ground.

Where was my fiery bride, fighting like a wildcat for what she wanted? It didn’t mean I’d give it to her, and that made me feel just as low as she looked.

“Hey, if you want something to do, why don’t you explore the town more often?”

“So, you’re not going to be busy tomorrow or the next day or the next?” she asked, looking me in the eye with a flash of annoyance that filled me with relief. My girl was still there.

I groaned, remembering the meetings I had set up to get the sale of the property fast-tracked and all the necessary permits lined up.

“Since neither one of us has seen a free-roaming snake in town, I think one of the guys can handle going in with you. We can meet for lunch, or dinner if my meetings go late.”

A delighted smile broke over her face, her eyes shining as she tossed herself at me and threw her arms around my neck.

“Oh my God, that sounds great,” she breathed against my neck.

I wrapped my arms around her, happy she no longer looked so defeated, but having a strange feeling about how easy it had been to change the course of her mood. Just a little bit too good to be true, but the feel of her warm body squirming against me put any worries out of my mind in a hurry.