Total pages in book: 197
Estimated words: 199143 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 996(@200wpm)___ 797(@250wpm)___ 664(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 199143 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 996(@200wpm)___ 797(@250wpm)___ 664(@300wpm)
“That doesn’t sound like you at all.”
The nicest woman in the world.
Sweet as could be.
That was her mother-in-law.
Kim laughed under her breath. “Right? And especially not to Gio—he definitely knows how to get on my nerves quicker than anybody else, but he doesn’t purposely do it just to make me mad. In fact, he does everything to avoid that, really.”
“So, how did you both figure it out?”
“He brought me home my favorite dish from Lucian’s restaurant, trying to ... well, soften me up, I think. Put me in a better mood. One sniff of it, and it sent me running to the bathroom. I was mad again, not at him, but just in general. Mad at everything. And poor Gio,” Kim said, trailing off with a shake of her head, “well, he meant it well, but he told me maybe my period was coming because I was kind of feeling off.”
“Ouch.”
Kim nodded. “Yeah, that was my first reaction, too, and then I stopped to think about it. So you imagine the scene, me on my knees in the bathroom, and Gio in the doorway staring at me. His eyes started to get wider as I realized he was wrong, but only in the sense that my period would be coming ...”
“And that’s how you figured it out?”
“Pretty much,” Kim replied, “but of course, I sent him to the store to get me a pregnancy test. He came back with ten. We had decided before that to wait a while because I wanted to finish school, and everything else. Andino was not planned, but to be honest, he came at the perfect time for me and Gio.”
“Do you regret not having more?”
“Not for one second.”
Kim’s confident statement had Haven nodding her agreement. She didn’t need to repeat the question, because her mother-in-law put it to rest just like that.
“There were times,” Kim said quieter, “where I wondered if it was what Andino wanted, though. If maybe he was lonely without a little brother or sister to look after. I was not an only child, and neither was Gio, so we had those questions ... but we were never serious on having more after Andino.”
“You know, it really shows that he’s an only child.”
Kim grinned. “I know. He had everything ... all of our attention all the time. If there was something he wanted to obsess over for months, we fed into it every step of the way. There was nothing he couldn’t do, and Gio made it clear from the beginning that we would not be the type of parents who held Andino back.”
“I can see how that’s translated to his adulthood.”
To say the least ...
“No one tells him no, hmm?”
Well, people tried.
Andino didn’t accept it, however.
“You’ll know how you want to tell him, Haven,” Kim said, “and it doesn’t have to be a huge production, if that’s not what you want. It just has to be right for the two of you.”
Right.
Sure.
*
“How did that go with John?”
Andino milled between the bedroom, and his walk-in closet on the other side of their massive master bedroom. Really, this room, the double closets, and bathroom that was big enough to be a small apartment by New York standards, had been what sold the mansion for Andino. For Haven, she was just struck at the price, and the fact Andino chuckled when the realtor asked about a mortgage.
We won’t need a mortgage, he had said.
The realtor quickly stopped asking questions.
“Went fine,” Andino said, coming out of the bathroom with a furrowed brow. “Did you pick up the watch I left in the bathroom?”
“Yes, and put it away.”
“Oh.”
He headed straight into the walk-in closet, already tugging his tie loose. She could have pressed for more information on John, but frankly, she wasn’t interested in knowing what was going on that took Andino away to handle business. She had quickly learned since marrying this man that if she asked, he had zero problem with telling her the truth.
Somethings were better left unknown.
Simple as that.
Haven went back to her reflection in her makeup vanity mirror, wiping away the day’s makeup with a green, cucumber infused facial wipe. She was just patting a water-based night cream into her face when Andino came out of the closet in nothing but boxer-briefs. He eyed the bed like it was going to be his best friend for the next several hours, and that’s how she knew his day had been more stressful than he was willing to admit.
“Hey,” she murmured.
His attention instantly came to her.
That was the thing with them ...
It didn’t matter if he was tired. It didn’t make a difference to him that the only thing he really wanted in that moment was a long, deep sleep. As soon as Haven spoke, he forget everything he needed, and his focus turned onto whatever she wanted.