SHE WAS DOING well in her online classes, so there was that. Liliana imagined that she should feel triumphant that she had managed to move forward with her plans, even with her heart nothing more than ground-up shards of glass in her chest. But it was difficult to feel pride around all the pain inside her.
She was becoming her own woman, and she was finding that it was not the easiest thing. It was going to take some doing before she was able to pay for her own lodging. Well, it would take less doing if she moved out of the city. London was obviously going to be im
possible for a pregnant student earning freelance money. At least, it would be impossible for her to get herself into any neighborhood that didn’t make her feel she was in danger at all times.
She supposed she could get roommates. And that was definitely a route she was considering taking.
But for now, she was just still hiding away in one of her father’s properties.
He had no idea she was there. He owned far too many places to notice that one, pale blonde was holed up in any of them.
She wondered if Diego had been in touch with him. If he had threatened him.
Diego must be furious. It had all occurred to her later that of course she had destroyed his chance at getting his family inheritance.
She almost felt guilty.
But...
She couldn’t worry about him, and she couldn’t live for him.
Oh, her heart still beat for him, but her actions needed to be for more.
She needed to be more.
If there was one thing she had done a lot of over the past few days, it was think about the future. Her future as a mother. She didn’t know what a mother was supposed to do, not beyond what she had seen in TV, movies and read in books. She’d never had a mother. And her father had been such a difficult parental figure.
She had made quite a few decisions about what she wanted to be.
She was not going to expect her child to live for her. She couldn’t put that on another person. She knew what it was like. To have someone care for you only as long as you were a vehicle for their goals.
But she had to be strong for her child, otherwise they would inevitably feel a sense of obligation. That meant she had to find her happiness in more than just motherhood, though she knew she would find so much joy in it. It wasn’t for herself. It was for that child. Because if she didn’t make a concerted effort, with just her and the baby she would put far too much on that little one’s shoulders.
She didn’t want to do that.
Didn’t want to hurt people in the ways that she had been hurt.
And while she had been musing on that she realized that the way she had loved Diego had actually done that very same thing to him.
If he didn’t react in the right ways, if he didn’t look happy when she wanted him to be happy, she was putting her expectation of fulfillment on him. Which, for all he had done, he had never done that to her. It was she who had done that herself. Diego was not like her father. But while hers manifested themselves in a much more altruistic way, she did have some similar tendencies.
She wanted Diego to be happy with her love because she wanted to feel good about herself. And that made it a somewhat selfish love.
Her father had said to her so many times that she was all he had, and there had been any number of addendums to that. She was all he had, and so she had to stay with him. So she had to be a good daughter. So she had to help him, because he needed her.
Diego had to be happy because she loved him. Diego had to love her so that she would feel good.
Yes, it might be different, it might come from a less manipulative place, but it was the same.
She was trying to figure out how she could want those things for him without imposing herself on him. And the only thing she could think was by being away like this. He would want to see his child, that much she knew. They would have to contend with each other eventually. But perhaps... Being forced to contend with each other as people, as parents, would be better.
She wanted less self-realization and more bread. Bread was all she wanted to eat. The craving was as real as it was intense. And her body didn’t mind overmuch what kind of bread it was. Buttered and toasted brioche in the morning, a baguette and some cheese in the afternoon, a pastry in lieu of dinner. Just carbohydrates and fats.
She couldn’t have love, so perhaps she could have butter, and that seemed about the best substitute she could manage.
With no small amount of guilt, she was using her father’s means to procure food as well. Living at his address meant she was able to charge whatever she liked as long as it was delivered to the penthouse. She was awaiting her afternoon baguette, coupled with the evening’s cinnamon roll. She was suddenly starving, and she had a feeling she would be eating everything all at once.
When the buzzer sounded, she immediately granted access and sat down on the couch, waiting. She felt like she was in the strangest emotional space she’d ever been in. Ready to be more independent on the one hand. And yet, nearly useless on the other. Lying around and allowing food to be delivered to her while she lounged on a couch.
Maybe it was hormonal. Maybe it was heartbreak. Maybe it was a unique combination of the two.
She would muscle past it eventually. She just didn’t want to yet.
She didn’t have the heart to yet.
The door opened. “Just set it on the table,” she said.
“So very imperious,” came a dark voice from behind her. “I assume you mean the bread.”
She jerked upright into a seated position. “Why do you have my bread?”
“The deliveryman downstairs was more than happy to allow me to bring it up to my wife.”
“Well, that doesn’t seem very professional. He has no way of verifying that you’re my husband.”
“Don’t you have other questions? Like how I found you and why I’m here?”
“I’m hungry,” she said, her heart beating rapidly, her hands beginning to shake. “My concerns are centered around my lunch.”
“Then have your lunch, tesoro,” he said, handing her the paper bag that contained the baguette. But in truth, she was no longer hungry at all.
She clutched the bag to her chest, using it as some sort of defense. Against what, she didn’t know. Maybe just the sheer force of him. Of all that he was.
He was still the most beautiful man she had ever seen. He called to her. Made her ache. Made her need.
All the grand plans for independence she had made felt diminished.
No. They weren’t diminished. That was the wrong way to think of it. She could stand on her own. She has been doing it for the past few days. She was confident she could do it for as long as she needed to. But she wanted to lean into his strength. There was the life she could endure, and there was the one that she wished for. What she knew about herself now was that she could make hard choices. She could do what needed to be done. But she would rather... Oh, how she would rather have a life with him.
“I have brought you something,” he said.
She crinkled the bread bag. “I know. I’m holding it.”
“There is something other than bread in the bag, Liliana.”
She rustled into the brown paper, and found a folder containing a stack of documents.
“What is this?”
“Proof,” he said, “of your father’s misdeeds. All the proof that I have. Beyond exploiting the connections to the people that I know, this is the only written proof that there is. It is yours now. You’re free. I’m not going to use it against you. I’m not going to use it against him.”
“Why?”
“Because you don’t have to be with me, Liliana.”
“What about your inheritance?”
“I forfeited it. As did my brother.”
“What...? What’s going to happen with that? What will your grandfather do?”
“That is up to him. I informed him that you left me. He wanted to know why I didn’t simply force you to return, as I had kidnapped you once. I told him that forcing you to be with me no longer appealed.”
“It doesn’t?”
“And I need you to understand that. I need you to understand that I...I have never cared what another person wanted or felt, Liliana. The decision to kidnap you was an easy one. I wanted you, and I saw no reason I should not have you. I just didn’t care what you wanted. I didn’t ca
re if you loved Matías, if you were his lover. It didn’t matter to me.”
He advanced on her, his eyes full of fire. “But when you asked me to let you go at the hotel... I cared. What you wanted mattered to me. And it has, Liliana, for weeks. But that was the first moment that what you wanted mattered more than what I wanted. Because what I wanted to do was chase you down in the streets and haul you back upstairs. To remind you that you’re mine. To remind you that you wanted to be with me, no matter what. But I knew I couldn’t force you, because suddenly your happiness meant more than my satisfaction. It has never mattered to me. I am not one of those altruistic men who avoided connections in order to spare people their darkness. You know I didn’t. I married once, and the fallout was horrific, and still, I took you. Still, I wanted to marry you. And then it changed.”
“How?”
“I don’t know,” he said, his voice rough. “I only know that the moment I realized that, the moment I let you walk away, was both the darkest and brightest moment I’ve had in years. Losing you, letting you go, was hell on earth. But realizing that I could change...”
“Of course you can change,” she said. “Anyone can. We’ve changed each other, Diego. That first moment I saw you something in me changed, and in all the time since, it has only been made stronger. The fact that I was able to walk away from you was a change in me. I’ve spent my life only understanding a strange kind of codependent love. And I... It’s the strangest thing, Diego. But I realized two things. Not only that the way I loved you wasn’t fair to me. But that it wasn’t fair to you. I cannot subject you to a life where my happiness is dependent on you reacting the way I want you to. To every little thing. That isn’t fair. And you’re right. It is me trying to control you to make you safer. To make you easier to deal with. I imagined that it was a giving, selfless love, but it isn’t. It’s just martyrish, and it isn’t fair. You never asked for a martyr. But there I was, more than willing to play the part. And now... I would be okay, if we couldn’t be together. I could stand on my own feet. I would figure it out. I’m going to find a way to not need my father’s money. To not need yours.”