“Fifteen thousand square feet of house. Eleven acres of land. Looks over the Sound. Has its own private beach. No boat landing though. Water’s too shallow.” Ian begins to itemize the features of the property.
“Do I want to know how many properties you own in the city?”
“This isn’t in the city.”
With that, he climbs out of the car and comes around to open the door for me. I step out and into his arms.
“You’re not the only one who is alone in this world. You’re not the only one with dreams that include falling into bed at night with someone by their side. I want a family too, but I want it with you. I can’t give you your mother back, but I can love you as fiercely. Tiny, I love you. Be my wife. Let’s start our own family.”
He doesn’t wait for an answer.
“This place,” he waves his hand. “I bought this because I wanted to settle down, to start a family. I saw it and knew I had to have it. When I saw you on the street that day, I was done for. Kicked in the gut. Whatever metaphor you want to use. I saw you and that was it. I had to have you.”
“This house is huge. It’s way too big for a bachelor,” I say with wonder. I’m trying to process everything, but I feel winded . . . and almost joyful.
“Do you know why I lent the money to the wig shop owner?”
“No.”
He snorts. “Her sister is a realtor. Has been my realtor for years. She came to me and asked me to do a favor. I complied, it worked out. But on the day that we saw each other, I was meeting Margaret to put an offer in on this property. When I saw you, I knew right away that you belonged here and that you had to belong to me. I’ve wanted to bring you here for weeks but figured it would be too soon and you would be frightened off. Like a scared bunny. But you aren’t anymore. Are you scared?”
“I am, a little.” I press my hand against my heart. “How did you survive this at age fifteen? All alone?”
“Because I must have known that someday I’d meet you, fall in love with you, and you would need me.”
He pulls me against him and kisses me then. Or I kiss him. We stand there, our bodies fused together and our mouths expressing all the words that are too scary and intimate to say out loud.
Breaking away, he says, “Your sorrow has weighted you down.”
“But you’re easing it. “
“This is our home. We’ll fill it with happiness.”
“What about Richard Howe?”
“Let it go,” he answers.
“Easy as that? You’ve planned for this for almost two decades.”
“Because I had nothing else, Tiny.” He draws some of my hair back away from my face, dragging his fingers down to my jaw and tipping my face upward—willing me to understand.
Alone, parentless, friendless. The things that powered Ian to go from poor person to billionaire were revenge and hate, but somewhere along the line he was able to let them go.
“It was you, Tiny. Seeing you with Richard made me realize that there were things I could hate more than Howe. Like seeing another man’s hands on you. Seeing you flirt, talk, engage with another man. I can’t have a future if I’m always looking behind. Let’s look forward together.”
“Take me home, then.”
We spend a couple of hours poking around the house. The interior furnishings are a weird mix of old world and ultra modern. “It can all go,” Ian says when I make a face at the black leather sofa situated in the middle of a sky blue reading room.
Outside, the grounds are beautifully manicured, complete with a pool and tennis court. The lawn is so big that it takes us twenty minutes to get to the beach. The waves lap lightly against the coarse sand.
“Mom would have loved it here,” I sigh.
He places an arm around me. “I know.”
On the drive home, I don’t have much to say. I’m drinking it all in. The house. Ian’s declaration of love. His ringless proposal.
Before bed, Ian draws me into the bathroom.
“Let’s take a steam shower,” he suggests. “You can make it smell good. There’s a little thing down here where you pour something in and then the heat makes it aromatic.”
“Aromatherapy.”
“Right.” He rummages around looking for something in the vanity. Triumphantly, he holds up a small brown bottle that looks about five years old. The letters on the label have started to rub off. “Eucalyptus.”
He pours a few drops onto a tiny metal dish only about two feet off the floor and then taps the LCD screen inside the shower. A low humming noise starts and steam pours into the shower space. Soon, the entire bathroom is redolent with eucalyptus. He sits me on the vanity and leans between my legs as we wait for the shower to fill up with steam.
“What do you think?”
“I can’t believe you still have that bottle. It looks like it was sold during the Stone Age.”
“I’m a big collector of things.”
“Am I a thing?”
“No, you’re my heart.”
Right there in the steam filled bathroom, we made love. Not “he made love to me”—that would suggest I wasn’t an active participant, just a receptacle. I kissed, stroked, and licked with every available body part. In his embrace, I tried to show through each touch the truth of my love and that he held my heart, too, although it was bruised. The words I couldn’t say just yet, I tried to express through my touch. Those words were weighted with too much sorrow.
As he carries me, damp and worn out, to the bed, I whisper, “Yes, I’ll marry you and be your wife.”
“Oh, Tiny.” He kisses me again. “You’ll never regret it.”
When I get up, the bed is empty. I hear music downstairs, a woman singing in Italian. Opera. Shrugging on a blue silk robe from the bottom of the bed, I float out. There’s a leather box with a big silver clasp on the table. Ian is leaning against the unlit fireplace with a drink in his hand.
I settle onto the sofa, tucking my legs underneath me, and stare at the box.
“My mother’s things are in there. Her wedding rings, a few pieces of jewelry she hadn’t sold. The clothes and other things I walked away from, but I packed this all up and haven’t ever looked at it again.”
“Do you want me to open it?”
“Would you? Or is it too painful?”
“No.” Even if it is painful, I’d take this for him. After all he’s done for me.