The Chemistry of Love(97)

How different this night might have been if his stepmother hadn’t basically tried to poison me.

Closing the door quietly, I went out into the hallway. I was close to the stairs when I realized there was something under my feet. I blinked a couple of times. It was red rose petals. Everywhere.

Like someone had murdered the host of The Bachelor in the hall. I heard a noise, and I turned, expecting to see Marco.

But it was Craig, coming out of his bedroom.

“I wanted to talk to you,” he said. “I heard you get up.”

“At three in the morning?” That seemed kind of creepy.

He came closer to me. “Let’s cut to the chase. I know that you have serious feelings for me. That you might even be in love with me.”

What? How? What?

“Had,” I corrected him. “And I was seriously mistaken.”

He tried to reach for my hand, but I pulled away from him. “Don’t you think we should explore this?” he asked.

“With your sweet fiancée in that room right there? In the middle of what I can only assume was a romantic gesture on your part?” I asked. “Catalina was right about you. You are the tooliest tool ever.” She was also right about him being a cheater. There would be no living with her after this.

“Leighton understands how things are.” He moved closer again.

I saw a shadow approach us. Marco.

Immediately, I thought of how this must look. Like I had some secret midnight rendezvous with his brother. That I was making out with Marco in the library and then meeting up with Craig late at night. Craig didn’t know that Marco and I weren’t really together. Craig was willing to cheat on Leighton, and it must have looked like I was willing to do that, too.

It was going to make Marco think less of me. My heart pounded hard as I realized how scared that made me. His opinion mattered so much to me.

“I’m going to get a drink,” Marco said in a neutral tone, and I was too afraid to offer to go with him. Because honestly? I felt a little like I had just cheated on him, even though nothing had happened.

And never would.

Marco silently walked past us. I wanted him to make eye contact with me so that I could show him nothing was going on, but he didn’t. He went downstairs, and when he was safely out of earshot, I said to Craig, “Leighton deserves better.”

“So does Marco,” he snapped back, and his shot was true and lodged itself right in my heart. That was painful.

And correct.

I went back into the bedroom and curled up on the bed, waiting for Marco to return. I wanted a chance to explain. To tell him how my feelings had changed. That I wanted him, not his brother.

But then I went back to the place I always did—my fears and insecurities. Just because Marco was nice and liked kissing me didn’t mean he had feelings for me. What would he do when I told him?

If I told him. Despite my earlier decision, I didn’t think I could go through with it. I wouldn’t risk losing him. He was too important to me.

Catalina was right. Given enough time, I would talk myself out of almost anything.

I was broken, not sure how to mend myself or my relationships. I didn’t know how to navigate a conversation with him where I was messy and vulnerable and myself. Science had rules. You followed them, and things turned out the way they were supposed to. But I didn’t know the rules here. How to keep Marco in my life, even if he didn’t feel the same way that I did.

That was my main fear. That Marco could never love me like I loved him. And him saying that to me, that would destroy me. Utter destruction, laying waste to my heart and soul.

I didn’t know what to do. And I hated this feeling. Not sure how to move forward, not able to go back. Just stuck.

While I was still wrestling with my choices, trying to figure out the right thing to do, I wound up falling asleep.

The next morning, I woke up to him coming out of the bathroom. His expression was flat.

“Marie-Angelique called last night. There’s an issue with one of our suppliers. I’d hoped that it would work itself out, but it hasn’t. I have to go back to California today.”

“Oh. Okay.” I thought of how awful I must have looked and tried to pat my hair down.

He seemed so serious, so unlike my Marco. This must have been what Catalina had initially been referring to, when we first started talking about him. I’d never known this guy. Was this solely about work? Or did it have something to do with Craig and me last night?

Was he jealous?

That was a good thing. It meant that there might be something else there.

“You’re welcome to stay,” he said.

“No, I don’t want that. I want to go back. With you.” There was zero chance I was going to stay in the Kimball house without him.

This seemed to surprise him. “Good. Well, get packed. The car is going to be here in about twenty minutes.”

That wasn’t enough time, but I was eager to put all of this behind me. Maybe when we got back to Los Angeles, things would go back to the way they were. Not entirely as they were, because I didn’t want to forget about that kiss in the library, but I did want things to be easy and comfortable between Marco and me again.

But that’s not what happened.



Marco was polite but distant the entire trip home. In the car, on the plane. He dropped me off at my grandparents’ home and didn’t even get out to say a proper goodbye to me.