Chapter 8 - The Unspoken Confession|
The interior of the lakehouse was warm, filled with the deep smell of cedar wood and old paper. A stone fireplace dominated the main living room, overlooking floor-to-ceiling windows that faced the misty water.
I lit a fire in the hearth while Alina stood near the glass, watching the yellow leaves float across the lake surface.
I walked up behind her, stopping a few inches away, feeling the delicate warmth radiating from her body.
"I hated lilies, Alina," I said softly, breaking the quiet.
She turned around slowly, looking up at me with a confused expression. "What?"
"Six months after we were married," I explained, looking into her dark eyes. "You replaced every flower arrangement in our Evanston house with white roses. I never told you why I hated lilies."
Alina looked down at her hands, a faint blush creeping up her cheeks. "Your old housekeeper in River North mentioned it to me once. She said your mother’s funeral was filled with white lilies, and every time you saw them, your face went cold."
My heart squeezed tight in my chest.
"You remembered that?" I whispered.
"I remembered everything, Dante," she said softly, looking up at me with a tear-stained gaze. "I remembered that you like half a teaspoon of brown sugar on Sundays. I remembered that you sleep on the left side of the bed because your shoulder aches from an old college injury. I remembered... because I spent three years studying the man I loved from across a silent room."
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Tears spilled over her lashes, tracing down her pale cheeks.
"And every single day," Alina sobbed, "I thought you were wishing I was someone else."
