"Well, that's embarrassing."
"Why?" he asks, looking genuinely curious.
I frown. "I've never... um... lost control like that. I've never done anything so impulsive or reckless in my life."
One corner of his mouth goes up in a sexy smile. "Sounds like you haven't been living at all."
"I wouldn't say that."
"What would you say?"
I think about it for a moment. "I've been... responsible."
"I rest my case."
I snort with laughter and then instantly color with embarrassment at the less-than-ladylike sound. "I'm guessing you do that kind of thing often?"
"Fuck women on the bow of my yacht?" I nod.
His answer doesn't come as fast as I assumed it would. In fact, there's a moment where his expression ripples. Is that anger I see? Or resentment?
Whatever it is, the emotion is negative. That much I'm certain of. It makes me doubly regretful for asking.
"I'm sorry," I say quickly. "It's none of my business."
He shrugs. "I know it's easy to assume things about me, but not every assumption is true."
I nod and drop the subject. When the silence stretches on, I start to feel like somehow I'm intruding on his space. Like the invitation he extended to me has now been rescinded.
"Should I go?"
"I don't see why you would."
I'm surprised by how relieved I feel when he says that. I lean back against my lounge chair and stare up at the stars. The wind off the water is biting, and I want to go retrieve my uniform. But I don't want to disturb the fragile sense of comfort that sits between us now.
"They'll be wondering where I am," I blurt out. "Everyone at the wedding, I mean."
"Probably," Anton says with a nod.
"I don't know how to deal with... everything."
"Then don't."
I turn to him. "What do you mean?"
"Why do you owe them anything?" he asks. "You're the hurt party in this. You don't owe anyone any explanations."
"Maybe not Dane and Salma. But what about everyone else?"
"Fuck everyone else."
I nod like that's something I could believe in, but in all honesty, it feels impossible. I try to imagine what my life would look like if I could think that way. If I could worry about myself and no one else. More and more, it seems like the right way to move through the world.
"Can I tell you something I've never told anyone before?"
He nods solemnly.
"My father cheated on my mother," I say. "When I was fifteen. She stayed with him."
He just looks at me, not judging, simply observing.
"I don't know why I just told you that."
"Maybe you're trying to tell me that you didn't want to be like your mother," he suggests.
"I don't," I agree. "I just... I don't want to make the same mistakes she did."
"You didn't make the mistake, Jessa," he says confidently. "He did."
"What about you?" I ask. "Do you make mistakes?"
Anton laughs. "Do I look like I ever do anything I don't intend to do, Jessa?"
I blush. "No," I say. "I guess not."
There's something about him that I can't quite put my finger on. He's confident and brash, though I can see the broodiness Molly mentioned, too. But up close, it's clear that it goes deeper than that.
Anton isn't just broody in, like, a James Dean or Adam Driver kind of way. It's more. There's a darkness inside him, vast and untouchable.
That terrifies me.
"Everyone in the kitchen will be wondering where I am," I mention.
"Let them wonder."
That seems to be his response to everything. Anton doesn't owe anyone anything. It must be nice to feel so un-indebted.
"Can I ask you a question?"
"Go ahead."
"Why did you stop to talk to me at the beach?" I ask.
He shrugs. "You intrigued me. It's not every day you see a beautiful woman in a wedding dress sitting by the beach looking completely miserable."
All of that, and my mind catches on the word "beautiful." "Pitiful" is more like it. For all I know, he's reading off a script he's used to scoop heartbroken brides off the beach again and again.
"Why did you offer me a job, then?" I ask. "You didn't have to do that. You didn't know anything about me."
"I trust my instincts. They're good. Usually."
I stop short, taking note of the dry voice and dark expression with which he adds the last word.
"Usually?"
He gives me a belated smile. "Sometimes, recklessness has consequences."
I feel a little shiver run down my spine. This time, it has nothing to do with the cold. His words make me wonder.
Is he offering a lesson... or a warning?
5
ANTON
I can tell by the way Jessa is watching me that, this time, I'm the one who has intrigued her.
But she is so far from the world I occupy that it feels cruel to drag her into it. Bringing her on board tonight will have to be the extent of my self-indulgence.
"Have you ever been engaged?" she asks, fishing for more information. "Or married?"
"Once," I say without specifying which. "She's gone now."
"Gone?"
"She died. A few months ago."
"Oh," Jessa gasps. "I'm so sorry. How, uh... how did she pass?"
It's almost amusing how delicately she's trying to tiptoe around the subject. As if I'm not intimately familiar with death.
"She took her own life."
She pales. Her plump lips part. It's enough to make me hard all over again. "Oh God," she breathes.
"I'm so sorry."
I wipe my face of any and all expression. "It is what it is."
"That must have been devastating."
I glance at her. "Do I look devastated?"
The question takes her back. Or maybe it's the coldness in my face when I say it. For a moment, I think I've succeeded in frightening her.
Then she surprises me.
"You seem like the kind of man who doesn't express your emotions no matter how deeply you feel them."
I chuckle. "Interesting analysis."
"Am I right?" she asks. Her golden eyes catch the moonlight as they turn to me.
"Trying to figure me out, are you?"
She nods. "I just want to know if you're as scary as you seem."
I smile. "Scarier."
She considers that for a minute and then grins. She thinks I'm kidding.
If only she fucking knew.
