Before You

My fucking God, I thought as I gripped the edge of the table.

I didn’t know how it was possible, but Billie was even more gorgeous than the last time I had held her. There was an elegance in her stature, a body that looked healed and so healthy. The beauty in her face made me stop breathing.

I didn’t have to stand or raise my hand to get her attention. The place didn’t have more than six tables, so her eyes naturally fell to me. When they did, it took several seconds before she realized who she was looking at.

Her eyes widened, and her lips parted, brows as high as they could go. “Jared …”

She was across the room, and I still heard her. I still felt the powerfulness of her voice like she was whispering in my ear.

I knew she felt it, too, because she didn’t move at first. She stood frozen at the door, taking me in, a mix of every emotion passing over her face, and I watched it all—the thoughts, the deep breaths, the questions. And then she finally released her lip she’d been gnawing on and made her way over to me.

“Hi,” she said as she approached. “Jared, what are you doing here?”

I rose to greet her and stepped forward, my hand going to her waist. She leaned into my fingers, and I bent down and kissed her cheek. Her eyes closed as my mouth pressed against her skin. I left my lips there for a second longer than I needed to before I returned to my seat.

“Would you like to join me for dinner?” I pointed at the chair she was now gripping with both hands.

With shock still registering on her face, she nodded.

A waiter came to the table as soon as we sat. I’d told him hours ago I was waiting for a woman, and when he joined us, he was smiling.

“Red or white?” he asked.

“Red,” Billie answered.

“Same,” I replied.

She lifted the water glass off the table and took a large drink from it. When she set it back down, she kept her hands circled around it. “I’m so surprised you’re here,” she said, staring at me like I was about to disappear. “How did you know? Or even find this place?”

My cell was in my jacket. I tapped the screen several times, showing her the hand-drawn map. “This made it easy.”

She continued to look at it. “I always wondered if you had texted yourself that picture from my phone.”

I couldn’t take all the credit.

I winked and added, “A little birdie might have helped me as well.”

Her lips lifted into a smile.

Jesus, she was as exquisite as ever.

Content.

Glowing.

It wasn’t Italy that made her appear this magnificent. This was what Billie had looked like before the plane crash. And what she had looked like during the moments we had been together, when I was the reason she had smiled.

The waiter returned with a bottle of unlabeled red that he poured into two small glasses, and then he left us once again.

I held mine into the air, thinking of the best way to approach this moment. “To a dinner that’s hopefully worthy of five noodles.”

She laughed, but I also saw a glimmer of a tear. It wasn’t from sadness. What I saw in those pretty eyes made the grin on my face grow even larger.

We clinked glasses, and she took a drink. When she set it down, she leaned her arms on the table. The happiness on her face dimmed, and there was an even heavier dose of emotion in her eyes. She took several inhales, and then she said, “My father’s flying in tomorrow.”

I’d avoided her father the entire time we were together. And I had crossed the Atlantic without knowing what he thought of me, if he would ever accept me, if Billie would even let me into her life.

But her father was an obstacle I needed to face, and I came here prepared to do that. I just didn’t realize I would get the chance to do it while I was in Italy.

“I would like to meet him,” I said.

Tears leaked past her eyelids, her lips quivering. “You would do that for me? For us?”

“Billie …” I shook my head. “I would do anything for you.”

Her mouth opened, and just as she was about to respond, the waiter placed a bowl of bread between our water glasses.

“Homemade focaccia,” he said, stalling. He looked at Billie as she wiped her eyes. When her hands moved away from her face, all of her emotion was gone, and he said, “Tell me, signorina, what brings you to Venice?”