CHAPTER53
TANNER
Iloved watching Larisa’s reactions as I surprised her during our date. It started off at a nice but small restaurant with rooftop seating. We had the whole roof to ourselves, though. There were no people obstructing our amazing view of the city lights on every side of us, and no servers bustled around except for ours.
As soon as Larisa realized it, she turned to gape at me.
“What did you do?” She put her hand on her chest as she shifted her attention from me to the panoramic view. “Why is there nobody else here?”
“I planned it that way,” I said. “Do you like it?”
“It’s way too much for me, but yes, I love it. I would’ve loved it even with dozens of other people here, though. It’s beautiful.”
“It is,” I agreed, but I didn’t look away from her until our waiter guided us to our table. The view was nice, but it was nothing in comparison to the woman I was with.
Pulling out Larisa’s chair for her first, I waited until she had a seat and then I went to take my own. Once I was seated, I looked over the wine list and pointed at a bottle I’d had before. “We’ll have that one.”
She peered over to see which item I was pointing at, and I handed the wine list back to the waiter just a second too late. He nodded and took off, but she gave me a wide-eyed stare. “Are you serious? That’s crazy expensive for something we’re just going to drink. It’s not like you’re taking it home and keeping it for a special occasion.”
“Says who?” I joked, moving my hand across the table to take hers. “As far as I’m concerned, this is a special occasion.”
Her dark eyes bored into mine for a long second. Then a slow smile spread across her lips. “You’re very charming when you want to be, but this is still too much.”
“It’s not,” I said firmly. “You deserve all this and more. It’s all part of my apology.”
She cocked her head, her gaze not leaving mine. Our waiter came with the wine and poured some into my glass for me to taste. As soon as I gave him the go-ahead, he filled up both of our glasses.
Once that was done, he took our order for appetizers and left, and Larisa prompted me to pick up where we’d left off. “Your apology?”
“Yep.” I squeezed her hand. “I missed you, Larisa. I know I’ve said that I’m sorry, but it doesn’t feel like that’s enough.”
“What are you sorry for?” she asked softly, and I could tell she genuinely wanted to know. It was painted all over her beautiful face. She wasn’t just trying to be difficult or to make me prove a point. As if I needed more confirmation of it, she explained. “You had every right not to like the house. There’s nothing in the contract that says you have to love my work. Even if you are partially to blame, your satisfaction with the end result is still on me, and I failed you.”
“No, you didn’t. That’s one of the things I’m sorry for, making you think that I hated it. I really didn’t. I don’t. There were just some things that surprised me at first glance, is all. It took me some time to realize that what you did to it is perfect, even if it wasn’t exactly what I had in mind.”
“What did you have in mind?” she asked.
Fuck. I walked right into that one. I sighed, tightening my grip on her hand just in case she tried pulling away from me once I told her. “Family homes don’t usually have nudes in them, do they?”
“Some do,” she replied so fast that I knew it was her instinctive response. A beat later, realization crept into her eyes and they widened. “Oh.”
“Yep.” I shrugged one of my shoulders, smiling as I looked back at her and stroked my thumb across her knuckles. “Truth be told, what you did was perfect for the guy I used to be even just a few months ago. The design itself is still perfect. I was just surprised that you did it up as a bachelor pad after I told you I was changing, but I’ve realized that I should’ve been clearer about wanting it to be for the more mature version of me.”
“Yeah,” she whispered, still staring at me like she couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “You definitely could’ve been clearer, but there’s not much to change to make it into exactly what you want.”
“Another reason why I’m apologizing,” I said. “I didn’t see it that way at first. All I could see was that you’d done it up as a place to bring girls home to, not a place where one would live. It took me a while to catch on, but I have. I now know that you essentially future-proofed it. You made it a place where I could be the me I am right now with my friends but also a place where I could change some of the basic décor if I ever wanted to move there permanently—or move in there with someone.”
“You caught onto that, huh?” She chuckled and blinked rapidly before she leaned back in her chair and averted her gaze. Her fingertips stayed in mine, though, even if most of her hand had slid out of it as she’d moved.
She fidgeted with her free hand in her lap. Sensing that she wasn’t done speaking yet, I kept quiet and gave her the time she needed. When she finally looked back at me, she sent me a small smile. “I missed you too, Tanner.”
The words slammed into my chest, burrowing straight into my heart and making it soar all the way up to cloud nine. “I’m glad. Are we all good on the house now? Do you understand that I really don’t hate it and that I still think you did an incredible job?”
“I’m not so sure about it having been an incredible job since you’re still disappointed in some of the elements, but I’ll take it as an okay job.”
“No, not an okay job,” I argued. “You delivered the perfect house, especially considering that your client was an idiot who didn’t tell you that he might eventually want to live there with someone else. That’s not on you, Larisa. The house you gave me fits the me I was when I met you like a glove. Considering everything you’ve been through with me, I can’t fault you for not magically knowing how much I’ve changed.”
“Have you?” she asked after pausing for a beat. “I keep thinking that maybe you have, but then something happens and I’m not so sure. Are you sure that you really have changed as much as you think you have?”