Chapter ten

"Can I come in?" Christian lingered by the threshold to the master bedroom.

Ana was sitting up in bed, cross-legged, staring numbly at the ceiling. She had already cried all her tears, and there were none left. She turned her head to the side; she didn't want him to see her bloodshot eyes and Rudolph's nose.

Christian sat on the edge of the bed to her left.

"Is he gone?" she asked without making full eye contact with him.

"Yep."

"Did he tell you?"

"About his ex-wife?"

At last, Ana turned to look at him. Seeing the sadness in her eyes, Christian felt a pang of sweet tenderness toward her.

"Yeah, he told me," he exhaled deeply. "I'm sorry, Ana."

"It's not your fault," she said, dabbing her eyes, partly to avoid his direct gaze.

"It's just something people say. What I should have said is that I'm sorry you have to go through this right now when you are most vulnerable. I can only imagine how you must feel being plucked from your homeland and from everyone you've ever known," he murmured softly. She bent her head as if she was going to start crying again, and he scooted closer and reaching over to touch her left hand. His thumb instantly moved to trace little circles on the inside of her wrist.

"What can I do to make you feel better?"

At last, Ana met his gaze but didn't respond. She was really enjoying the magic of his touch. It was sending tiny shivers down her spine.

He suddenly remembered the question he'd been meaning to ask her. "Did your symptoms go away completely...the ringing in your ears?"

Oh, yes. The sonic attack. Somehow it seemed like a century ago. "Yes, they did."

Good. Although he was still planning on making her an appointment with a doctor to rule out any lingering side effects.

"Are you hungry? The pizza is finally here. It seems like the delivery guy was new. Anyway, it shouldn't have taken an hour to get here," he shrugged. "At least we got it for free."

Ana's eyes widened, unable to process this information. Did he say they got the pizza for free? That just didn't make any sense.

"But why?"

"Why what?"

She shook her head and removed her hand from his touch to run her left hand through her hair. "Why would they give it to you for free?"

Christian shrugged. It was such a basic and complex question. "That's just how businesses work here in America. It's the one hundred percent satisfaction guaranteed service model. If a product or service is not up to a certain standard, then the customer receives a full refund."

Ana shook her head again, even more, baffled. "But what is this 'certain standard' exactly? And a full refund is not the same as getting something for free."

"I guess I didn't explain that right. The standard can be arbitrary. What it really means is that the customer is always right and if he or she is not satisfied for whatever reason, then he doesn't have to pay. In the restaurant business that often means the customer get compensated somehow with another similar item or getting the item for free."

"But...It seems to me restaurants would be losing more money? I mean, how can they afford to stay in business with so many customers getting their food for free?"

Christian let out a chuckle. "Believe it or not, the number of unsatisfied customers is a small number... small enough that businesses can absorb the loss."

"But people can take advantage..."

"Yeah. There will always be freeloaders

, but they're still a minority."

"But how could they be a minority?"

"They just are," Christian said. He was starting to get a bit frustrated. Ana was questioning things he'd just taken for granted and forcing him to think deeper. She'd been living with him less than 24 hours and she was forcing him to re-evaluate his life to the most basic levels. God, it was as if he'd been sleepwalking all his life.

Ana really disliked his answer. It really didn't help her understand how things worked any better. In some ways, she was back at square one. So, in America, you get things for free if you're unhappy?

The idea was absurd.

"I used to run my own business back in Cuba, I sold homemade yogurt," she said in an attempt to prove to him she was no dummy, she knew about economic business models. She even took a couple of business courses in high school.

Christian nodded, recalling that bit of information had come directly from Raymond Steele when he hired him.

"I don't think this one hundred percent business model would have worked for me... I would have lost more money than I earned."

He cleared his throat. He didn't have any more to add to this conversation. Plus he was starving. So he rose to his feet and offered her his hand. "Pizza is getting cold." She took his hand and let him pull her up to stand next to him. They stood inches apart. She looked down, and he lifted her chin with his finger.

"I hope you're feeling better...from earlier?"

She nodded, and unspoken agreement passed between them; that they would enjoy each other's company, for now, postponing any serious conversation about the potential storm involving her father. And together, hand in hand, they walked back to the kitchen and sat down to eat at the kitchen island.

"So what do you think?" He asked after she had her first bite of the Hawaiian pizza.

"It's...kind of good."

"Are you saying that because it's the polite thing to say or because you really like it?"

Ana exhaled. "Okay...hmm... maybe it would taste better without the pineapples?"

"Take them off then," he said good-naturedly, and she smiled. He was relieved to see her carefree smile as she plucked the pineapples off and ate with gusto. He didn't know why, but her happiness mattered a great deal to him at the moment.

They talked for a little while they ate and then, most unexpectedly, he grew a bit serious. "Tomorrow morning I'm going back to work. That means I will be home until a call comes in from the police station or the courthouse saying they need me to track down someone who's jumped bail. I have to be ready to go at a moment's notice. I don't work weekends though."

Ana nodded. Tomorrow was Wednesday. She was about to open her mouth to comment when he beat her to it as though he'd been reading her mind.

"I guess this calls for a trip to the grocery store," he murmured with a small smile which she instantly reciprocated. He exhaled deeply, coming to the realization that there was still a lot Ana needed to learn. She also needed clothes and a phone. And a car. The list seemed endless.

LATER

Ana was used to shopping in modest mom n' pop stores. Stepping into a big supermarket chain store was overwhelming, to say the least. The size of the store and the sheer amount of merchandise on display made it hard was hard to process. She found it hard to shift her focus fast enough to take everything in. Every couple of steps, she stopped to check out something, attracted by the bright, alluring packaging.

Realizing this, Christian did his best to move quickly through the store and steer her toward getting the basic items on their list only. Later over the weekend, they would come back for a couple of hours and look at things in greater detail. They stopped the longest when selecting cooking oil, cereal, coffee, and cooking spices.

Ana couldn't believe there was an entire aisle dedicated to breakfast cereal. Back in Havana, making choices was easy as there were two or three choices per category. If she ever came here by herself, she would need to spend hours and still find it difficult to make up her mind. Luckily, Christian knew exactly what he wanted. He selected his favorite cereal plus three other ones for Ana to try. Ana shook her head no, no. She didn't need three boxes of cereal. She would be happy to eat the same cereal as he. By now, he'd learned that Cubans don't have cereal for breakfast and that Ana was used to getting by with just a piece of toast with her coffee first thing in the morning.

Two and a half hours later they were at Escala.

Almost as soon as they were back, Ana busied herself in the kitchen, and Christian took the opportunity to catch up on everything he had missed while he was in Cuba. Sitting at the kitchen island, he fired up his laptop and surfed the internet. He still needed to catch up on everything he'd missed while he was in Havana and hadn't even come close to reading to all of his emails. He needed to prioritize. Predictably, there was one from Ray Steele inviting Ana to dinner tomorrow night at a restaurant. The invitation mentioned it was a chance for her to meet Chloe, and it clearly stated it was just the three of them. Christian gritted his teeth, he was clearly being excluded.

He glanced up at Ana. She was busy in the kitchen cooking, and she was clearly in her element. So he decided against mentioning the email. It would only stir up feelings of unhappiness; he wasn't looking to ruin their quiet, restful evening together.

"How is it going? You have everything you need?"

"Yeah. I just finished with the beans and rice," she murmured while slicing a green plantain into thin slices. She put a heavy skillet on the stove and started heating the oil.

"That's an awful lot of oil," Christian said, looking over his laptop.

"Tostones are fried in deep oil," she replied, smiling.

"Can I help you with anything?"

"I'm okay. I just need to add a pinch of salt."

Christian got up and fetched a salt shaker for her. "Here you go."

Their fingers brushed when he handed her the salt. Christian stared deeply into her eyes, and she immediately lowered her gaze and threw herself into the task at hand.

Christian watched her prepare the tostones. After the oil was boiling hot,she heated the slices for about three minutes. At the end of the three minutes, the plantains were lightly browned and soft but not mushy. She then removed the slices with a spoon and let them cool for about a minute. After that, she smashed the plantains into flat rounds. This time she fried them for another three minutes until they were crisp and golden brown. It wasn't until then that she sprinkled them with a dash of salt.

"We need to wait until they cool down a little more."

He nodded. "How about the beans and rice?

"The rice will take another ten minutes, but the beans could take as long as three hours."

Christian whistled. "I don't know much about cooking, but I've heard of pressure cookers. They reduce cooking time in half."

"I've never used a pressure cooker."

"I guess I will have to get you one."

She smiled. "We can have the tostones as a light snack before our meal," she suggested casually.

She looked so eager for him to try her tostones, he didn't have the heart to refuse. She served him a couple of slices in a small plate. He grabbed a slice with his hand and popped it in his mouth. Hmm. These were actually quite good. Unlike the ones he'd tried at the restaurant in Havana, these were not as salty. They made a really good snack.

Seeing the expression on his face brought joy to her eyes. She gave herself permission to serve herself a couple of slices and eat them. Christian was happy to see her having an appetite; unlike every woman he'd ever known, she really needed to put on some weight.

"I grew up having tostones at every meal," Ana said happily. That had all changed when she got arrested. After that, their choices had been more limited, and they could no longer afford the same luxuries.

"We'll have to save some for our meal then," he said his body naturally leaning closer to her. They were standing close to each other next to the stove.

"Don't worry, we have plenty," she said even as she reached back to start another batch of plantains. Except these were not green but ripe plantains. She explained that the ripe plantains would be soft, mushy and very sweet.

They waited another six minutes for the second batch of plantains to cook. Christian stayed put, knowing that his proximity was making her nervous. But he really couldn't help himself. To help her relax a little more, he glanced over at the plantains and pretended he was really interested in watching the cooking process.

He took a bite of the ripe plantains and she stared at his mouth as he savored the sweetness slowly. "These are really good," he said, licking a bit of stickiness off his fingers. "Thank you for making them."

Watching his lips, Ana felt her pulse spike like crazy.

"Aren't you gonna have some?"

At once, Ana put a slice of the second batch in her mouth. He was right. These were pretty good. She honestly couldn't tell them apart from the ones back home. She was acutely aware of him watching her intently as she chewed. Desperately needing something to do, she reached to double check the stove was turned off even though she didn't need to.

"Wait," he said, his arms on either side of her now, trapping her between him and the counter. There was a sliver of sweetness still trapped on her lips.

She held her breath as he leaned close, her face inches from his own. "Christian," she gripped the counter behind her, watching his eyes darken. "What are you doing?"

He grazed the side of her mouth with his thumb, showed her the trace of mushy sweetness he swept away and brushed it across her lower lip. Her tongue slipped out to blot the sweetness, and he watched her in utter fascination.

Ana didn't remember consciously moving closer and yet, she found her left thigh pressed against his right one, and her palm rested on his chest. She tried to swallow, but her mouth was too dry.

"Relax, Ana.

"Christian..."

"Yes?" He murmured against the side of her neck, his warm lips setting off sparks of excitement. "This can't happen."

"Hmm...you sure about that?" He murmured with a hint of amusement in his eyes.

She closed her eyes as he nipped her lobe. Want and panic battled within her. To let him continue was asking for trouble. There was no way she could rationalize this and justify going against her principles, the honorable principles she'd been brought up in. It was a code of honor she couldn't break. She'd already done it once when she agreed to marry him. The fact that they were now married did not mean theirs was a union blessed by love.

With a gentle finger, he lifted her chin, tipped her face up, and placed his mouth over hers. He teased her lips slow and deliberate, testing, and then tasting as she responded. One hand curved down her back and the other skimmed the curve of her hip. Want surged under his touch, and she pressed herself against his aroused body.

As he drew in a shuddering breath, filling his lugs with her, Ana shifted minutely creating this amazing friction between them. Her nipples hardened, and her body throbbed.

Christian continued to kiss her with passion mixed in with tenderness, and Ana continued to shift her body, increasing the friction between them. Her breath hitched, she needed more. Christian groaned against her lips, and she stretched herself toward him, bringing her hips against his. For a moment, she felt a burst of pleasure down there that shocked her, and then she was shocked to realize she was pressing herself shamelessly against his erection.

….