The thing no one tells you about dying is that your life doesn’t flash before your eyes like you’re watching a movie. There’s no white light enveloping you while bucolic scenes scroll by—you on a bike with your dad, you at the park with your mom, your first kiss, first time, the last time you felt truly happy. Not when you can’t breathe.
Instead, your life closes in like a pinhole camera, tighter and tighter as you try to cough up the small bone that’s lodged in your airway. Your hands go up reflexively to your throat like you’re trying to choke yourself out, and all you can think is not like this as fear floods through your body.
But it doesn’t end like this. Not this time.
Because Oliver is the hero of this chapter.
Right before it feels like I’m going to pass out, he bounds around the table and grabs me from behind, his hands on my solar plexus. Then he pushes in and up until the bone dislodges, and poof, I can breathe again.
I take in three slow, ragged breaths, and the camera lens widens.
The entire cast is standing in front of me.
—Harper with tears on her cheeks.
—Allison and Emily clinging to each other in shock.
—Guy standing at the ready to do something—who knows what.
—Shek with his phone to his ear, trying to explain to the emergency operator in broken Italian that I’m not going to die after all.
—Connor and Isabella standing hand in hand with expressions I can’t read. Connor’s might be relief, but it might also be joy; I don’t want to spend too much time thinking about it.
And finally, Oliver, whose hands are around my waist, my back pressed against him. It feels so familiar to be in his arms that it dissipates the fear and makes it feel like a memory.
“I can’t believe that worked,” Isabella says, with wide-eyed wonder.
“Thank God for Oliver,” I say, but I shouldn’t have said anything at all, because his hands loosen and then he moves away from me.
I shiver and hug myself. I almost died. I was just about to die, but Oliver saved me.
All this talk of Connor’s death, and it was my life that ended up on the line.
That tracks.
“You’re okay?” Oliver says, stepping in front of me. His dark eyes are unreadable, but the tone of his voice is one I know—a mix of dread and hope.
“I’ll live. Thank you.”
He pats me on the shoulder, then rounds the table back to his seat. His chair was toppled over in his rush to get to me, and he picks it up and rights it.
If only we could be put back together so easily.
That’s a pipe dream, but his action is a clue to the others, and they disperse to their seats as I sit down.
“What’s the next course? Not fish, I hope,” Allison says as she smooths out her napkin, and everyone laughs.
Shek raises his glass. “Told you we should’ve stuck with pasta.”
“Pasta’s coming,” Guy says. “That’s guaranteed.”
I feel a rustling next to me. Connor is inspecting his plate, poking around it with his fork.
“What are you doing?”
“Checking for evidence.”
“Of what?”
He lowers his voice. “You know what.”
“You think that fish bone was meant for you?”
“You are sitting next to me.”
I feel that quiver again, the one telling me that there might be real danger here.
But no, that’s impossible, because—
“You can’t kill someone with a fish bone.”
“Weren’t you the one about to die?”
I raise my hand to my throat. “Not on purpose, I meant. It was an accident.”
“There have been too many of those. The car, the Vatican, the mugging, you. Come on, you must see it?”
And the thing is, I do. I see where he’s coming from, even if I can’t make it add up to attempted murder. But I’m also sick of it.
I almost lost my life, and now I have to listen to how it was probably his fault?
Fuck this.
I throw my napkin down. “I think I’m done.”
“Weren’t you the one saying that we should enjoy the dinner?” Allison says dryly.
“Yes, well, since I’m the one that almost died, I think it’s my prerogative to call it quits.” I stand. “Feel free to finish without me. I’ll see you all tomorrow.”
I don’t wait for anyone to respond; I just push my chair back and go.
I take the path around the kitchen into the main section of the restaurant, scanning the room for Cathy because she’s the last person I need to see right now. It’s full: couples at tables, families fighting over the bread baskets, laughter, smiles of pleasure. As I walk through it, I feel apart from it, and maybe it’s just the lingering effect of almost dying, but it feels like more than that.
Because—what if Connor is right?
What if the next attempt on his life is successful?
What then?
“Hey,” Harper says, “wait up.”
She catches up with me at the door, and we exit together. Outside, in the still air, the paintbrush trees reach toward an inky, starless sky.
I still feel winded and sick.
And then Oliver walks out the door.
“Hi,” I say.
“Hi.”
“You didn’t have to leave because of me.”
“I know. I wanted to.”
“Why?”
“Because I … It didn’t seem right, just acting normal, after what happened.”
I feel the same way. That’s always been the good and bad about us—how similarly we think about so many things. I’ve missed it, our connection. I wish I knew how to get it back. I wish I could believe that his interest now isn’t only because he had to save my life.
“Where to?” Harper asks.
“Hotel?”
“Mind if I walk with you?” Oliver says.
“Of course.”
“You do?”
“No, I meant, of course, join us.”
Harper squeezes my hand. “I forgot my phone. You go ahead, I’ll catch up.” She releases her grip, then disappears into the restaurant.
Now we’re alone.
“You believe that?” Oliver asks, watching her go.
“Not for a second.” I rub my midsection gently. It feels like there’s going to be a bruise.
“You sure you’re all right?”
I look up at him. He’s so handsome in the half-light from the streetlamp. I want to reach up and brush one of his curls away, but that would be a mistake.
Because what if he flinches?
What if he moves away before I can even touch him?
The possibilities for humiliation are endless.
I close my hands into fists at my sides. “Thank you, Oli, for saving me.”
“I wasn’t going to watch you die.”
“I know, but thank you anyway.”
He smiles gently. “You want to get a cab to the hotel?”
“No … I know this is going to sound crazy, but I think I’m hungry.”
He tips his head back and laughs. “You know what, me too.”
“Should we get something to eat?”
“You think it’s safe?”
“I think the chance of me almost choking to death twice in one night is pretty low.”
“Good point.”
“There’s a place around the corner. Harper and I had lunch there yesterday.”
He holds out his hand. “Lead the way.”
I walk ahead of him. It only takes a minute to get there, and before we enter, I text Harper to let her know where I am.
“You still love pasta?” I ask him over my shoulder as I pull open the door.
“Who doesn’t love pasta?”
Good question. Only, before this trip, I hadn’t eaten pasta in two years. It was hard to do it in LA, surrounded by model/actresses and menus full of arugula salads and steamed fish. That first plate of pasta I had yesterday was like a sexual experience.
“Every diet plan ever.”
He makes a face. “You don’t need to be on a diet.”
“You’re sweet.”
I step to the woman behind the check-in counter and raise two fingers. She says something in quick, flowing Italian, then leads us to a cozy table in the corner with a white tablecloth and an actual candle flickering in a small votive glass.
We order a bottle of the house red, and she hands us each a menu. There are four main courses on it—the four Roman pastas64—plus salad and dessert.
Oliver puts down the menu and glances around. Half the tables are full—a mix of tourists and locals, by the looks of them. It feels cozy and romantic.
Maybe I should’ve picked somewhere else.
Oh, I definitely should have.
“Nice place,” he says.
“Harper found it.”
He smiles. “What would you do without her?”
“Excellent question. Though I think I’m about to find out.”
“Oh?”
I sigh. “After this trip, I think she’s done.”
“With what?”
“Being my assistant. This life. I think I am, too.”
A waiter comes to the table—his apron crisp and his white hair thin—and I order the amatriciana. Oliver gets the same and a Caesar salad to share. The waiter pours us each a large glass of wine from a decanter, then leaves.
Oliver raises his glass and clinks it against mine. Our eyes lock in the candlelight, and that inner monologue starts up again.
Only this time it’s got sense memories attached.
—How soft his lips were when he used to kiss me.
—The way his fingers felt as they traced slow circles on my skin.
—The way it felt when I fell in love with him. How it was wonderful and terrifying all at once, because Connor had broken my heart and betrayed my trust.
I didn’t think I could survive that again.
Turns out I could. Knowledge I’d rather not have.
Oliver tastes his wine and smiles. “Can I be honest?”
“Of course.”
“This is better than that fancy restaurant wine.”
I taste mine. It’s rich and light at the same time. “Right?”
“So what did you mean, before? About you being done, too?”
“With the Vacation Mysteries. The next book is going to be the last.”
“Why?”
I lift my eyes to his. They’re a deep brown, and I’ve always gotten lost in them.
“Because I want Connor out of my life. Once and for all.”
The waiter arrives with our food. He places the salad in the middle with a pair of tongs, and sets our pasta dishes before us along with some delectable-looking bread dripping in olive oil and rosemary. We thank him, and then he leaves.
“He’ll never be out of your life,” Oliver says, reaching for a piece of bread.
“He will. When I kill him, he’ll be gone.”
Oliver nearly chokes. “What did you say?”
“I’m killing him off.”
“Oh, I thought…”
I twirl my fork in the pasta. “That I was going to murder him for real? The thought had occurred.”
I take a bite, and the pasta is everything I hoped it would be—the umami of the tomato and the spicy guanciale mixing perfectly.
“I’ve fantasized about it,” Oliver says.
“You’re not the only one, according to him, but him dead in the book should be enough for my purposes.”
“He really thinks someone’s trying to kill him?”
“Apparently.”
“Why?”
“He’s been short on details…”
“So unlike him.”
“Yes, that’s the only thing that makes me think it might be real.”
“Hmmm,” Oliver says. “And you ending the series—you think he’s going to let you get away with it?”
“Harper said something similar, but what can he do?”
“You know I hate the man, but he’s resourceful, I’ll give him that.”
“He can’t make me write about him.”
“Have you spoken to Stephanie or Vicki?”
Vicki is my editor. “No, not yet.”
“They’re not going to be happy.”
“I know.”
“What if they won’t publish you again?”
“I’m okay with that.”
His mouth twists. “Really?”
“I’m fine financially … and let’s be honest, a final installment where Connor dies will probably sell like gangbusters.”
“You so sure they’ll agree to publish it?”
This stops me. It hasn’t occurred to me that they might turn the manuscript down. “Maybe not. I’ll have to see once I write it.”
He spears a crouton. “So, how are you going to do it?”
“Not sure yet.”
“If you need help…”
I catch his eye. “We’re talking about in the book, right?”
“Literary murder. Not literal murder.”
“Exactly.”
He takes a beat, then smiles. “Well, I, for one, can’t wait to read all about it.”
AMALFI MADE ME DO IT—OUTLINE
WHY?
WHERE?
TO DO
Correct quote: “The play’s the thing / Wherein I’ll catch the conscience of the king.”—Hamlet, Act 5, Scene 2