Lost in Paradise: A Sinners on Tour Honeymoon

by Olivia Cunning

  “Everything’s fine,” she called back, frowning at the slimy green roll she set on a paper plate. Maybe if she nuked it the texture would improve—like if she literally obliterated it with an atomic bomb. Having no atomic bombs at her disposal, she stuck the plate in the microwave and watched it spin around on the turntable. The roll began pulsating like some alien slug, snapping and crackling and giving off an even viler odor. Her stomach heaved when she thought about putting that thing in her mouth. Chewing it. Swallowing it.

  Oh God. Seasickness wasn’t going to make her hurl, but ingesting her own cooking might do the trick.

  “Something smells good,” Sed called down.

  “It does not! It smells like ass!”

  “I’m sure it will taste good.”

  She was sure it would taste worse than it smelled. Maybe if she doctored it up a bit with something from the cupboards. She found bottles of ketchup, mustard, and olive oil. There was also flour, cornstarch, and baking soda, but no mayonnaise. She was craving mayonnaise. An explosion in the microwave had her scrambling to open the door. Well, the cabbage roll didn’t look like an alien slug anymore. Now it looked like slimy shrapnel. Bits of meat and chopped vegetables peppered the interior of the microwave.

  “Well, that’s just great.”

  Maybe her mishap was a blessing in disguise. Perhaps heating them up in the toaster oven would be a more successful option. There were still several that hadn’t been eviscerated by the microwave.

  Knowing that Sed was hungry, she cranked up the toaster oven to its highest setting, transferred the rolls to a foil pan, and got to work on cleaning up the microwave while their food warmed.

  “Is something burning down there?”

  Jessica pulled her head out of the microwave. Tendrils of smoke were curling out of the top of the toaster oven. “Shit!”

  She yanked open the door and reached for the pan, cursing as the hot metal scorched her skin. She grabbed a dishtowel and used it to pull the foil pan from the oven and tossed the entire mess into the small sink. The cabbage rolls were a little scorched, but the smoke had come from the juices that had dried to crisp black lakes at the bottom of the pan. The rolls themselves were still edible—she hoped—but she feared they’d never been palatable.

  She moved them onto plates and added the lettuce she’d chopped for a salad. She could make salad. Unfortunately, she’d forgotten to bring dressing or any embellishments, so her salad was lettuce a la carte. “He’s going to divorce me by nightfall,” she muttered under her breath.

  She searched a few more cabinets but didn’t find anything remotely resembling dressing. They did have olive oil, though. It would have to do. Unless Sed wanted ketchup on his iceberg. She also found a couple cans of soup they could use as backup should none of her hard work pay off.

  “Lunch is ready!” Well, as ready as it was going to be. “Do you want me to bring it up, or can you come down?”

  “I’ll lower the sails and come down,” he said.

  “Do you need help?”

  “I’ve got it.”

  While she waited for him to join her, she set their paper plates on the small dining table next to the galley and opened the empty refrigerator. It was starting to get cold now that it had been running for a couple of hours, so she transferred their drinks from the cooler to the fridge, saving two bottles of water to round out their meal. Chocolate milk sounded so good to her right then, but it wasn’t like she could ask Sed to make a quick run to the store.

  When he came below deck a few minutes later, she was poking at her undressed salad.

  “Did you make cabbage rolls?” he asked, removing his life vest before sliding into the booth across from her.

  “If that’s what you want to call them.”

  “They look good.” He lied.

  She cringed. “I’m afraid to try them.”

  “Well, I’m not.” He picked up his fork.

  “Do you want oil for your salad? I forgot the dressing.”

  “It’s fine,” he assured her, but she didn’t believe him. He cut into his cabbage roll with the side of his fork and shoveled it into his mouth. Such a brave man. Someone should give him a medal.

  He opened his mouth and waved his hand in front of his face. “Hot!”

  “Sorry. I think I had the toaster oven up too high.”

  “I mean spicy.” A tear leaked from the corner of one eye. “But good.” He reached for his bottle of water and downed half its contents in rapid glugs.

  “Cayenne.” The recipe had called for it. It was the dill that she’d replaced with thyme. And the ground pork she’d replaced with lean ground turkey. And she’d slipped in some kale for added health benefits. But the recipe had definitely called for cayenne, and she’d added a heaping tablespoon of the stuff.

  “A lot of cayenne,” he said.

  “Sorry.”

  “I like it.” He braved a second bite and chased it with several forkfuls of plain chopped lettuce. “The salad helps cut the heat. Good choice.”

  She still wasn’t brave enough to try the cabbage rolls, but she did stick a lettuce leaf into her mouth, feeling like a rabbit munching lunch directly from the ground. “Fresh,” she said, and snorted.

  “Thanks for cooking, sweetheart.” Sed reached across the table and squeezed her hand.

  “Thanks for pretending it sucks less than it does.”

  “I like it,” he said, subjecting himself to a third bite. His poor digestive system.

  When he started on a second roll, Jessica got brave enough to try a bite. Instantly her mouth was on fire. She spit the bite into her hand and slurped water, which didn’t help tame the fire on her tongue in the slightest. “Oh my God! How can you eat that?”

  “After a while your mouth goes numb.”

  She stood and grabbed his plate. He might be nice enough to eat it, but she wouldn’t subject him to further agony. “I’ll heat up a can of soup for you.”

  “Jess . . .”

  “It’s fine. I’ll do better next time. Now I know that more cayenne isn’t necessarily better.”

  “How much did you put in?”

  He was drinking her water now. Even though he liked spicy food, a sheen of sweat covered his forehead. Inferno food obviously didn’t agree with him.

  “Just a tablespoon.”

  “Are you sure it didn’t call for a teaspoon?”

  “It said T-S-P. That’s a tablespoon.”

  “T-B-S-P is a tablespoon.”

  She bit her lip. That made total sense. She felt like an idiot.

  “But I liked it,” he said. “What I could taste of it.”

  “I suck at cooking,” she said. She tossed his plate into the sink.

  “You’re great at so many things.” He rose from the table.

  “Name one.”

  “Arguing.”

  She grinned and shook her head. “A skill all husbands want in their wives.”

  “I didn’t marry you because you’re a great cook.”

  “Obviously.”

  “I married you because you can do anything you set your mind to.”

  “Except cook.”

  “You cooked.” He kissed her, and her lips burned from the spice on his mouth.

  “I think you could accuse me of attempted murder.” She rubbed at her tingling lips with the back of her hand. “Does your stomach hurt?”

  “If it can survive the stuff that passes for food while the band’s on tour, it can survive a tablespoon of cayenne.”

  “Heaping tablespoon,” she said.

  “So you were trying to kill me.”

  “It wasn’t intentional. I was worried that the ground turkey wouldn’t be flavorful enough, so I spiced it up.”

  “I guess I should expect that. You spice up the bedroom too.”

  She was confident that she could keep their sex life entertaining. At least until she got so enormously pregnant that she became unbendy. Then what use would she be to him?

&nb
sp; She scowled at the direction of her thoughts. She didn’t typically struggle with self-confidence or realizing her self-worth. What was wrong with her? So she’d screwed up cooking their lunch, so what? So she’d temporarily given up her career to join him on tour, help Myrna take care of Malcolm, and incubate Sed’s baby. So what? So her entire self-worth currently centered around making a man happy—what was the big deal?

  That was a very big deal for her, she realized. How could she hope to have everything she wanted—love, career, and a happy family—if she couldn’t even make fucking cabbage rolls from a recipe?

  “Storm clouds are brewing,” Sed said.

  She glanced toward the steps that led to the deck but couldn’t see the sky. “Should we be worried? Can this boat survive a storm?”

  “It’s not the boat I’m worried about. It’s you. What’s bothering you, stormy eyes? Are you sorry we got married?”

  She gasped and grabbed him by both arms. “No, of course not. Are you sorry?”

  He stroked her hair from her face. “How could I be sorry? All my dreams have come true.”

  And part of hers had been put on hold.

  He kissed her forehead and tried to look into her eyes, but she couldn’t meet his gaze.

  “You’re not really upset about putting too much cayenne in those cabbage rolls, are you?”

  How perceptive of him. “I’m a little upset about that, but only because it proves I can’t do everything.”

  “Why do you need to do everything? You’ve got a husband who is capable of pulling his weight. Men can learn to cook too, you know. We’ll learn together.”

  “Together?”

  “That’s what this marriage thing is all about, isn’t it? Being together. Working together. Telling each other why we look like we’re about to cry just because our cabbage rolls are extra spicy.”

  She blinked, but trying not to cry made it harder to keep the tears out of her eyes.

  “Tell me what’s really bothering you, Jess. I’m a big, strong man. I think I can handle it.”

  She took a breath and blurted, “I’m worried that I’ll have to give up my dream of being a lawyer.”

  “Because of the baby.”

  She nodded. “And you. I want to be a good mom, a good wife.”

  “And a great lawyer,” he finished for her.

  She bit her lip, considering his words, and then shook her head. “No, I never want my career to come first. Family is always first, but I do want a career. And it’s hard enough to be a good lawyer when your only focus is learning the ropes. But I have so much more to focus on than learning.”

  “We should have waited to have kids,” he said.

  She’d been so excited to get pregnant, was still excited, and didn’t regret their decision to start a family right away, but yes, the timing was a little off. Babies complicated things. But that would have been true no matter when they brought children into their lives.

  “I think I’d still feel this uncertainty even if we’d waited. Sed, this baby is going to completely change our lives.”

  “For the better,” he said.

  “I agree.” She sighed. “I knew I shouldn’t have said anything. Now you think I regret getting pregnant.” She hated making him think that. She knew how much he wanted this baby. He was always touching her belly and talking to her belly and telling everyone with ears that he was going to be a father.

  “Do you regret it?”

  “Not at all. I just need to figure out how to build a life different from the one I’d been working toward before you walked into my life again.”

  “I’d apologize for ruining your plans, Jess, but I’m not sorry you fell for me.” He wrapped a lock of her hair around his finger and tugged gently. “I’m not sorry at all.”

  “I’m not sorry either. I’m happy we’re together. I’m happy we’re going to be parents. I’m happy your career has taken off and you’re so successful.” But that left her nothing of her own. At the moment, everything she had was part of we. I’m being selfish, she thought. Maybe she didn’t need any part of her life to be solely for herself. Maybe she’d be perfectly content being someone’s mom and someone’s wife.

  “And I’m happy you’re going to be a great lawyer,” he said. “Your dreams are as important as mine are. We’ll make it happen. You aren’t alone anymore. You don’t have to do everything yourself. Lean on me for support. You know I get off on it.” He winked at her.

  She chuckled. She did know that about him. She also knew how hard it was to allow herself to depend on anyone, even her husband. “I’ll try.”

  “We can start by you allowing me to heat up the soup.”

  She hugged him. “I love you. Thanks for listening and not getting mad.”

  “Why would I be mad? You’re allowed to have dreams, Jess. Getting married doesn’t mean you have to sacrifice yourself for my sake. And that baby is going to have two doting parents, not just one.”

  But all of Jessica’s “role models” had taught her that a woman had to give up her identity to be a good wife and to be a mom. Men did whatever the fuck suited their purposes, but women sacrificed. She supposed it didn’t have to be that way. Maybe Sed was serious about their marriage being a true partnership. Maybe he would be an active parent and not lay all the responsibility for raising their kids at her feet. Maybe she really could depend on him to support her as she followed dreams of her own, just as she supported him as he navigated his current success with Sinners and would continue to support him if that success ever faltered. Maybe marrying him was the best thing that had ever happened to her.

  As she gazed up into his striking blue eyes and read the love, the devotion, the care, and the support behind his gaze, she knew that was true. Marrying Sed was the best thing that had ever happened to her. And just as he could support her as she struggled to find a balance between work and home, she could support him as he sorted through whatever had been bothering him since his dad died.

  “I told you mine, now you tell me yours,” she said.

  “What?”

  “I told you what was bothering me, now you tell me what’s been bothering you.”

  He took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “I’d better get that soup on,” he said. “You must be starving.”

  So he still wouldn’t share. She tried not to feel too hurt by his lack of confidence in her. He’d tell her eventually. She hoped. “You’re not my servant,” she said.

  “I know that,” he said. “You’re going to help.”

  She smiled brightly. How many arguments had they had in the past about him serving her? A hundred? A thousand? Had he finally figured out that she didn’t want to be coddled? She needed her independence as much as she needed air. And compromise was a two-way street. She could lean on him if she needed to, just like he could lean on her.

  But would he ever lean on her? It seemed that she was still doing all the leaning.

  She took a deep steadying breath. This marriage stuff was going to take some work, but they could do it.

  They reached for the can opener at the same time.

  Chapter Eight

  Sed scorched the soup. It was Jessica’s fault for having such delectable lips. He couldn’t resist making out with his sexy wife when they had downtime. Waiting for liquids to boil was dull business, especially when she’d finally confided some of her fears to him, and he felt the need to celebrate her rare openness. Not by sharing his own—that would have put an undue burden on her. But he understood that she struggled to depend on anyone, and he absolutely loved that she felt she could lean on him a little. She’d never had someone she could trust to be there for her instead of ignoring her, to lift her up instead of bringing her down, to help her instead of hindering her, to encourage her instead of belittling her. She’d had to endure an absent father and a self-absorbed mother, yet somehow Jessica had risen above the childhood negligence that had alternated with psychological abuse and had ended up a stronger person. Perhap
s she’s a bit too strong, Sed mused. But he was learning how she ticked a little more every day, and he would figure out how to be the best husband for her that he could be. He probably should have started with not burning the soup. Shit!

  “This actually makes me feel a little better,” Jessica said, picking bits of burnt carrot and potato out of her bowl. “At least the meal I screwed up wasn’t out of a can.”

  “Are you saying I suck at cooking more than you do?” He couldn’t deny that fact.

  “I’m saying we both have miles of room for improvement.” She picked out another burnt carrot. “And that our children are going to starve.”

  “We should take cooking lessons together.” He didn’t mind the burnt taste of the vegetables. It gave them a blackened Cajun flair. Or something.

  She brightened. “I’d like that.”

  “Then we’ll see who’s the master and who can’t even make canned soup.”

  “After we learn how to boil water properly, we should set a date and throw a dinner party. Let our friends decide who’s the better cook.”

  He laughed. “We might lose a few friends in this wager.”

  “From food poisoning?”

  “Probably. But I’m in. You know I can’t turn down a good competition. I can use the grill, right?” Because he did know how to grill meat. He just usually rounded out the meal with prepared foods he purchased from a deli.

  “Depends on the class we take. Do you think they have one that puts mayonnaise on everything?”

  He laughed and lifted his bowl to slurp down the dregs of brackish broth at the bottom of the dish.

  “I could really go for a mayonnaise sandwich right now,” she said.

  “I could probably whip you up one of those, if I had any bread.”

  “Or any mayonnaise.”

  “I think I can make mayonnaise from scratch.”

  Her chin dropped, and her eyes widened. “For real?”

  “If you have oil.”

  “We do have oil.”

  “And eggs.”

  Her shoulders sank. “Now I know that I should never brave the wide-open Pacific without a jar of mayonnaise.”