Three Simple Words - A Finding Sam Novella

Chapter 5

It was past nine that evening when Olivia stepped out of the suite she shared with Julie who had conked out while reading a spa magazine. She could have watched TV in the other room but she was too restless. So after removing the magazine from Julie's face and setting it aside, Olivia decided to step out of the suite to stretch her legs.

There was also a full moon that bathed the resort in such ethereal light that she had to sit somewhere and admire it. And then there was the heart labyrinth that Josh had built a year earlier, some of its rocks glowing in the moonlight. After assuring the staff that she didn't need anything, Olivia found an empty table in the dining room that faced the window and sat down to admire the view.

During the day, the Rosemary Inn was a beautiful retreat with walking paths lit up by a hundreds of solar lights at night. Although the main building featured private suites and rooms, there were also little cottages like Josh's casita that dotted the property. Some of them could house up to six to eight guests with circular beds that hung from the ceiling and other quirky features. It was a favorite destination for yoga and meditation retreats as well as fans of the local flora and fauna. In the morning, she and Julie were going on a hike with an expert on local plants and herbs. It was an activity that Olivia always looked forward to because it reminded her of her late parents who helped invest in the Rosemary Inn when Helen and Craig took over.

As Olivia's gaze spanned across the landscape in front of her, she couldn't help but stare at the grouping of rocks in the distance. Josh's Heart was how one of the guests called it and she couldn't help but smile.

Was Erik pulling her leg when he told her that Josh had built it for her? And Sam said the same thing even though they both claimed that Josh never said anything to them.

Why would a man build a labyrinth in the shape of a heart, of all things, Livvy? Sam had asked her one night. Men usually build them in squares, rectangles and circles. But, no, Josh had to choose a heart. Why do you think that is? Do you think it's for somebody?

She'd laughed it off then, even though deep inside she did hope it was true. But Josh had never said anything to her that would have told her exactly how he felt. For as long as she'd known him, he was always the ladies' man, ever popular in the South Bay with his revolving door of women. Sure, they'd been close when they were younger and he was the only one who was a fan of her button cookies even then. But Olivia had always liked him. She had even asked him to the prom but he said no even though she knew he hadn't asked anyone at the time. Then she wondered if it was a best friend thing. Maybe there was a code she didn't know about that had Josh ignoring her because he was best friends with her twin brother.

But it wasn't as if she moped the whole time, Olivia thought as she kept her gaze on the labyrinth in the distance. In the middle of her surgical residency in New York, her parents died in a car accident. In her grief, she married the first guy she met a month later, Sebastian Firelli, a charismatic Italian race car driver who swept her off her feet at a party. Who knew that she'd abandon her medical career and move all the way to Italy to be with him, only to end up becoming a widow just weeks after their daughter, Bella, was born? Even with Sebastian's family surrounding her, Olivia could barely remember one day from the next. It took Erik flying to Italy to bring her and Bella back home with him to Manhattan Beach. And he'd been there for her ever since. As was Josh.

Olivia pulled out her phone and tapped his number, her call going to voicemail after a few rings. She slipped her phone back into her jeans pocket, wondering what he was doing now. They used to talk almost every day whenever he wasn't working undercover but that stopped the night he got shot. He rarely answered her text messages and it baffled her. She understood the stress he must have been going through and she wanted to be there for him. But Josh wanted nothing to do with her; he'd made it clear to her the day he called her those awful names and she fled in shame.