I don't know about Harry, but I hadn't been back to the Malibu house since Nora and I moved out. We still paid for the landscaping to be kept up, and of course, Maria made her weekly rounds, but other than that it was a ghost house full of memories.
Even pulling up through the gate made me smile, and Harry absolutely had it right when he asked me to meet him "at home". This was the first place I ever had that felt like home to me, but I guess it had nothing to do with the ocean view or the perfect architecture. It was just Harry that made it feel that way.
I parked right next to his Lamborghini and snatched my overnight bag from the passenger seat to take inside with me. It still smelled exactly the same, like mahogany and spice, which absolutely baffled me. I almost had to stop there in the entryway and just take it in all over again.
"Harry?" I called out, dropping my bag over by the stairs.
He called back to let me know he was in the kitchen, so I made my way down through the living room and around the corner to see him cooking at the stovetop. He had his white button down on still, a baby blue dish towel tossed over his shoulder. Why was he so hot when he did anything remotely domestic?
"Hi," he shot me that smirk as he turned one of the burners down and pulled the towel off on his way to greet me.
"Hi," I smiled right back as he leaned in to kiss me. "You look amazing."
He laughed the way he does to make me feel like a little girl with a crush, taking in my outfit. I kind of loved that he knew what I was wearing underneath, and I think he loved it too. "You look perfect like you always do."
I accepted his secondary kiss before he started guiding me toward the open back patio, where the dining table was set for us. He had me sit down and squeezed my shoulders as he kissed my neck and told me he'd be back in a second.
The breeze coming in from the ocean was something I definitely missed, and the air just smelled different here than in Beverly Hills–like salt and summer. It was also just quieter, like you could almost forget you were in one of the most populated cities in the world.
Harry returned a couple of minutes later with a plate of my favorite pasta dish that he makes, setting mine down before his. He ran back inside to grab the bread and wine, mumbling something about how it was okay if I drank it now since I was still baby-free.
"I can't believe you did all this," I said.
He scoffed as he sat down across from me. "Why can't you believe it?"
I laughed at the look of genuine offense on his face and in his tone. "No, I just mean...you've been so busy and this is a big gesture. I really appreciate it."
"Well, I'm never too busy to do something nice for you," he spoke casually as he raised his glass to mine. "You deserve it."
As we started eating, I told him how everything went at the rehab center, and he seemed pleased to hear that John looked better already. He even smiled when I told him that Nora drew him a picture to keep in his room.
"I'm sorry I gave you a hard time about it earlier," he said. "It's important for him to know that he has support right now."
"Careful, Harry," I sipped from my wine. "You almost sound like you care about him."
"I don't care about him. I care about you, and you care about him."
"Right," my smile softened at his correction, twirling the pasta around my fork to have another bite.
I didn't have much else to say about my day, so Harry started to rant to me about the drama that was happening in London, about how Liam is starting to get on his good side ever since he saved me that night, how Zayn has been considering asking Claudia to marry him, but when I gasped so hard that I almost choked, he told me I wasn't allowed to say a word.
